There was a passing comment from one of our esteemed Roarers, The Barry, the other day that got me thinking.

The passionate Bulldogs fan said: “It has been a pretty dark decade. Before this run, the longest the Bulldogs had been out of the semis was two years. I grew up thinking premierships were a way of life. I’ve learned a lot about being a fan over the past eight years”

I’ve gone through many stages of fandom over my relatively long life.

I started in the Brisbane competition supporting the Redcliffe Dolphins. To be a Dolphins supporter was to know deep in your gut that you were going to compete in finals virtually every year, but that the legendary 1965 Artie Beetson-inspired premiership was to be the only one.

From my earliest memories in the late 1970s through to the BRL’s last hurrah in 1987, Redcliffe always had plenty of money and plenty of talent (often poached from other clubs), but the footy gods always had the last laugh, including a Souths Magpies try on the siren in the 1981 grand final to wreck Artie’s swansong season.

Twenty-two years of nearly good enough bred an interesting type of fan. We were always confident of winning or at least competing in every game, but learned not to care too much.

I saved my victory dances for State of Origin. Every Redcliffe fan was used to wayward goalkicking, dropped ball at crucial moments, or just rotten dumb luck, year after year.

At the same time, as a blissfully unaware eight-year-old I chose Canterbury-Bankstown as “my team” in the Sydney competition from 1979, purely on the back of Steve Mortimer and The Entertainers’ fabulous run from fifth to the grand final, before ultimately losing to St George.

Jumping on the Bulldogs wagon was a joy. Within 12 months Steve Gearin was taking his remarkable catch to score in the 1980 grand final.

The Dogs of War arrived just as I was hitting my teenage years and success was an expectation.

Rugby league Immortal Arthur Beetson.

Then in 1988 as a loyal Queenslander I jumped on the Brisbane Broncos.

Boasting a State of Origin level roster, with all sorts of bling, attitude and blanket positive media coverage, it was easy to get used to winning.

Five premierships by 2000 and sticking it up the arrogant southerners. In 1997 we effectively started our own competition!

There was a small lull in the early 2000s, but 2006 reminded us that we supported a powerhouse. Plus, my second team, the Bulldogs, were not too shabby either.

The angst and fatalism of my Redcliffe years was washed away by entitlement. Between the Broncos and Bulldogs I had been a part of 11 premierships between 1979 and 2006. Being a fan is dead easy!

And then, the years ticked by. Brisbane are now heading towards two decades without a title. The Brisbane fans are still entitled, but years of failure has led to recrimination, coaching turnstiles and angst.

Fans compare players unfavourably compared to past legends when the clubs benefited from, shall we say, a fairly loose salary cap era. Luck has also played its part and the footy goods reminded me that no fan can expect victory.

From Darren Lockyer’s broken cheekbone, to Melbourne’s last gasp preliminary final try to Ben Hunt’s dropped kick-off, I was back in my Redcliffe era, but I’d had the acceptance trained out of me by decades of lording it over all comers (“St George can’t play!”).

Humility and taking the little wins are not in the wheelhouse of a Broncos fan, or a Dogs fan for that matter. Parramatta fans still haven’t learned the art despite having had plenty of practice since 1986.

Then came the Anthony Siebold years, and this is where I learnt to laugh at my own team. It is a coping mechanism to expect disaster so failure doesn’t slice you open and any success is a pleasant surprise. But it all felt like a comedy as the players still acted like kings of the jungle when they were anything but. I started to … miss games.

But now I am enjoying a new type of fan experience. As my Dolphins re-entered top flight footy I’ve learned the joys of being the underdog, the annoying little brother. Wins are savoured so much more when they are achieved through honest toil and creative development to make a silk purse out of a Dolphin’s ear (do dolphins even have ears?).

A group of journeymen, cast-offs and hopeful youngsters have led to more passion on my part than I’ve had for years. Losses are forgiven based on effort. Wins are celebrated because deep down, you don’t know when the wheels are going fly off.

I no longer care about winning the whole show, I just want eighth, is that too much to ask? Oh, plus beating the Broncos, I’ll have that as dessert.

So, the type of fan I’ve become has been shaped over the years by the clubs I decided to support. And it has changed over time as fortunes have waxed and waned. And I’m not sure whether fans like me shape their clubs or the clubs’ identity influences how their fans engage with them.

Here in Brisbane, the Dolphins have branded themselves as scrappy, with a sense of humour to contrast against the Broncos media juggernaut. We don’t take ourselves too seriously and we are reasonably kind to our players and coach if they show they are working hard and not getting big heads. And we are always, always nervous. One injury, a one percent drop-off and we are toast.

Broncos fans expect to win, and they think every player who makes first grade for their team is a future superstar. They never accept that other sides may have more talent and they will savagely turn on their team for “not turning up” if they dare to lose. Because how could they lose with 17 superstars?

Parramatta fans are just angry, all the time, at fate, at Peter Sterling for ageing, at pretty much everything.

Souths supporters expect every other group to bow to their superiority as a fan base, since they are the “pride of the league”.

Ben Hunt. (Photo by Bradley Kanaris/Getty Images)

Manly fans get a kick out of being despised. How they must loath the pity currently flowing their direction.

Newcastle fans are tough as nails and working hard is a badge of honour. Talent is secondary to having a solid crack.

The Warriors fans love a big hit and a flick pass, but they are sprinters, not distance runners. And yet the team is now shaping the fans, as they embrace the more reliable and repeatable success of the Webster era.

So does the team shape the fans? Are Panthers fans fundamentally different in attitude to the 2018 vintage? What about the long suffering Dragons? Would a fan transported from 1962 even recognise their club?

I’d selfishly like to think that we fans have more power than that. Redcliffe is not the most glamorous of cities.

Supposedly a beach lifestyle, but traditionally it’s been as far away from the Bondi latte set as you can get. it’s just a little bit daggy, a bit rough around the edges and certainly filled with a sense of humour.

And that, I believe has seeped into the ethos of the team. We are bit daggy – Felise Kaufusi, what were you thinking with that haircut?

We are slightly rough around the edges. Josh Kerr isn’t packing into scrums discussing his latest wine tasting evening and Kurt Donoghue is the very definition of loose cannon.

And we have a sense of humour. For evidence see Jamayne Isaako and Kodi Nikorima’s secret post-try handshake. See also Jack Bostock proving he can count to four on his way to the tryline and then showing that’s as far as his schooling got by dropping the ball over the line on try number five. And we can of course go back to Kaufusi’s haircut once more. And then there is Dwayne Bennett.

So what kind of fan are you? And are you that way because of the team you support? Or does a team reflect the area they come from and fans that support them?