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Not really interested in all honesty, although I can see United doing it.
I think Mourinho is a prize knobhead, and every time he opens his gob I think United winning the league can't be quite so bad. But then United fans tend to be the most smug and self righteous fans you'll ever meet, and I don't think they deserve any glory.
So fuck knows really.
Gone are the days when a QPR, Villa or Leeds can get promoted and then immediately challenge for title honours. It's a real shame, and its why I think the whole football gravy train is coming off the rails a lot sooner than people reckon.
I don't think manu fans even do anything to provoke these comments, it's just that manu play much more attractive football (and win more) than the shit teams, so everyone assumes manu fans are smug.
If you're a Manchester United fan who is not from Manchester, or a Liverpool fan not from Merseyside, or a Leeds fan not from Leeds, then you are not a decent fan. You are a glory-hunter and a hanger-on, and you are the very reason why the Football League is bankrupt.
Look at the Man Utd fans on here- of the three most vociferous, one's from Gillingham and one's from Northern Ireland. There's a Liverpool fan from Watford and Leeds fans from Exeter and Reading. And Arsenal and Chelsea fans crawl out of the woodwork every time they win something. It's the same in Scotland as tens of coaches make the journey from Perth, Inverness and Aberdeen every weekend to the Old Firm games, whilst teams like St Johnstone and St Mirren go bust.
They're not real fans, they hunt success. And when the English league is down to thirty teams (like it will be soon enough- most of Divisions three and four are bust or about to be) they will be the ones to blame. Not that they'll care, they'll have their Sky dish and their local derby with Juventus or Barcelona to look forward to.
And for the record, there are lots of reasons why I despise Manchester United, and none of them are to do with their success on the field. If they were relegated to Conference North (where their fans belong) I'd still despise them.
Whether we're decent fans or not is entirely subjective and I certainly wouldn't let fans of other clubs tell me how decent a fan I am or not.
It's entirely unrealistic to expect, for example, all of Man United's fans to come from Salford, or all of Liverpool's fans to come from Merseyside. You could kiss goodbye to English clubs competing in European competition for one, and kiss goodbye to England being able to attract the best players.
I can understand where you're coming from entirely though. Ideally football
should function in a way that everyone can compete for honours, but it's not realistic in the modern game.
But there's plenty of reasons why people might support a team that isn't geographically the closest to them. If your family is originally from the area, and still support the team, then that's a common reason. Especially since football is already a very father-son thing anyway. Admittedly the fact that they were the best when you were growing up is the usual reason for supporting someone (though it's usually justified by some bullshit story about Ryan Giggs going to a school two towns over or because you once bought a dog from Gary Nevilles cousin and he got him to sign it's collar for you). But to be quite honest, I have far more respect for someone who saves up all their spare cash to make a 200 mile round trip as many times are year as they can, than I do for some rich twat who moves across the road from Stamford Bridge and buys a season ticket when he couldn't name two players in the team.
This is all true. You do get the odd bullshit stories of justification, but I wouldn't even bother. For instance, alot of people from Northern Ireland have supported Man United for over 30 years since the days Bestie was there - there's murals of him in his United kit in Belfast (which makes a nice change from a paramilitary gunman), and you can understand why people would have an affinity to the club. And in response to Kermit's muckslinging, I have an uncle who's supported United since the 60's and helps run a supporters' club, organising trips to matches, often involving ferries or flights. But he's from Northern Ireland so he mustn't be a decent fan and he's destroying the football league. :rolleyes: Get tae fuck. His dedication to the club is more 'decent' and 'real' than some local fans, who won't go to a match if it's raining or just not bother because it's only Watford.
The George Best thing is more of a convenient excuse that an affinity, much like some of the kids I went to school with who "support" Man United because of what Fergie did at Aberdeen before they were even born :rolleyes:
I wouldn't go as far to say that Man United fans that aren't from Manchester aren't real fans, but I'd say that people who've supported a lesser team through thick and thin, paying over the odds to watch mediocre shite year after year are better fans than Sky TV fans who think never missing a game in the pub makes them a proper fan.
Like when Liverpool or Man United win the cup, you get people from all over, who've hardly been to a game in their life saying "We won, we won!" and bragging about it like they're part of the glory. Whereas if my team won the cup, or Scunthorpe or whoever got to Wembley, the fans that went week in week out would truly deserve it, much more than the glory hunting hangers on who still bang on about the treble in 1999.
FA Cup? Lineker, Gascoigne etc?
Sadly that could never be said of me (and my currently underacheiving but still totally awesome club)
Bit harsh. I'm sure there are lots of decent ManYoo fans, people actually from Manchester, who turn up week in, week out and who have done for years. If they're not the real fans you speak of, I don't know who is. I'm pretty sure they are the people who pack Old Trafford every week. If your club was as successful as they are, I'd feel like I would have a right to gloat as well.
It is unrealistic to expect that, people will end up supporting the teams that they are exposed to the most. For many kids these days that's the Big Four on Sky TV, rather than Rochdale or York on the terraces.
Clubs with long and proud traditions like Preston and Burnley struggle now because instead of local people turning up to cheer them on, they all go down the pub and watch "their" team on the big telly instead.
And you're right, in the days of big money, the shirt sales in China and Japan are very important when you want to compete at the highest level. Manchester United is kept afloat by yen, and its the same over at Real.
But at the same time clubs like Newcastle United and Middlesbrough manage to succeed on a largely-local fanbase, just as Blackburn managed before.
I agree again, because of the big money.
Aston Villa beat us to promotion on the last day of the 1987/1988 season. The next season they finished second. Leeds did the same thing, getting promoted and then winning the league the year after.
It changed in 1992, coincidentally when the greedy Big Four clubs led a breakaway from the Football League because their already-huge slice of the pie wasn't big enough. Aldershot went bust even then, but since the Premier League was created the gap between the Premiership and Division One is huge- relegation always means financial ruin now. The Football League is littered with clubs ruined after relegation from the Premier League, and that is why the state of the game in this country is rotten at the core, and the whole edifice will come crashing down. If we're not careful we're going to have six big clubs in a league of their own, with everyone else going bankrupt trying (and failing) to compete.
If Roy Keane is to be believed then Old Trafford is filled with prawn sandwich-chomping Japanese. It's the same at Highbury, its the same at Anfield. There are many reasons for that (the greed of clubs pricing ordinary fans out having a big impact, I quite agree) but that's what the problems are in this country.
As Bri says, its strange how people always have an "affinity" to the successful clubs. If there isn't a football league club near you then fair dos, but the people who abandon their local team for some reflected glory in the Premiershit (West Yorkshire used to be full of people trekking to Leeds every weekend whilst Halifax and Park Avenue went bust- now they all go to Manchester) are the sole reason why the whole league is going down.
I'm just trying to think who my local team should be, because there's no-one in the football league proper for miles. I think it'd be Preston. Or Blackburn if I was to go for a top flight team.
It's not some oil sheikh or some US hedge fund.
So what about people who make 400 mile round trips, and have gone to see the team come rain or shine, come success and failure, as much as they can possibly afford, all for the love of the club? Ok, so they're not there every week like the locals but they put in the effort. Don't they deserve to celebrate at least a bit, if the team they've loved all their life, wins something? I've met lots of fickle fans in my time, and armchair aupporters, and glory hunters who'll hop onto the winning team, but there's also proper fans, who are dedicated, and have as much love for the club they support as someone from across the road from the stadium. Obviously the people who go week in week out deserve success, but even local fans can be fickle, so I don't think geography should be a measure of being a 'real' fan.
Then I can support Man United without any pangs of guilt that I'm destroying the football league, though I certainly wouldn't begrudge anyone else the right to support whoever they want. It's when people start changing their support stance, that I'd have a problem.
Oh, and on a different note, did you get a copy of this for Christmas Kermit? I stumbled across it last night.
You don't, but if you don't have a reason for supporting a team then people are gonna call you a glory hunter if it just happens to be a big team that wins loads of trophies. Amazing how happy coincidences like that you hear.
Like I say, it's funny it's always Man United or Liverpool and never little teams people always "support", but it's far more worthwhile to support a smaller team - other than those big team fans who always go to games - because you appreciate it when you win and you're gutted when you lose.
I love it when people claim to be "gutted" after they get papped out of Europe, even though they never seem to be near Old Trafford.
What about them? They're fans right enough, but it doesn't change the fact that they're very possibly just supporting them for the trophies, irrespective of how much they spend travelling.
Never missing a game when they're on Sky or on in the club doesn't qualify as being a proper fan, no matter how you slice it.
Give a good reason for why people can't support whoever they want?
I know here, it's pretty difficult to support anyone but a premiership team as you don't actually get to see any other teams. Obviously teams like United are exposed to the public more because they're the big sides with the big players. Also, for instance, you'll not find too many Irish internationals and Irish legends who play at Scunthorpe United either, so people have less desire to follow them.
Yeah, I support United because they were on TV when I was younger, and I loved football. My dad didn't make me support them or anything, I just loved football, and loved watching Man United. Eventually I was able to turn the love of the club into proper support by getting the chance to go see matches etc. I go through the same emotions as any other fan, and have as much interest in the team as any good fan.
I don't claim to be a dedicated fan, I don't go to games, I don't even watch most matches live
Im not giving the team money by going to matches every week, so i'm not a "true" hardcore fan I guess, doesn't mean I don't want them to win as much as the hardcore ones though. Football has just become entertainment, so might aswell be entertained by the team I like. I still don't get the point of the attacks on manu/arsenal etc fans.. do you want ppl to change who they support? Would it be better if i supported halifax town??
You can support whoever you want, but if you support a big team for no apparent reason then you've got to expect a bit of stick.
It's just amazing how many people fall into supporting big teams who win big trophies, that's all I'm saying.
If you go week in, week out, year in, year out you deserve a bit of success for your team because you're a true and proper fan. I can assure you that once you spend hundreds on your team going to games and following them round the country, you get such an affinity for them that you just don't get sitting in the pub with your replica top on.
It's always that age old question: if they were relegated three divisions, would you still support them? And that means more than just answering the question "who do you support" with that clubs name. If the answer is no, then you aren't really supporting them in the first place in my opinion, you just enjoy watching them play and like to see them win. But you don't really care about the club. I mean I do that with Arsenal in Europe, I've even been known to cheer when they score, but I'd never call myself a supporter. If you've got a half decent team reasonably close to you, then that should really be your team unless your dad dictates otherwise (no son of mine will be seen dead in that shirt, take it off). But it's not the definition of a good supporter
Is it really that amazing? The big teams are the ones that get the most coverage and publicity. They always have the players you idolise as a youngster growing up. I think it's perfectly logical that alot of young people fall into supporting big teams.
I agree. I've spent hundreds going to see Man United play many times before, for that very reason I can't go as much as a local who doesn't have to pay for travel etc, but I certainly have an affinity to the side as a result of it.
The amazing bit was sarcasm, and it's no surprise that kids nowadays decide to support Chelsea etc.
Bollocks to idolising players (how many Southampton fans did you see come out of nowhere when Le Tissier was strutting his stuff? That's right, none) - the main reason people support big teams hundreds of miles away is because they're likely to win trophies.
What difference does that make? Surely you mean, if there isn't any football team near you then fair dos. Problem with that argument is that there could be hundreds between you and the team you choose to support...
All you do there is water down the argument. Either it is wrong to support a club away from your nearest or it isn't. It's like you agree the principle but want to haggle over the price...
Besides, should people support the club nearest thier birth, or where they are living???
Oh, and I'm not Gillingham based. My nearest "league" teams are Dover, Ramsgate and Margate. I used to (in my teens) attend my local side which with a fan base of 80 went bust in the 90s...
RIP Old Etonians
Exactly, they're more or less semi-professional, standard wise anyway. I don't even have a proper football club in my whole county.
If you think about it actually, the clubs in the north west of England are some the nearest proper professional clubs to us.
COME ON YOU REDS!!
we like the colour red
What? Liverpool?