Torino

1. Chicago CubsIn 1945, Cubs fan Billy Sianis was watching his team take on the Detroit Tigers in a World Series game at Chicago's Wrigley Field. As usual, Billy was accompanied by his pet goat. But when nearby fans complained about the goat's rotten odour, Billy and goat were ejected. A furious Sianis placed a curse on the team, saying: 'Them Cubs, they aren't gonna win no more.' He was right. Without a World Series victory since 1908, the Cubs have tried to break the curse many times - Billy's nephew Sam has brought a goat on to the field on several occasions - but to no avail.

2. Cleveland franchisesIt sucks to be a sports fan in this bitterly cold Ohio city, no matter which team you follow. The Browns have some of the most loyal fans in the NFL, but they have never made it to the Super Bowl. From 1995-2001, the Indians sold out 455 home games in a row - but they haven't won baseball's World Series since 1948. The Cavaliers have been one of the lamest NBA teams for years. They took almost 30 years to win their first Conference title in the NBA, with the considerable help of star player LeBron James, then lost the 2007 finals 4-0 to the San Antonio Spurs.

3. New Zealand's All BlacksThe great Australian hooker Phil Kearns said it best: 'You can go to the end of time, the last World Cup in the history of mankind, and the All Blacks will be favourites for it.' That's the problem. The expectation on New Zealand's rugby union team to go out and demolish all-comers, all of the time, is huge. When the team lose, New Zealand mourns. The All Blacks' knack of choking in every World Cup except the first has caused so much grief to Kiwis that papers put black borders on their front pages after last year's quarter-final loss to France.

4. Newcastle UnitedAt least Chicago Cubs fans have a good excuse for their history of near-misses. At St James' Park, there is no cursed goat to help explain 81 years without the League title. Scapegoats abound, though. In the Premier League era, Newcastle's appetite for self-destruction has turned the 'massive club' into a laughing stock. How much blame lies with the self-professed 'best fans in the world', who can't stop scratching at old wounds, is difficult to assess. And with the Big Four seemingly impregnable, the wait for a title will go on and on.

5. TorinoIn the 1940s, Torino were Italian champions five seasons in a row - winning Serie A by as many as 16 points and providing up to 10 players for the national team. On 4 May 1949, with the fifth title in sight, a plane carrying 'Grande Torino' crashed into a hillside at nearby Superga during a thunderstorm. All on board died. While Turin's other team, Juventus, have become European giants, Torino have won just one Serie A title since. Supporters have to endure not just their rivals' success, but also chants from opposing fans celebrating the Superga disaster.

6. 1860 MunichAs a boy, Franz Beckenbauer supported 1860 Munich. It was his dream to join the club, which was Munich's pre-eminent team in the late 1950s. But playing against 1860's youth team in an under-14 tournament, he was slapped in the face by a defender. Beckenbauer never forgot the insult and chose to sign for Bayern Munich, persuading future German greats such as Uli Hoeness and Paul Breitner to choose Bayern as well. Poor 1860 fans, without a league title since 1966 while Bayern have prospered, have never forgiven the Kaiser.

7. Toronto Maple Leafs

The ice hockey-mad city of Toronto hasn't celebrated a Stanley Cup win since 1967. Older fans may remember one or two of the franchise's 13 successes - the team won four in the Sixties alone - but the longer the drought goes on, the more the memory of the glory days fades. It shouldn't be this way: the Leafs (or 'the Buds' as they are commonly called) are officially the NHL's richest team, worth more than $400m. To compound the fans' misery, the Montreal Canadiens, their bitter rivals, have won no fewer than 10 Stanley Cups since Toronto's last triumph.

8. French cycling fansSince it began in 1903, more than a third of Tour de France winners have been French. But since 1985, when Bernard Hinault claimed the yellow jersey, the sport's spiritual home has produced none. There is no obvious explanation for this dry spell, which along with doping scandals has caused so much torment to the locals. Fans have been reduced to firing barbs at Lance Armstrong. The American never failed a drugs test in winning seven Tours, but race officials continue to make baseless accusations - as if a tainted Armstrong might somehow soothe the pain of French failure.

9. Gloucester rugbyYou win the league at a canter, then you lose the right to be called champions based on one game. Such is the bizarre logic of rugby union's Premiership play-off system, at least as far as Gloucester are concerned. The cherry and whites have finished top of the league in three of the past six seasons, but the club won no titles in that time. Three cruel defeats in the play-offs, including two heavy losses in the final at Twickenham (to Wasps and Leicester), have been especially difficult for the ardent denizens of 'The Shed' to accept.

10. England cricket teamDecades of Ashes torment at the merciless hands of the sledge-happy Australians, inexplicable batting collapses against all Test nations, the failure to produce world-class players of spin, three defeats in three World Cup finals, botched selection after botched selection, an unhealthy obsession with finding Ian Botham 2.0, the recent Stanford Super Series debacle ... just a sample of the reasons why it's not much fun to support England, even if they do win every now and again.

Oliver Irish defends his selectionEvery sports fan knows the pain of defeat. It happens to all of us and, without it, winning wouldn't seem so much fun. But, as Andrew Anthony writes on page 21, there are levels of torment that only supporters of perennially disappointing teams such as Spurs have had to endure. In compiling this list, I wanted to identify the fans who suffer the most, albeit for varying reasons. Sometimes, as in the case of the All Blacks, it's not about how many games you lose - they don't lose many - but which games you lose. The only game that really matters to Kiwis is the Rugby World Cup final, and they haven't won that for more than 20 years. For other teams, rivalry amplifies the misery; it hurts when the team you love fail, but the agony is doubled when your rivals succeed. That left room for a couple of teams - three for the price of one in Cleveland - that torment their fans with plain, old-fashioned ineptitude.

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