April 25 2002

Crystal Palace

Well another season bites the dust and Doctor Jamesey gives advice to a depressed football fan...

Dear Doctor Jamesey,

At around this time of the year I always get all sorts of unsettling and unpleasant mental and physical symptoms.

I am at a loss to think why this should be. I sink into a depression, accompanied by a profound lethargy. I snap at my work colleagues and family for no reason, and am quick to find fault with anyone who crosses my path.

I find it difficult to sleep and when the alarm clock rings it is equally difficult to get up. Although I am normally an even-tempered person I shout at my dog for no reason and push the cat off my lap when she jumps up to be stroked.

In general my health starts to improve in mid-July and by mid-August I am usually my old self again.

Do you think you could help me? I sometimes fear that my spring moodiness will alienate all my family and friends and that my long-suffering wife will leave me.

Oddly enough the only years recently when this condition did not occur at the end of April were 1996 and 1997 although it arrived as severely as ever by the end of May.

Rodney Eagle, SE25.

Dear Rodney,

There are several clues in your letter - your name, postal address and some of the dates you mention - which enabled me to instantly diagnose your problem as FWS (Football Withdrawal Syndrome).

It is a common illness among the male population as the football season ends and the unfortunate victims look ahead to weeks of football nothingness.

It is not usually so acute in World Cup or European Cup years as sufferers have those tournaments to look forward to in May and early June.

However the idiocy of playing this year's tournament in Japan and Korea and kicking off games at totally ridiculous times for Europeans is bad news for FWS victims.

I take it from your name and address that you are a Crystal Palace supporter and can tell you that the reason FWS struck late in 96 and 97 was because your team was involved in the play-offs, thus extending the season by a few weeks.

There is no medical cure for FWS but you can take certain measures to alleviate the worst symptoms:

* Build up a video collection of your team's televised games and replay them on Saturday afternoons.

* When symptoms are really chronic, jump on a train to Selhurst and walk along the Holmesdale Road, trying to imagine you are accompanied by thousands in red-and-blue shirts.

* Eat lots of rancid cheap burgers and drink lashings of Bovril.

* Go to as many friendlies as you can in July. OK, it's not much fun traipsing over to Carshalton, Crawley or Whyteleafe to watch a Palace eleven get beaten by a paunchy collection of mechanics, postmen and electricians but it's better than nothing.

* Don't forget you can always visit all the Palace web-sites, especially the best of them all 'The Holmesdale Online', where you can read comment, news, statistics and chat with other FWS sufferers on the chat boards.

Doctor Jamesey

Email Jamesey with any of your comments to Jevans3704@aol.com