Alexa

i think they had fans but no where near as many that a/l had. and i think the a/l fans were very loud in their support for them and then once a/l happened it was just hard to go back on that.

i do think kirshner loved A/L and annie so obviously that hard partly to do with it but i don't think a/l was planned the whole time because otherwise they'd have gotten more interaction in early season 2 and i don't think they would have build l/n as much as they had.

im not sure what the writers were thinking in season 4. that whole plot was just really dumb and it was definitely hard for me to root for them again after that happened but i was obviously glad they ended together.

Chastidy

I think Kirshner had A/L planned from the get go but she underestimated just how unpopular Annie was in season one especially. I think that's why A/L didn't interact in season two because Kirshner put N/L together to keep fans happy and then tore them apart quickly. The writing in the latter half of season two was constantly pointing out how terrible Naomi was for Liam and how him and Annie had a special bond. A/L ended up with more fans but they were written more rootably whereas Kirshner wrote Naomi into the wall so we'd all cheer when Liam dumped her. Once the rootable writing stopped for A/L around season four their fans began to decline in numbers as well. It's the same with any ship on any show. If you're going to write them terribly then eventually people will stop caring. One of 90210's biggest flaws were how terribly they treated their ships.