An ode to the game we love

Buddy - Like you, my football education was a long time back and gained in a different country than our present day abodes. All this super league talk just makes me smile for I've heard it all before, not once, not twice, but really countless times as the rich got richer and the poor got poorer. And there is little doubt in my mind that as time passes we will hear all the same arguments put up as sound economic reasoning as to why it should happen sooner than later. The one inescapable fact that we have to remember is that it will happen, and whether that is due to honest economic argument ,or the corruption everyone seems to know about, we will probably never know, but, it will happen ,history tells us so, Cheers jb.

Nice piece but I believe if you dig below the surface just a little more you might find that the picture is slightly different, possibly depending upon age. I grew up pre-epl and living in the uk I went to football week in and week out; home and away, skimped and scraped the money together although by comparison, it didn’t cost a lot to stand on the terraces. The travel to away games was always the most expensive part and games were not all ticket affairs, plus they were played only on Saturday with a predictable kick off time. When I emigrated in the mid 1980’s you could find me most weekends on a balcony or a roof, armed with a six pack of “silver bullets” and a shortwave radio tuned into BBC world service to listen to live commentary of a game, score checks and sports report which meant the classified results and reports around the grounds. British Soccer Week was a fairly good read and then we saw the arrival of satellite tv; this was well before Foxtel. We used to travel to Bondi Diggers Club and into a room with whatever the largest size tv screen was - no large projected images or anything like that. At midnight in the winter, the screen would come alive and we would settle down to enjoy whatever game was being beamed in. We did not know in advance except on certain occasions, not]rma;ly European competition nights. That was the only way you could see live games from the uk. The 90’s saw Galaxy come along as a satellite service and that marked the beginning of a huge change in marketing a game worldwide. Through all this period and the birth of Foxtel and Austar in the country, I would burn the midnight oil along with many others, attend a few NSL games but struggled with the identities of most Sydney teams and played football during the winter season here. On the other side of the world, friends that I left behind were beginning to change their viewing. As the EPL grew and became a dominant world brand, the price of entry soared beyond belief. All seater stadiums were compulsory and friends began to share season tickets rather than attend all games on their own as it really stopped being a “working men’s game”. As the premier league clubs grew and demanded higher and higher admission charges, $200 plus for a club shirt to help them advertise their latest sponsors, for quite a few people I know, it was time to make a change. The conversations switched to be more about What was referred to as real football rather than fantasy football which was the way the EPL is described by many. Some friends switched to league 1 and 2 clubs and yet more went to the myriad of semi professional or non league clubs as they are popularly referred to. On this side of the globe, Together with other regular fans that I know began to drift away from all those late nights and early mornings. Some will argue that it is natural as people age and have family responsibilities. I don’t disagree but would add that we’ve grown wiser and are much less drawn in by “the pied piper” of football. We watch bits and pieces, highlight packages and overnight goals and have one eye on it but have engaged far more with the local game in its various forms. As a demographic, we may have been replaced by the next generation of armchair viewers but I’d even dispute that. Being heavily involved in grassroots football, I take the opportunity week in and week out to anecdotally survey players and families, garnering opinions on A League and consumption of the game on television. By far the majority of 20 somethings that I ask do not watch live games but are content to get up in the mornings and watch highlights and overnight goals or tune in to the magazine style roundup that is presented and that is how they “ support their team”. Most younger guys have apps on their phones that will provide live score updates and sometimes clips from games but There are far fewer people who actually watch live games from across the world and in casual conversations are quite incredulous when I describe how we used to get our fill on a Saturday night. In my pre covid travels around Asian countries I witnessed a massive interest in EPL though and huge crowds of fans in Singapore, Thailand, Japan and Korea dressed in club shirts all heading for sports bars to watch “the big game”. On recent (pre-covid) visits to the UK I managed to take in a few games at different levels and was astonished at the general make up of the crowds. EPL games I heard more dutch, german and a sprinkling of French being spoken in and around the grounds, combined with quite a large presence of active away fans. Tourism packages are quite common with hotels and gem tickets a common practice. In lower leagues, far more families or father/son traditions and in a couple of non league games I felt as though the clock had been turned back 50 years. The clothing was slightly different but the groupings were the same and there were queues of people at the canteen being served by volunteers with large catering style teapots and instant coffee. You could buy chocolate bars or a piece of home made cake. There were young children playing at the front of the grandstands and behind the goals at each end were groups of “active support” numbering between 20 and 50 that shouted and sang throughout the game and oddly, had flags and banners pertaining to much larger EPL clubs. That’s my experience at any rate. It may be atypical according to some but Despite appearances on the surface, there is not the passion and interest in following live football from the other side of the world that some think - it’s a matter of being really honest.

Brilliant. Agree with your sentiments whole heartedly. :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

A good read. Interestingly, what these 12 clubs are trying to do in Europe we all ready have here, with our A League. I suspect that the ESL is a very risky gamble on behalf of some of these clubs. La Liga can't survive without Real and Barca [IMO] and Serie A would struggle without Juventus and the Milan clubs. However in England, I think it would be a whole lot different. The EPL wouldn't stop if those 6 clubs were all of a sudden told they have no place for them.

Nice article There is hope that the ESL will basically be a glorified version of those nonsense pre-season tournament