About

Villa Park, the Trinity Road Stand, block C8, row 8, near the tunnel; the seat I occupied from August 2003 until May 2012. That bit of blue plastic is the place I'd be every other weekend for nine years. I've sat through sun, rain and even snow. I've watched dismal defeats, boring draws and the occasional emphatic victory. And in that seat I've enjoyed some of the most amazing experiences of my life - Aston Villa 6-4 Blackburn Rovers and the subsequent pitch invasion tops the list so far. Ever since I was six years old, sitting at the front of the upper Holte End watching my boys in claret and blue beat Wimbledon with my Villa-mad mum, I've loved football. And over the years I've gradually decided that I want to continue to be involved in football. My weekends at Villa Park have inspired me to try and enter the world of journalism. So while the title of my blog might not be necessarily relevant, or indeed neutral, it's fitting in the sense that without my seat by the Trinity Road Tunnel, I probably wouldn't harbour ambitions to be a sports journalist right now.

I say harbour ambitions. In some ways I am already a sports journalist, and in some I am not.

I am, because as well as a relevant first-class degree, I've got approximately two years of work experience in the world of football club journalism, and counting.

Yep, I want to be the one who writes the content in a matchday programme that half of you will never read, or find the latest way to make you all cringe from your team's Twitter account, or stare at footballers eating their lunch in the hope that one of them will throw me some cliches about the weekend's game.

In fact, I can't think of anything I'd rather do for a living.

But I'm not a sports journalist, because I'm not doing that. I'm not employed in journalism, I'm making my degree and student debt all worthwhile by working in retail. Since I'm not anonymous I won't reveal where or in what particular area of retail but I will say that for every day I have to catch a bus at 6.30am, part of my soul is irrevocably eroded away.

Anyway.

What exactly does a sort-of sports journalist do with their life?

Well, when I'm not earning pittance in a vain attempt to stay out of my overdraft, I'm watching non-league football and helping out at my local club, putting on accumulators that never come in, and judging football clubs on their media output and coming up with my own ideas as if I am important.

Oh, and applying for jobs. I seem to do a lot of that.

In about 12 months I've applied for what feels like every club journalist job going and have reached the interview stage five times. Four times I have failed, while one occasion still carries a glimmer, a slither, an atom of hope for the future, but I won't know about that for a while yet.

Each rejection has been accompanied by very nice and encouraging feedback, for which I am grateful, but no one has ever told me I'm doing something wrong, because, well, I'm not. I'm actually quite good.

So right now, with no current vacancies around and three days a week of being viewed as nothing more than a dumb peasant who can just about operate a till, I have decided to kick-start Trinity Road Tunnel. I am hoping a) it will stop me from losing my mind entirely and b) maybe tempt any potential future employers to make it sixth time lucky due to the fact I am showcasing my wonderful writing skills and uber-sharp wit. Ha.

Until then I shall remain sidelined, a captive of the substitutes bench along with all the other unwanted media graduates.

Before you go, if you'd like to see any of my published work, go here or if you want to befriend me, you may do so on Twitter or LinkedIn.