Roman Abramovich

[Deuce]

It’ll all be water under the bridge when the YewEssEmmEnnTee hoists aloft the Capitol One World Cup, presented by Coca Cola, Trophy.  

[Kid Icarus]

Come on, you all know what the difference is.  That Budweiser "you do the football, we'll do the beer" advert wouldn't have been able to parody it if it wasn't already widely known.

 

You're all great at taking the piss out of yourselves on here, so it's always so funny when you go on the defensive when anyone else touches on it and it's over nothing.

 

 

Edited May 7, 2022 by Kid Icarus

[Geordie Ahmed]

2 hours ago, Kanji said:

There’s a lot European football can learn from American sports - the fan experience does matter in modern times. Whether you like it or not. The accessibility and access on Tv matters. The ticket sales, resale market does. Ticket operations is about 30 years behind ours. The idea English football allows clubs to just disappear - doesn’t happen here. Fans wouldn’t have to suffer that - or another mike Ashley. 

Genuine question but don't clubs in US Sports get shifted? And often quite far distances? What happens to the fans in that scenario?

 

Is that not the equivalent of clubs disappearing? 

 

This is based on what I hear people say so not sure how much truth there is in it. 

[Kanj]

1 minute ago, Geordie Ahmed said:

Genuine question but don't clubs in US Sports get shifted? And often quite far distances? What happens to the fans in that scenario?

 

Is that not the equivalent of clubs disappearing? 

 

This is based on what I hear people say so not sure how much truth there is in it. 

they do get shifted, it happened a lot in the past. It doesn’t happen as much anymore and it when it does it generally a political battle between owner, city and it generally all has to do with stadiums. It’s nasty for sure. But the league sometimes steps in and sometimes doesn’t to be fair. I have friends who are Oakland folks who still support the Raiders in Vegas and friends who lived in St Louis and still support the Rams in LA. Some do and don’t. 

What I was banging on about was stuff like Bury and such - where it seems the leagues didnt protect the fans there. But it’s just as bad on reflection. 

[Deuce]

Alright do we all feel better having let the id have its say?

[ponsaelius]

23 minutes ago, bobloblaw said:

 

My favorite is the one who went to a live NBA game and was just meh.  Live NBA is the peak of "holy shit these guys are athletic freaks'."

 

It was dull because nobody in the audience seemed particularly interested. People spent most of the game wandering back and forth for food and drink. If somebody does that at SJP other than at half time they are rightly viewed as a dickhead. I've never once been to a football match where people did that en masse.

 

Sport lives and dies as an entertainment, both live and on TV, by the stakes at play and the atmosphere in the crowd. Otherwise it is just athletic people with very good motor skills. Which is dull in my opinion. You may disagree.

 

For what it's worth the NBA playoffs can be extremely entertaining and I think basketball at its core is a good game - particularly when the teams are closely matched.

 

 

Edited May 7, 2022 by ponsaelius

[Disco]

18 minutes ago, Kid Icarus said:

Come on, you all know what the difference is.  That Budweiser "you do the football, we'll do the beer" advert wouldn't have been able to parody it if it wasn't already widely known.

 

You're all great at taking the piss out of yourselves on here, so it's always so funny when you go on the defensive when anyone else touches on it and it's over nothing.

 

 

 

Gawd bless The Malky Glazer Ultras, patriotism is a hell of a drug (like expensive insulin).

[bobloblaw]

2 minutes ago, ponsaelius said:

 

It was dull because nobody in the audience seemed particularly interested. People spent most of the game wandering back and forth for food and drink. If somebody does that at SJP other than half time they are rightly viewed as a dickhead. I've never once been to a football match where people did that en masse.

 

Sport lives and dies as an entertainment, both live and on TV, by the stakes at play and the atmosphere in the crowd. Otherwise it is just athletic people with very good motor skills. Which is dull in my opinion. You may disagree.

 

For what it's worth the NBA playoffs can be extremely entertaining and I think basketball at its core is a good game - particularly when the teams are closely matched.

 

So the NBA as a live experience is poor because some people wanted to get their kids a hot dog.  Nothing to do with the product on the court.

[ponsaelius]

The fact people wander off to get food because the events on court are so inconsequential reflects to the overall quality of the live experience. Yes. And the fact that also makes a less intense atmosphere, liberated of tension or tribalism, also impacts the quality of the live experience. Yes.

 

It's probably a different culture and we're never going to agree. This is fine. But equally I don't have to believe our game needs to change to be more like something totally different.

[Kanj]

Nobody is telling you that you should leave your seat at a football match to grab a bite to eat or drink or take a piss. And if they do - surely you’re adult enough to not give a fuck and focus on the game.  No American here has said that. 

[ponsaelius]

No I'm certainly not adult enough to accept that and focus on the game. When I used to have my ST the one guy on our row who kept going for a piss was the bane of my life. But at least he had an excuse of probably having some bladder issues.

 

If everybody starts fucking off to scran mid game then I'm going to get miffed. Ideally the food offering stays abysmal to discourage this.

[Kid Icarus]

3 minutes ago, Kanji said:

Nobody is telling you that you should leave your seat at a football match to grab a bite to eat or drink or take a piss. And if they do - surely you’re adult enough to not give a fuck and focus on the game.  No American here has said that. 

 

Well no, we collectively hate it and it's exactly this 'be an adult, 'it's a "you" problem' outlook about things we don't want that's so nauseating about it. We don't want that stuff, keep it and enjoy it and godspeed to you, but it's not for us, we hate it.

[ponsaelius]

If people waltzing back and forth with hotdogs and fucking popcorn genuinely became the norm it would probably put me off ever going to another PL game again. 

[Kid Icarus]

Worth bearing in mind that this went viral because fans up and down the country identified with it. Things that we, rightly or wrongly, associate with U.S sports and the American lads don't think are a big deal but we don't like and don't want.

 

 

[Kanj]

I see what youre saying. But, Well, football is a different sport. You shouldn’t get up unless there’s some emergency because you’d miss something key. So I’m all about that too.
 

But in American sports like nba or nfl or mlb - you’re there for ages and there’s - lots of stops in action and breaks and such. It’s just different sport. 
 

and ya, look - I guess because I’m just not bothered by what happens around me anymore (maybe it’s just life changes, having a kid, getting older) the deep rooted mindset of what people can and can’t do at sporting games just doesn’t enter my mind. I’m just happy to be there and genuinely trying to enjoy the few hours I have there where I’m not doing the other things in life that’s keeping me away from some “me” time. 

[TheBrownBottle]

1 hour ago, Kanji said:

What I was banging on about was stuff like Bury and such - where it seems the leagues didnt protect the fans there. But it’s just as bad on reflection. 

I don’t have much time for the ‘American sports are shite’ arguments (don’t watch them myself, but there’s loads of things I’m not interested in - doesn’t mean that they’re shit).  But the Bury argument wouldn’t hold water in terms of extolling the wonders of US sports administration - a place the size of Bury wouldn’t have a club that would ever be able to potential compete in the ‘majors’.  Greater Manchester would likely have a franchise based on the size of the population (and market potential).  Bury’s sad demise wouldn’t have happened in US sports, primarily because Bury would be unlikely to have a professional team which had an opportunity to one day compete in the ‘majors’ in the first place.

 

And therein lies the big difference, for me.  European clubs - not just English ones - represent the locality.  They are social hubs, where an expression of civic pride / coming together happens - clubs are completely tribal.  That’s why people who support a club to which they have no connection other than the fact they saw them win a lot on TV when they were kids are sneered at - quite apart from anything else, they undermine the entire fabric of the game.  

 

The existence of those ‘fans’ are why local sporting institutions like football clubs now sell for stupid money.  To most supporters who actually attend, ‘fan experiences’, shiny merchandise, etc are utterly meaningless because the pleasure comes from a tribal sense of togetherness, not because the club shop has shiny trinkets.  Some of the best fan ‘experiences’ I’ve had have been in crumbling shitholes.  Some of the worst in shiny superdomes.  You’re in the place for a couple of hours, the vast majority of which is spent staring at a green rectangle.  I’ve rarely been arsed about the fact that the half time bar is decked out to the standards normally reserved for upmarket restaurants. 

The tribal thing is why clubs in English football’s fourth tier can pull five-figure attendances.  That’s how several clubs who have literally won nowt - ever - and don’t even have large supporter bases (Watford, Palace, Brentford etc) can be in the ‘majors’ whilst huge clubs with great histories and sizeable catchment areas can languish outside of it.  The US is so culturally different, yet because it is anglophone many assume it is somehow more alike.  I’d no sooner want to adopt the US sports model in the UK than I’d expect to tell the average American how they should change their sporting institutions.  I fundamentally don’t understand it, and it isn’t really any of my business. 

 

I don’t personally think American owners / directors are any more likely to sign up to nonsense like ESL (though I don’t doubt they’d see a ‘logic’ to it); Arsenal, Juve, Barcelona, Spurs, Real, Man City etc were only too happy to hop-on despite having very different ownership models.  Truth is, the influx in money to the game has meant the continual pressure to ‘improve’ things which don’t need improving because the money dictates it (more CL games, more CL places, too much input from TV companies etc) - and that’s not an ‘American’ thing, it’s a capitalist thing.  For the first century or so of its existence, football clubs weren’t actually allowed to even pay dividends, per FA rules.  Money & greed are the issue.

[Kanj]

[ElDiablo]

I'm all for cultural relativism, me. 

 

[Ghandis Flip-Flop]

It’s also the perfect illustration of the fact that you lot have a very limited attention span and a complete inability to delay gratification. ??‍♂️

7 hours ago, bobloblaw said:

 

My favorite is the one who went to a live NBA game and was just meh.  Live NBA is the peak of "holy shit these guys are athletic freaks'."

 

 

[RodneyCisse]

8 hours ago, Tomato Deuce said:

It is a bit weird how y’all get all kinds of hot and bothered by Americans in particular being involved in the game. Far more so than any other foreigners.

I think it’s that they’re only doing it for sports washing unlike some other investment countries.

[TheBrownBottle]

Sports laundering I think they call it over there.  Or at least the Glazers do. 

[Dr.Spaceman]

1 hour ago, Ghandis Flip-Flop said:

It’s also the perfect illustration of the fact that you lot have a very limited attention span and a complete inability to delay gratification. ??‍♂️

 

 

 

Jesus Christ 

[Kanj]

Wow. 

[Unbelievable]

Sorry for going back on topic, but does anybody know what the 1.5b investment part of the purchase price will be spent on?

[Guest]

9 minutes ago, Unbelievable said:

Sorry for going back on topic, but does anybody know what the 1.5b investment part of the purchase price will be spent on?

Stadium, first team, academy, women’s