There appears to be a growing number of football supporters becoming increasingly disillusioned by the direction in which football is currently heading.
Many may have felt this way for quite some time but since supporting ‘their’ club has been pretty much a way of life, a religion if you will, they have just continued to pay their money, take their seat and file away back to their everyday lives outside of football as soon as, if not some time before, the final whistle has been blown.
The sadness to me is that when that final blast of the referee’s whistle sounds; win, lose or draw, to some it merely signals the end of an almost joyless and hollow occasion – something ‘ticked off’ the to-do list like a not-so-close friend’s birthday party or the kid next door’s christening.
No longer is the joy of victory the over-riding emotion accompanying a win. Indeed nowadays you are just as likely to read foul-mouthed tirades tearing one particular player or another’s performance apart like the most vicious-tongued food critic out there.
People have all sorts of mitigating reasons for this feeling of detachment from their former passionate love ranging from the amount of money in the game these days to the number of games moved to accommodate TV scheduling, amongst countless others.
There are also a band of sado-masochist style supporters who crave for the return of the days when the players we saw in front of us on our particular patch of hallowed turf were not that much better at the game than ourselves were in our prime – at least in our own minds.
Fans lament the fact that football clubs nowadays are faceless businesses intent on wringing every last penny from it’s customers. Though I don’t necessarily like that fact, it remains exactly that. A fact. Football club’s these days are businesses and football fans are customers of their business of choice. The sooner we as fans come to terms with what in all honesty cannot truly be a startling revelation, the better.
We, as fans, are bombarded with all manner of information and requests through multiple different medium from the club that we support, usually regarding ways of getting the notes out of our wallets and into their own. Though maybe slightly unwelcome and occasionally unnecessary, this is normal practice for any business, football club or otherwise.
Applying the same degree of advertisement filtration as you would with any other form of business advertising will result in the superfluous stuff associated with your club remaining just that – superfluous.
Ignoring the seemingly endless stream of club shop emails or comedy night ticket-selling emails that we receive doesn’t make you any less of a fan, it just tells the club that themed Christmas crackers, baby grows and logo-riddled wallpaper will be purchased IF you want them to be, not as a direct result of being almost implored to.
We are all quick enough to demand that cash be spent by the club whenever the window seal is broken and the opportunity presents itself, but for that to happen, unfortunately to some, these sorts of emails, sales drives and associated promotions will continue and even grow further. They are a necessity.
Maximising all possible income streams is about as much of an example of ‘non-football speak’ as there could be but the on pitch product and the off pitch profits drive go hand in hand. And in truth, they always have. Clubs have always sold various products in their club shops, it’s just that today, the choice is so much greater and the prices have rocketed and the club shop is now a megastore.
Look around you though and is that not the same case you see repeated wholesale with pretty much everything else in our day to day lives? Times move on, prices rise and people adapt. They have to. So too however do the clubs we used to be only too proud to support.
Television broadcasters play a huge role in today’s footballing world and by and large, the product that we pay to see is vastly superior to anything I ever saw during my childhood.
On the horizon is a trip for my club – and regardless of the views of other fans, to me, they remain precisely that, MY CLUB – to Newcastle United for a televised match in the Saturday ‘tea-time’ slot. Following a campaign aimed at reciprocal pricing of away supporters, the cost of the ticket is £15. To me, in today’s financial climate, that is a bargain and I firmly believe that more of these campaigns should be pursued as they are for the benefit of both sets of supporters whilst they also improve good will within the game at a much-needed time. Capped pricing us another scheme which needs introducing as soon as possible.
Going back to my youth and another venture North to watch my team play at Hull City’s old Boothferry Park ground (which I believe is still standing, just in an even more decrepit state than it was all those years back) where my dad (he was paying) was told that it’d cost £9 for me to go in (I wasn’t even 10 years old). Now £9 might not seem a huge price but twenty-odd years ago, to stand on a lump of concrete in the provincial north was a bit on the extreme side so we opted for another turnstile and I ducked under the barrier as my dad entered (also for £9).
So what is the difference between being totally against paying £9 as a child in the 80’s to being almost elated at a scheme to keep spiralling ticket prices down in the present day? My point is that clubs have always tried to squeeze the penny and push the financial barriers as far as possible, but unless clubs start to take notice of the views of fans then ultimately, much like the bloke on the Boothferry Road turnstile, not to mention his paymaster, all those years back, they will lose out.
Today’s fan won’t simply try to find another turnstile to duck under (they would if it were still possible though) but they are more likely to ask around, should they need to, for a list of local pubs showing the game or alternatively just tap a few keys on their computers and watch it in the comfort of their favourite armchair.
And do you know what? Once they choose that path in order to watch ‘their’ club play, it is an extremely difficult task for the club to win them back, no matter how many emails they send imploring them to do so.
You would imagine that playing good football and reaching footballing heights that haven’t been scaled for decades would be ample reason for fans to flock in their droves to the turnstiles, but alarmingly for the money men in charge, even achieving those once-aspired to dreams are no longer enough to convince some that the ‘Mecca’ of our youth is still our shrine of today.
Football, to some, is at a crossroad and clubs must be careful not to kill the goose that laid the golden eggs.
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