THE lot of the "football widow" is not a happy one.
Nick Hornby who wrote his bestseller, Fever Pitch on his lifelong obsession with "The Arsenal," as it is known to the faithful, said once that while he had met women who loved football, "I have not yet met one who would make that Wednesday night trip to watch a Division Three match at Plymouth. And what was to be done about the male who was more concerned about Exeter City than the woman he loved?"
Earlier this week, somewhere between the current obsession over cash for questions and Princess Di, the Arsenal footballer, Paul Merson, announced that he was separating from his wife, Lorraine; their marriage had collapsed under the strain of his recovery from triple addictions to drink, drugs and gambling.
A not uncommon occurrence one might say, with the statistics on failed marriages in the UK standing at 60 per cent.
But as footballers' wives are often lampooned as brainless wonders, ex barmaids or childhood sweethearts expected to cause the minimum amount of fuss, combined with high maintenance glamour, the pressures of coping with an "addictive" partner are all too evident.
As their corresponding statements on the failure of their six year marriage and the 13 years they spent together in total explained, the Mersons spoke as two people who had come to realise that the pressures placed on a marriage, when one partner is battling against many "demons" can be ultimately overwhelming.
Paul Merson said that he felt he owed his wife everything. "If it was not down to her, I would never have stopped drinking and I would probably be dead now. I cannot get away from that fact."
Lorraine told the press: "Perhaps something had to give while he worked at his recovery, and that something was our marriage. I would like to think I was the biggest help to him when his world fell apart. Now he is finally on his feet I find I can't live with him to share his success."
Not surprisingly when such a high profile confession is made in public, the combined wisdom of the British tabloids is brought to bear on the minutiae of the "celebrity marriage break down".
This week it was the turn of the woman's editor of the Sun, Ms Jane Moore, who berated Merson in her column this week. "My name is Paul and I'm an obsessed bore," ran the headline, and she went on to sympathise with Mrs Merson.
"But the monstrous times aside, Lorraine will be thinking fondly of the good old days when Paul was exciting to be with and lived life on the edge. Now his personality prop has gone."
Onto the addiction bandwagon jumped Dr Thomas Stullaford, writing in the Times this week. If Dr Stuttaford can find the answers, then it is that there are no answers and the debate between doctors over whether an addictive personality can be inherited or is "an acquired habit" will continue, ad infinitum.
"Many alcoholics who, like Merson, have an obsessive personality, are not only heavy drinkers but are also interested in the history of alcohol and its artefacts. Mrs Merson doubtless expected that when her husband stopped drinking and gambling she would have him back again as a loving, devoted man around the house and that they would have a normal domestic life," Dr Stuttaford advised.
The psychological debate on the issue has been argued for many years. And each time a confession to addiction of any description is made by a public figure then the debate erupts again. According to Sandra Breem of the marriage and partnership research agency, One Plus One, unforeseen circumstances, such as an addiction, can render a marriage redundant from the very early stages.
In a radio interview following the announcement of the break up of the Merson marriage, Shelley Webb, the wife of the former Nottingham Forest footballer, Neil Webb, was asked whether footballers were encouraged by their managers to marry young in order to make them more malleable and receptive to the orders barked at them from the touchline.
"Yes," she agreed, this was the case at the majority of football clubs, "because the managers believe that marrying young will keep them away from other temptations and act as a means of settling the boys down. Managers see early marriages as a way of having 12 quiet men in the dressing room."
Now as Paul Merson admits that his life revolves around training and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, Sharon Breem points to addictions as being one of the prime factors in bringing tolerant individuals to the brink of despair.
"Addictions, along with death in the family, illness or redundancy for instance are likely to cut the foundation of marriage to the core once the rosy phase is over."