Because there’s stability of ownership.
Nostalgia is form of psychic defence mechanism: the inexorable attachment to the mistaken belief that things in the past were better gives us mental shelter from the awfulness of the present. Thanks to the internet – where all new technologies are pioneered by pornography, popularised by hipsters and then polluted with presenile reminiscence by the middle-aged public – nostalgia is better than it’s ever been. For football fans, in whom nostalgia rises to the level of a mental disorder, it’s doubly so.
And thank God, because without it I’d have to care about Alan Pardew nearly headbutting someone. I’d have to have an opinion about the remarkable success of the Southampton youth academy. I’d have to give real thought to Demba Ba. And why would I want to do that when I could be thinking about Ian Culverhouse?
The Ugly Game 