The story of FC United of Manchester gets more intriguing every season. The better they do in the league, the more media coverage they get and the bigger the club gets.

The fans have no problem with this. Their problem is being told by the Football Association when to play games without consultation and though they can attempt to fight England’s governing body, I’m afraid it is a losing battle.

As we have seen in the past, the FA doesn’t care that away supporters may not be able to get home after games and will schedule a team to play at 5.30pm or 8pm on a weekday, hundreds of miles up the road.

FC United’s clash with the FA last month when they were forced to play their FA Cup clash with Chesterfield on a Monday night and initially obliged to charge a minimum £10 for tickets (£1 above the club’s agreed standard ticket price), is one that will come up time and time again.

As they climb the English pyramid and get further in cup competitions, they will see their games moved to inconvenient times for the supporters. It will cause problems and the FA will not make exceptions.

If they did, then it would open up a can of worms with every club complaining about the scheduling of fixtures.

FC United were not built to one-day reach the Premier League, their aim is to be a successful club for the local community and they have already achieved their goal in that respect.

But there is a growing sense of change on the terraces. That the club is losing its soul, its identity.

And it is causing a problem among the fans, namely the newer ones. People are coming to watch FC United to watch the football and aren’t interested in the club’s history or what it stands for.

For example, the board voted to have a collection for refugees at a game in September.

A small minority of fans thought that there were more pressing issues the club and supporters should be concerned with, following the right-wing line that we should be looking after the homeless in Britain before bringing in more people.

While others felt that because there was a bit of infighting, maybe the issue should be ignored totally and the club should usher in an era where the politics plays second fiddle to football.

I must stress that this is a very small fraction of fans on various FC United forums. Some may not even support the club and only post messages to stir up trouble online.

But could that be a sign of things to come? Will the next generation of fans who don’t have the protest legacy the club was founded on want to take the club in a different direction as they get more successful?

At the moment the club are in unprecedented territory, in the midst of a relegation battle. Since taking over in 2005, manager Karl Marginson has never really been under pressure but unrest is growing and rumours are flying.

How would the club handle relegation? Will the board panic and sack Marginson in an attempt to stay in the league?

If they do stay in the division, will the board decide that there needs to be a change of boss to take the club forward? The next manager will want to make a name for himself, as every manager does and that means winning games, trophies and promotions.

How long before the club is in the football league? Which will again bring a wave of new problems.

Players will want more money the higher up the club goes and it would shatter the current wage structure. What then?

Sponsors will want to get involved. In 2006, Barcelona put Unicef on the front of their shirts which was the first time the club had a sponsor.

Four years later, the deal struck with the Qatar Foundation marked the first time in the team’s 111-year history that they would be paid to advertise on their kits.

Can FC United promise that they will never bow down while they look to climb up the English football ladder until one day playing the Premier League? And for the fans that don’t have that as their aim, what will maintain momentum in the long term?

I would never say I was a supporter of Clapton FC but I loved watching them play, the atmosphere and what they stood for was a throwback to a time when money didn’t dominate football.

But in the past 12 months there has been a change on the terraces, as the owner attempts to wrestle back the club from a new set of supporters.

As the crowds have increased, the football has become less important to some of the fans.

People are turning up to chant about what is going on in the world and one of the attractions of Clapton was the openness, that you could bring a can of beer to watch the game and enjoy yourself. The flares at half time were a wonderful attraction.

But the owner has banned that after a crackdown from the league. He has seen a way to bring in more cash to the club. Cans are banned as he attempts to force the supporters to buy alcohol at the ground.

Flares are not allowed and talk of a rise in ticket prices could price out the locals. It comes across as a challenge from the owner.

If you are actually here to support the team and watch the football, then you can do so drinking beer that I will provide and in an atmosphere that is comfortable for me, not you.

For many that isn’t why they turn up in East Ham. They do so because they are priced out of Premier League grounds, don’t feel comfortable due to the racism, sexism and political messages on the terraces and have become despondent about the flat sanitised game football at the top has become.

How many grounds can the home fans get away with chanting “Maggie, Maggie, Maggie. Dead, dead, dead” before the stewards kick them out?

But at Clapton you can. It’s great that football has been able to bring a variety of people together for a greater cause, helping others while raising the important issues that are forgotten by the upper classes.

But as with FC United, there are some who just want to watch the football on a Saturday afternoon without the distraction of anti-fascist chants and songs about Polish lager.

Clapton isn’t steeped in a history of movements, this is a new chapter for the club and it has become attractive to support the alternative team. It reminds me of 2013, when suddenly everyone’s second club became Borussia Dortmund.

Not many people actually watched them but it was the popular thing to do for the “football hipsters.” It isn’t about actually supporting the club, it is about the status.

The “I am a football fan who doesn’t care about the scoreline and want to be part of something bigger,” which was immediately dubbed being a hipster.

Fans of Clapton will hate being called hipsters but the newer fans are, simply because it wasn’t fashionable to support them two years ago.

And for FC United, as they continue to expand they will come across similar problems. They will have to amalgamate the old and the new, the locals and the admirers and more.

It is vital that throughout the expansion, they stay true to the core values which started the club in 2005.