​I thoroughly enjoyed Gavin and Andrew chatting on the pod after the Foundation of Light’s fixture release breakfast and chuckled when they said that all these matches were on a Saturday at 3pm – except they’re not. They’ll be all over the place. That got me thinking about the whole fixture-setting process and its impact on football supporters, which brings me to what may become a bit of a rant. When you get older, though, and your memory is still functioning (to a degree!), these are the inevitable musings on whether things were better back in the day.A further impetus for these considerations was the fact that I slowly developed an increasing interest in local non-league football. For a while, I could only manage the occasional visit to the Stadium of Light or an away League Cup game, so I was persuaded to go along and watch Workington AFC (Workington Reds), which slowly became a bit of a habit. Life has changed now, and I can get across to the North East more regularly again, but I still go to watch the Reds whenever I can, don’t miss many home matches, and fit in the odd away day.AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementMy reason for talking about non-league football is simple – fixtures are set in the summer and that is that, unless, of course, there is a cup clash or bad weather. I appreciate knowing that the match will kick off at 3pm on a Saturday or 7.45pm on a Tuesday.And that is exactly how it used to be when I first started going to professional football – Roker Park at 3pm on a Saturday or 7.30pm on a Tuesday. It was even quite a change when evening games began to kick off 15 minutes later in the 1990s! The status quo was soon to change, although it might surprise some people that attempts were made back in the 1960s to show live football with altered kick-off times. Deals were struck, broken, and fans had to make do with highlights programmes instead.Tyne Tees Television was actually the first regional broadcaster to show highlights (of North East football only) in 1962/63 in the programme Shoot. It aired on a Sunday afternoon. Sadly, I can still remember the theme tune.AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementThe demand for live televised football grew steadily following England’s success in 1966 and various deals were made. There was even an experiment with pay-per-view broadcasting. The popularity of live football rose quickly, particularly throughout the 1980s, resulting in a huge rise in the value of television rights.The BBC showed more live FA Cup games from the third round onwards, while ITV covered live league games on Sunday afternoons. Then everything changed in 1992 with the birth of the Premier League and its deal with Sky. Football no longer belonged solely to the FA or the clubs.And the fans? Does any media mogul or senior football executive really care about the fans? It seems to me that supporters were left behind in all of these negotiations, yet without them the product is undoubtedly diminished.It is i