And there it is. Relegation, finally confirmed.

The thing most of us had accepted by Christmas – the quiet, sinking realisation that there was no way out of this mess – finally happened last night at Cardiff. With a whimper rather than a bang. Where we needed moments of clarity, Jaheim Headley and Ben Waine could only give us moments of comedy. However, the fact we lasted this long – 43 games – and that Northampton and Rotherham fell before us, is testament to Jon Brady and the work he’s done since January. He dragged us forward long after gravity insisted otherwise. The damage, after all, had been done long before we stepped into 2026.

Of course, hope kept rearing its ugly head. It always does. It is hope that keeps us going, and hope that kills us. It holds all the cards. It burned itself into my soul with every win, every time a result briefly disturbed the ruthless logic of the table.

Albert Camus – the great French philosopher – argued that living without hope, without appeal, without illusion, is the clearest way to experience our meaningless existence. His absurd hero refuses false consolation; he stares reality down without flinching, without bargaining. The problem here though is simple. Where football is concerned it just doesn’t work. Camus’ permanent metaphysical revolt collapses completely under a floodlight. And Camus was a football fan. He should have known this.

Football exposes a huge flaw in Camus’ philosophy of absurdism, and deep-down I’ve always known that. Always. I just never quite had the courage to say so out loud. You can’t really take one of the most captivating philosophies of the twentieth century and brush it aside with a throwaway, Vale-related observation. It feels disrespectful. But I could have done it. Thirty-odd years ago, I could have stood up in that lecture hall and said, “Port Vale have proved to me, on countless occasions, and beyond any reasonable doubt, that it is impossible for one to live without appeal,” and that would have been that. Degree earned. Done and dusted. The trouble is, nobody wants to hear that kind of thing. Least of all from a Goldenhill stoner already with a lifetime of grudges against the footballing gods. So I kept quiet. I didn’t say it. I bottled it. Big-time.

And this is what I know to be true: football and hope cannot be separated. Even though I knew, four months ago, that relegation was our fate, hope clung on to the bitter end. I dreamed of miracles after the win at Peterborough; I entertained them again after the draw with Wigan. Even when Ben Waine missed from two yards out last night, hope didn’t die gently. It had to be cornered, pinned down, turned into an unavoidable fact before it finally let go. Supporting Vale offers no escape from this – nowhere to run, nowhere to hide.

We’ve witnessed a dreadful league campaign. There is so much to dissect if we were inclined: Darren Moore still in the job until 27 December, his post-match interviews, his formations, his substitutions; the silence from those running the club; those dreadful 150th‑anniversary scarves; the wilful surrenders against Bolton, Stockport, Huddersfield and Wycombe. I could go on – but I won’t. We all know the failures. We all know who’s responsible. There’s nothing left to be gained by wallowing in that particular swamp.

I’m leaving the negativity here. Filing it away. Keeping hold instead of those fleeting moments that lifted the soul – those happy-beautiful interruptions. Arsenal in the League Cup. Sunderland at Vale Park. Stamford Bridge glowing like a fever dream. Hernandez gliding down the wing. Ethon Archer’s free‑kicks cracking the air. Proof that beauty didn’t entirely abandon the season despite strong evidence to the contrary. These flashes don’t redeem the campaign – of course they don’t – but they justify enduring it. They are the reason we watched. The reason we will keep watching.

And here’s something worth considering.

Relegation closes one loop. And then the mind does what it always does: it opens another.

The season ticket.

Of course, we indulge in the performative ritual. “I might not renew. Why should I?” Everyone does it after a relegation. We’re compelled to join the dance, to strike the pose. But much like a junkie contemplating the needle, we know exactly how this ends. We can tell ourselves we’re done, that this time we’ll walk away and stay clean. But deep down, we know full well what’s coming. The season ticket gets renewed. We’ll be back at Vale Park in August, ushered in by a new season and the same old pull. There is no cure.

And so it begins. First comes the retained list – who stays, who’s done enough, who’s offered another year (Hernandez, please!), who isn’t even granted that courtesy. The quiet exits. Contracts expiring without ceremony. The ones we’re desperate to see the back of. The ones we cling to, hoping they’ll fancy the fight. Then the speculation. Names thrown around forums and socials. Players who “know the level”, players who can “step up a level”, players who “fit the system”, strikers who can score goals, goalkeepers who can do what goalkeepers are supposed to do, someone “comfortable with the ball at his feet”, “decent in the air“, “box-to-box”, “likes to ping it around”. Bring it all on. Incoming bodies. Fresh optimism. Recycled hope.

Then the fixtures. Scrolling through that new list, hunting for the away days – the proper ones. Crewe. Walsall. Shrewsbury. Grounds you know. Grounds you’ve half‑forgotten. Grounds you’ve never set foot in. We’re going to York. New corners of the country to tick off. New pubs to discover. Seaside towns that briefly become central to your life. Games immediately dropped into calendars, circled, planned around. Life rearranged once again around Vale.

There’ll be a kit reveal too. Home and away. A photo shoot. A slogan. A video. A knowing nod to history that we’ll argue about endlessly online. Of course, the new kit won’t be as good as this season’s absolute beauty. No chance. It can’t be. Not unless we’re getting the 79/80 Adidas kit exactly as it was – or was that 80/81? I can’t remember. It doesn’t matter. It won’t happen. We’ll buy it anyway. We always do.

And threaded through all of this is hope. The thing Camus told us to reject, but which Vale keeps smuggling back into our lives. Jon Brady’s black-and-white army regrouping, recalibrating, carrying our scars into League Two.

Another loop opened. Another season waiting. Keep the faith. Keep hoping. No matter how much misery they inflict upon us Vale will always, eventually, give us something wonderful back. Something to keep us pushing through those turnstiles.

Fin.