Like Brexit and Trump's victory in elections over in America. Something that will turn the rotten tide. There. I said it. We have had years of corruption at the very top. We still have people in FIFA wagging the finger at us for daring to commemorate the dead and threatening us with sanctions if we disobey. Heartening to see we disobeyed. If only the FA always showed as much gumption and balls instead of the craven bungling we are used to. W still have the highest admission prices in the world, some of the money has gone on building the best stadia in te world, but the product on pitch is pants and the national team a joke. How can you continue to pull the wool over the public's eyes with admission prices? The idea back in 1992 was to tempt over the biggest stars away from Serie A into our league and a raising of the quality and sophistication. That should in theory lead to our team being among the best in the world like Italy's was. Except it hasn't worked like that. We continue to pay top dollar for a league dominated by a handful of teams backed by billionaires, and we are expected to believe every week that the results could any way, when most people realise that most games are a foregone conclusion. It's not a level playing field so the majority of games are predictable and skewed in favour of one of the Top 4. We now see the unheard of phenomenon of fans being given free transport to away games- surely a sign of **** football has become that people have to be bribed to go to away games? How long before a combination of the **** national team, the skewed PL, the overpriced tickets, the overpaid players, the unsavoury owners (ours for example) becomes a critical mass, and the tide turns? Maybe never?
Maybe we need a foul mouthed, zenophobic demagogue to stand at the high alter and disperse all those foreign untalented players from our leagues. We can then all be shocked that he has no plan B when everyone stops watching our league, and all the money that so quickly poured in disappears. And when our national team continue to disappoint we can wonder where we'll find the money to fund all those coaches and build those all weather pitches to allow our kids to learn to be as technically gifted as the Germans, French, Italians and Spanish. Maybe he can have a **** hair do, or have an obsessive interest in self-determination laid down by his privilged upbringing so he can cut taxes for the rich whilst selling an empty lie to the disenfranchised 'underclass' who lap up his racist bile because of the years of pain he and his ruling elite have so carefully caused them by de-regulating hither and thither, cutting here and there, whilst filling their own Swiss bank accounts with the immoral earnings of their Machivellian pursuits. Or maybe not.
Can our national team get any worse? Maybe it might get better if more English players were prioritised so that they gained match experience in the PL?
Southampton are probably a good example of young english kids been given a chance. But they have to be good enough obviously. It's such a complex issue really. A) because the premier league revolves around money and clubs want to play their best players to maximise their earnings and stay in the league. B) Not every club has brilliant youth facilities and bring enough good enough players through C) Agents have too much power, and it's hard to wrestle that back D) clubs also want to maximise their earnings through licensing and bringing star players from other leagues is a key part of this. There's so many more reasons, I'd like to think it could be something organic because then the premier league would retain it's appeal.
Football is rotten from the top downwards, money has distorted and corrupted the spirit of the game. If the PL must be governed by money, let it be along US lines where each franchise has a similar pot of money and therefore similar prospects of winning the ****ing thing.
The Americans have some of the best and worst ideas when it comes to running sports. However, there's no doubt the way they run their sports creates a fairer and more competitive league.
Part of the problem remains the demographic of the fans themselves. We are all too old to improve atmosphere. In previous years a tartan army descending on Wembley was a drunken rabble of youths, now its middle aged. How does football encourage our youth to attend? A ticket costs the same as Fifa17 and that technology connects lads in their bedrooms together, most premier league football clubs can't physically sit groups of youths together away from the masses of aging old mute sit down shut up gits. Football needs safe standing areas or the libraryization will continue.
So why have the noisy youths of yesterday turned into sit down & shut up old gits? Is it the stadiums? The old safe standing again? How does Stoke continually keep being reported as a great atmosphere? The Germans bouncing up & down wherever they go?
I've just said it's the aging demographic, everywhere is **** at home, Stoke included, only away fans generate atmosphere now. Germany charges less and has standing areas.
Don't they just use the money they get from Sky or something, specifically set aside for supporters? Anyway, at least they do it, what do we do for the fans?
And let's you drink booze at your seat ( in litres at a time) and smoke...like grown ups It's just fundamentally different (and better)
A few thoughts; my 13 year old son and his mates love the game but are as interested in its FIFA/PES incarnation as they are the real thing. I went to my first match at BP in '73 - unaccompanied by an adult. I'm not even certain they would admit an unaccompanied minor these days. Also, I think the national team have a lot to answer for in respect of the lack of interest. The last time we were any good was 20 years ago; if then, any of the team had slagged off the support as Rooney did for being insufficiently enthusiastic of his crappy effort he would probably have been given a slap by his team mates back in the dressing room. Jim White, speaking on R5 recently, testified that one player had called his agent before the Scotland game to ask if there was anything he could do to get out of the England side. The FA should only pick players from the FA leagues maybe, and players would be able to confidentially say they do not wish to be considered for selection. At least then we would have a team that played with pride. Basically, the current lot are a bunch of fannies.