I remember we were having too much fun in pub and missed the first 15 minutes of a game at Crystal Palace When we got to the ground City were 2-0 up. Final score 2-2. I wish the game had been over after 15 minutes!
But this tweet misses the key point that the blackout isn’t in place to protect PL crowds, it’s in place to protect the lower and non league clubs. Theres nothing in the world as deeply supported as the English football league pyramid and that brings tremendous benefits to the game in the country. If that means games can’t be televised for 2 hours on a Saturday afternoon it feels like a fair trade off.
Yepp. I've never seen anyone leaving a cinema ten minutes before the end of the film, or on my rare visits to the theatre. Not sure what it is with some people. I knew a few who would always leave early, but it's common practice so that's up to them, l suppose.
I knew that would be the response because he clarifies that in his own responses. He's not talking about protecting the pl crowds he's pointing out they still go despite all games being available to stream. If it's so deeply supported with such passionate fans why are people so afraid to embrace modernity and think the fans would turn up their toes and stay home instead?
But the PL teams have loads of supporters so if because the game was being shown live on TV 25% of stadium capacity stayed home to watch there would be others supporters waiting to take their seat. In the lower leagues when your only getting 3 or 4 thousand in a 10,000 seater ground if 25% of the usual support stay home to watch on TV there will be no others to take their place and the club is 25% down on numbers. I think that is the theory of why the TV rules are as they are.
It’s more to do with attracting future generations of fans. If PL games are on TV at the same time as a lower league game, chances are younger fans would rather watch the big game at home, that starts a huge slow drip feed towards lower and non league clubs going out of business. Football tourism is a much lower deal the lower down the pyramid you get. I certainly wouldn’t want to see City in League 2 these days up against PL games on TV. I appreciate illegal streams are already doing that - which is why it probably does need looking at but I think some sort of black out needs to remain.
The younger fans can do that though. All games are on firesticks, streaming, etc. It isn't 2001 anymore. The only difference to legalising it would be putting more money in the game, giving more value to sky subscriptions (though I'm sure they'd go up in price but at least you'd get all games) and likely putting downward pressure on ticket prices. Anyway, guess we'll see when it finally happens but here in Aus it has happened so it's not strictly hypothetical. I appreciate there's different cultures so not precisely 1:1.
I do think there’s a huge difference to making it completely accessible to it still being a bit of a faff though. Like how music downloading was rife when it was illegal but gained even more in popularity as soon as iTunes came along. As soon as something is simple even more people do it. I agree with you, we can’t ignore it forever otherwise football will actually miss the boat and the future of clubs could get even worse but I also don’t think it’s as simple as just opening everything up either.
More useless stats re: Attendances 13 games in thus far. 7 at home..6 away . Total aggregate = 280,080. Average = 21,544... Top to bottom.... 1. 09/08/2025 A Coventry............ 29052 2. 18/10/2025 A Birmingham City..27215 3. 01/11/2025 A Norwich........... 25724 4. 20/09/2025 H Southampton. 22085 5. 30/08/2025 A Bristol City....... 21385 6. 04/10/2025 H Sheff Utd... 21030 7. 25/10/2025 H Charlton.... 20804 8. 17/08/2025 H Oxford.... 20667 9. 23/08/2025 H Blackburn.. 20518 10. 21/10/2025 H Leicester City. 20211 11. 30/09/2025 H Preston NE... 18264 12. 27/09/2025 A Watford.......... 17973 13. 13/09/2025 A Swansea ......15152
