It could always do with more money, but it’s heartening the minds of fans turned towards the Cruwys family so quickly and particularly that the impetus for this fund came from a dismayed Wolves fan.

This was a horrible attack, but there are those who are seeking to turn this into something else - into a sign football has sunk back into its violent old ways.

Hooliganism, I have heard it said recently, never really went away, and now it’s coming back to life.

I’m very dubious about this. I’ve never been a football hooligan, but I have seen a lot of hooliganism at close hand.

As a teenager three decades ago, I used to go across London to watch West Ham in the days when pre-match fights were absolutely expected.

The police horses would line the road all the way from the Tube station to the ground and still people would be trying to goad each other into fights.

The atmosphere was, at times, feral, with groups of fans focusing far more on the fight than they did on the game.

My parents had no interest at all in football and no real idea of what these games were like, and somehow I persuaded them it was fine for me to go to Upton Park on my own.

In retrospect, it was a pretty daft thing for a kid from Radlett to be doing, but at the time it was almost accepted as the nature of football.

Fans were often treated like animals and some of them simply seemed to respond by acting like animals.

Later, as a sports journalist, I saw a series of nasty battles between hooligans and police at England games.

The worst I saw was, curiously enough, in the sleepy tax-haven backwater of Liechtenstein, where I was chased across a field by neo-Nazis in England shirts.

I ended up hiding on top of a portable building, only to discover the police observer who had been watching, and filming, my plight.

None of these things were acceptable.

I’ve seen people being wounded in grounds, fans making coshes, blood being spilt.

I’ve seen tear gas, water cannon, police charges, endless Alsatian dogs and rubber bullets bouncing towards me.

But the attack on Nic Curwys seems completely different.

Let’s be transparently clear Mr Cruwys clearly had no interest whatsoever in getting involved in trouble.

He, like thousands of us each weekend, had simply travelled to a stadium, watched a match, and was now heading home. Not much to expect, is it?

Football has changed profoundly since my formative years dodging punch-ups in Upton Park, because these days everyone expects to enjoy their days at the football with no threat of violence.

They expect that because, by and large, that’s what always happens.

It’s only when something as grotesque as this shakes us that we are forced to realise there are still some horrible people in the world.

But that’s why I think it’s wrong to equate what happened on that miserable day in Wolverhampton to some nascent return to hooliganism.

This was a terrible anomaly, a ghastly event, but surely not a sign of something profound changing in our society.

It is very hard to accept sometimes terrible things happen, just simply happen, and they happen to decent people going about normal lives.

Naturally, we want an explanation, and I’m sure there are specific lessons to learn about the nature of policing around Molineux.

But, I fear what happened to Mr Cruwys was one of those unpredictable, freakish acts of horror.

The fact it clearly appalled the fans and staff of Wolverhampton Wanderers is something for Watford to remember and value.

In my youth, clubs often felt they were too important and lofty to involve themselves in condemning the violence that happened on their doorstep and allowed resentments to simmer.

Here, we should note the instant response of Wolves and bear no grudge against either club or supporters.

And now it is time to do two things - support the Cruwys family, and give the police the time and space to pursue their investigation.

Because the very best thing that can happen now is that the right people are brought to justice.