November 22. Dr. B. R. Ambedkar Stadium. Delhi. It’s that time of the year. Tamchon Memorial time. Around  10 minutes past 12 noon. The electric scoreboard mounted to my left read SSPP 0 – 2 TSFD in ominous red. Another dream of glory terminally ended. Another fruitless year witnessed. The last time I was here, it had ended in victory. An inconsequential victory. That dream had ended a few days earlier at the Jesus and Mary College grounds on a cold and misty winter morning. The sun was out today. But the dream died. Another inconsequential victory is in prospect. Or who can say with certainty it won’t end with further misery on Saturday?

With defeat comes that same old feeling. Of disappointment, inadequacy, anger and so many more emotions. It seems any negative feeling you could have rises to the surface. The smiles and the laughter of the morning felt like a hundred years ago. One of the fans there with me moaned, “I’m done with this heartache every year. I won’t come next year”. But he knows better. He knows he’s not the only one feeling this way. And you know what? He knows he will return and so will the others.

What is it with following football, or any kind of sports for that matter, that so resonates with the human psyche? Even more than the players, it is often the spectators, the fans who seem to be more affected by the outcome of matches, by the fortunes of the teams or the players they are supporting. It’s like each one of us is living a cherished dream vicariously through them. And when the passion flows, a victory is never just a victory. It is much more than a match won. It is heaven ascended. And a defeat feels like getting a brush with death, its cold, clammy hands wrapped around the body and soul for days to come till a victory takes away the sting.

However, victory or not in the game on Saturday, it won’t take away the pain of missing out on another chance to finally make a mark at this ever-increasing-in-stature football tournament. But for a semi-final berth two or three years earlier, SSPP FC is yet to make the type of mark on the competition that its support has thoroughly deserved. And having vociferously stood behind the team since Tamchon’s inception, only a winner’s trophy can erase the memories of failure and disappointment that they have been made to endure. So is this remedy achievable? Yes. Can they achieve it? Now, that’s the question on everyone’s mind after yet another exit in the opening stages of the tournament. One that only Time can answer.