Rupert Metcalf: Fans of other clubs are helping to raise spirits at Home Park

Sometimes it takes what passes for a crisis in the world of professional football to deliver a potent reminder of what can be good about the game.

Times have been hard at Plymouth Argyle during the past year, with the team and the club tumbling from one disaster to another on and off the field of play.

The Pilgrims have plummeted to the very bottom of the Football League, the club has spent most of 2011 in administration, and – worst of all – Argyle's staff have been forced to endure month after month without seeing much or anything at all by way of wages.

The club's employees have carried that burden for practical reasons. They have been well aware that, if they had decided against agreeing to salary deferrals, the likely outcome would have been liquidation for the business, and thus no chance of seeing any back pay.

The staff have also soldiered on for less hard-headed reasons. They care about the club, and they want it to survive. They have not marched alone.

Supporters of the Pilgrims have risen to the occasion time and time again in the club's year of need. Thanks mainly to the organisational efforts of the fundraising group Green Taverners, Argyle Fans' Trust and the Internet message board PASOTI, money has been raised during the year to help the staff cope with the hardships they have had to grapple with.

This weekend, the involvement of football supporters in the campaign to prevent Argyle vanishing from English professional football is being broadened by the involvement of fans of other clubs.

Fourteen years ago, when Brighton and Hove Albion seemed to be in similar danger of closure, a teenaged Argyle fan by the name of Richard Vaughan came up with the notion of supporters from clubs across the country converging on a Brighton home game to show solidarity for the beleaguered Sussex club.

That duly came to pass, and Brighton fans are returning the favour today. After watching their side take on Leeds United last night in the Championship, some of them are heading for Plymouth to watch Argyle take on Macclesfield Town in League Two at Home Park this afternoon.

Followers of other clubs are also due to come and watch the Pilgrims in action today as part of the "Fans Reunited" plan of action, while there has also been a campaign to urge fans who cannot tear themselves away from their own teams to wear green in support of Argyle this weekend.

Brighton supporters were also planning to demonstrate their backing for the "Green Army" during their televised game against Leeds last night.

Their efforts this weekend, along with the determined campaigning by Argyle fans to save the Pilgrims and the painful sacrifices made by the club's staff, have demonstrated that, despite the catastrophic failings of the occupants of the Home Park boardroom in recent years, there is still reason to believe that football can raise spirits in even the bleakest of times.