A few years ago, I was standing in a bookshop idly flicking through a copy of something I was never going to buy. Through the shop window, I saw a familiar face walking past. A worryingly overweight middle-aged man, the kind of person that, if you don’t see them for a while and then find they’ve lost twelve stone, you can’t help thinking they’re either on the Mounjaro or terminally ill.

He plodded from side to side rather than perambulated forwards; he was in grey jogging trousers which were a little too short and a sweatshirt which seemed to have a ketchup stain on it. His trainers were of an indeterminant brand from a sports shop for people who don’t play sports.

He was a prominent member of the professional world I work in, responsible for hundreds of people and billions of pounds. I’d only ever seen him in a suit where he had respect and authority, here he was, on a weekend, looking like he’d just been released from prison.

Weekends are an opportunity to drop the pretence of your work-self. I’m reading Racket by Conor Niland, the memoir of a mid-ranked professional tennis player. He talks about how he learned that while playing he could only show an accepted range of alpha-emotions – he could never be tired or bored, just angry and vengeful – nor could he acknowledge that another player had played well as that showed deference. It’s the same as work, we live in a claustrophobic shell which we’re released from at the weekend.

Football is one of the great vehicles for this release and away days, a micro-adventure few at work know or care about, maybe its greatest articulation. There are others, of course, but riding a horse or being spanked by a dominatrix doesn’t have the same appeal. Those are the three weekend options, right? I can’t think of any others.

I’ve always had a soft spot for West Brom, it was only yesterday that I realised why. When I was five or six, we had a school assembly. A member of the school football team – men in my eyes, no older than ten in reality – stood at the front wearing the threadbare school kit of yellow shirts and black shorts. The headteacher said he had some exciting news and invited another of player to walk through the door from the back of the hall. He was wearing the new school football kit of yellow and green stripes; I was in awe. It was almost identical to West Brom’s traditional away kit, which has become a constant reminder of my first ever kit reveal. On putting these fragmented memories together, I slipped into a melancholic reverie.

We negotiated our way around the ground, past the notable number of vendors selling pork-based products – hot dogs, scratchings, pulled. It was like each kiosk had taken the bit of the pig they needed and passed it onto the next. 

We shuffled through a turnstile as wide as a credit card, into the small concourse and a sea of faces. I suffer from a very mild, self-diagnosed form of prosopagnosia – face blindness. It may be real, or maybe just because I’m always staring into the middle distance trying to figure out what to do next, which, as a middle-aged man, is usually a tactical trip to the toilet. Through the crowd leapt Jonny Biscuits and Gingermoods, fellow participants on the Oxblogger Podcast. We chewed the fact, compared notes, plotted and enriched. Our debate over whether Leicester and Southampton would represent new grounds, having been to the old ones, was more enjoyable and investigated with more detail than we discuss how to spend £100,000 at work.

We concluded, because there was a mere 45 minutes to kick-off and we had to get to our seats which were approximately two minutes away. Through the crowd, someone called my name, it was Dan ‘Teams Like Oxford’ Freeman of the Behind the Badge podcast. We’ve met on Teams a couple of times, but we rambled on about our shared history following the club, away days and parking woes. It was like group therapy. All while in the background another group were loudly failing to squeeze ‘De Keersmaecker’ into the song Tequila by The Champs.

It took 30 minutes to get to the toilet before we headed into the bowl of the stadium for the main event – although in many ways, it felt like it’d already happened.

Rowett dropped Will Vaulks in preference for Nik Prelec, it seemed an odd choice for an away game, like he was plucking at the narrative of disquiet around the Hawthorns towards their manager Ryan Mason. Equally, it worked at Bristol City. The hope, perhaps, was if we could start positively, we’d drag them into their bleak introspection.

But even a listless West Brom are going to be a challenge and they quickly set about dominating territorially. With Prelec needing to track back, rather than Vaulks sitting looking forward, we seemed to lose momentum. Not that they threatened particularly, nothing above the usual sharp intakes of breath when an opposing player appears to be free.

The second half got better, turning the screw a little, having the ball more. We’d taking the wind out of their sails. Just before the hour, the ball appeared at Shemmy Placheta’s feet and for once he had space to run. After Millwall he used the phrase ‘I’m the kind of player…’ Which is what many people misunderstand about the Placheta. He’s the kind of player who runs and tries to animate, you can’t expect him to be another kind of player. 

He unleashed his prodigious pace and centred to Lankshere to tap home, it seemed so simple, the plan had worked. The Hawthorns crowd grew restless, we could now let the cacophony of perturbation inflame. We needed Rowettball ramped up to twelve for a few minutes to let the brooding rumble to a roar.

It took two minutes, Johnston and Stiles immediately attacked down the left outpacing Sam Long, Stiles’ cross was parried by Jamie Cumming, the ball popped up onto Greg Leigh and into the net. 

It was a calamitous mess, but one which speaks to the unspeakable; it’s not just the new players, who we feel less connected with, who should be under scrutiny, Cumming, Long and Leigh – all play-off winners – were all at fault, and it wasn’t the first time this season.

The second felt inevitable and the kind of goal you’ve seen scored a billion times before at this level. Well worked, well taken, but it should have been the equaliser, not the winner.

Again, we weren’t overrun, if there’s a criticism, it was that maybe Rowett tried to play the game inside Ryan Mason’s head rather than on the pitch, but the performance wasn’t as bad as the phone-in would have you believe.

Last season we often played at the margin between wins and losses, accumulating just enough to see us safe. This season we’re at the same margin, but by trying to be more progressive, we’re falling on the wrong side. It’s a quandary without an answer, and nobody should pretend they have one, ridding ourselves of Rowett won’t make it go away.

There are 30 games to go, we’re not in the relegation zone and we have a transfer window to make adjustments, equally at least two teams below us should have the firepower to get out of trouble although there’s still time for teams above to fall apart. Gary Rowett now has a couple of weeks to think about his next move and whether to put us back onto a relegation fighting footing. In theory, there’s plenty to worry about.

But worrying misses the point, it’s recalling the past of my school days and the present of the game that counts. Whether we end up next season playing Burton or Birmingham, West Brom or Wycombe, the same people will be there sharing the same goal. Days are slow but life is quick, and when you keep that in focus, relegation worries evaporate and in its place comes a higher, clearer purpose.