Some articles sum up a hockey season. Others can make a town want to do something with it.
For us, Christian Gustafsson's column in Barometern OT on 23 October belongs to the latter category. He sees the shortcomings. Above all, though, he sees a team worth doing something for.
We welcome that.
Not because CG should agree with GLID INTE. Not because we need a newspaper column to endorse our ideas about signings. But because one of the sharpest writers in sports journalism, in our view, writes with a conviction that can make people beyond the already converted listen.
We do not need to be competitors
We and Barometern OT have different jobs. They are a newspaper. We are a supporters' site. There is no contradiction between wanting better coverage of IK and wanting the newspaper to succeed at providing it.
We have views on how IK is covered. We also think our neighbours' project in Kalmar receives more attention and weight than it deserves. But that irritation must not make us so petty that we stop appreciating a really good piece about our own team.
When CG writes like this, we want people to read it. Including those who usually settle for checking the score. Including those who have fallen out of the habit of going to games. And preferably the business owner who still sees IK as a project that ended with the SHL years.
That is where his voice can offer something neither a club website nor a supporters' site can replace.
And he must remain independent. We do not need another spokesperson for IK. We need a journalist who can scrutinise the club and still recognise when there is something around it worth believing in. Each makes the other more credible.
Something has stirred
It feels as though we supporters have helped stir something again. In the stands, in the conversations around the team – and now in this piece.
We are not going to take credit for what CG writes. His pen is his own. But if GLID INTE, together with everyone else who continues to care, can help make the conversation about IK more lively and more demanding, then we are doing something useful.
That is also why his enthusiasm matters. He can capture what is difficult to set out in a league table: why you want to watch this particular team, even though you know it can drive you mad.
Calle Karlsson and Joel Svensson are part of the answer. Our homegrown players give us more than points. We get to follow people with a connection to the club and the town, not just a roster to be replaced next autumn.
But that is no excuse for asking them to carry too much. Quite the opposite. When young players give the team more than anyone could reasonably demand, the club needs to try to make the most of it.
We do not know how long this opportunity will remain in the same form. It does not have to disappear next season to be worth acting on now.
The same potential – not necessarily the same shopping list
CG calls for reinforcements in goal, on defence and at centre. That is his sporting assessment. It is close to the discussion we have been having about stability, experience and more lines that can produce.
We do not have to rank every need in exactly the same order to share the central idea: there is more to get out of this team if the supporting cast improves.
Matt Brown is a good example. We want to see more from him and will keep demanding it. But a good addition could also give Brown better combinations, ease the load on Calle and Joel, and make more lines difficult to face. The value needs to extend beyond the new player's own scoring total.
What makes CG's piece interesting, then, is not simply that someone else says IK should sign players. It is that he explains why this particular team could be worth a targeted effort.
That is a very different starting point from simply asking for money to cover another problem.
Now the sponsors need to join the conversation
This is the column's most important opportunity.
It could prompt someone with resources and a heart for Oskarshamn to pick up the phone. Not to ask for another advertising space, but to ask: what would make a real difference to the team?
That is the kind of initiative we want to see. Sponsors do not always have to wait for the club to arrive with a finished proposal. Several businesses could start from the other end: we see the opportunity, we want to help – what do you need to take the next step?
It is then IK's responsibility to have a well-thought-out answer. Which role is missing? Why would that type of player improve the team? What would it require financially, and how can the commitment remain within the club's means?
This is not a demand to spend money that does not exist. We do not want to exchange a promising autumn for another financial problem. A signing needs funding and a sound sporting rationale. But financial responsibility does not have to mean giving up the search for opportunities.
From the outside, we sometimes find IK too hesitant on precisely these questions. Work may be going on that we cannot see. Even so, too often we miss a clear statement of ambition: this is what we believe in, this is what we want to achieve, and this is how more people can help.
If supporters feel hopeful and CG can put that feeling into words, the club ought to try to meet that energy. It should not need to be dragged all the way into the conversation.
And if the initiative comes from sponsors this time, that is no loss of face for IK. It is an asset.
From the newspaper to BEGE
Our own little vision of the future is, of course, CG becoming a regular guest with Johnny and Acke on IK-podden. At that point, they might as well start thinking about the name Ickedickedoa too. Somewhere around there, we would feel we had really achieved something.
That is a wish, not a podcast announcement. But behind the wink is a serious point: more strong voices around IK make it harder for indifference to return.
Not everyone needs to say the same thing. Quite the opposite. There can be friction between journalists, supporters and the club. But let it come from people caring and wanting more, not from having already given up hope.
CG has written a piece that deserves a life beyond the newspaper. In conversations at work. Among sponsors. Inside the club. And on the way to BEGE tonight.
We can start by doing our part: turn up and support IK against Mora. Not because everything is good. Because there is something here we want to see become better.
A good column does not sign a player. But it can get the right people talking to one another.
Now we hope the phones start ringing.
GLID INTE supporter column responding to Christian Gustafsson's column in Barometern OT on 23 October 2026. Assessments of the journalism, the club and possible sponsor initiatives are our own. No new transfers, sponsorship commitments or podcast appearances are confirmed here.