Supporters and Rivalries
The main area of Carlisle support can be found within and around Carlisle itself and, due to being the only professional football club for a long distance, it attracts fans from across the county of Cumbria, South West Scotland and parts of West Northumberland. The club's supporters are known as the Blue Army. The most vocal supporters on match days reside in Brunton Park's Warwick Road End, known affectionately to the fans as 'The Warwick.' In addition to generic English football chants Carlisle's supporters sing Proud to be a Cumbrian, Super Carlisle from the North and an adapted version of Peggy March's I Will Follow Him.
Carlisle's traditional local rivals are Workington, however the west Cumbrian club have not featured in the Football League since 1977 and consequently competitive matches between the two teams are extremely rare. Prior to 2008 the club's nearest professional football club was Gretna F.C., who at one time played in European football thanks to the financial input of Brooks Mileson (A United supporter also, who once tried to buy United). The club were residents of the Scottish Football League however and therefore the chance of meeting in competitive competition remained highly unlikely. The club was eventually liquidated in 2008.
In 2004 market research company FFC surveyed fans of every club across the country to find who they consider their main rivals to be. Carlisle United fans were shown to consider Middlesbrough as their main rivals, followed by Hartlepool United.
They also in the past shared a historic and, at times, fierce rivalry with Preston North End. Although there is some 80 miles separating the two clubs, clashes between Preston and Carlisle have often broken out into violence. One of the most recent encounters between the two clubs was on Boxing Day 2011 where Carlisle fans lit flares in the Deepdale away stand and threw toilet paper and various other objects onto the pitch.
Read more about this topic: Carlisle United F.C.
Famous quotes containing the word supporters:
“The opposition is indispensable. A good statesman, like any other sensible human being, always learns more from his opponents than from his fervent supporters. For his supporters will push him to disaster unless his opponents show him where the dangers are. So if he is wise he will often pray to be delivered from his friends, because they will ruin him. But though it hurts, he ought also to pray never to be left without opponents; for they keep him on the path of reason and good sense.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)