In due respect you wont replicate the english atmosphere overseas. The whole match day experience i mean. wathing the early kickoff game in a pub, having a few pints, walking over to the stadium, the atmosphere building up in the stadium. there simply arent enough expats who will recreate the overseas and no offense but US fans who try to copy European fans are kind of cheesy.
Well no but it starts a chain of events. No atmosphere at games, games become boring, foreign fans lose interest, no more money. when the premier league bubble bursts which it will if these plans go ahead, it will be the people who live in Bolton, Reading, Wigan, Sunderland etc who will keep the league running not some plastic fans from Thailand, Australia and the US.
I think you're maybe guilty of overgeneralizing if you think that all foreign fans are that fickle so as to abandon their teams when things get 'boring' or 'tough'. The existence of Newcastle fans in North America flies in the face of that idea. I agree, obviously, that local fans are far more important but you seem to be assuming that foreign fans have zero connection with the club simply because they aren't local, and will switch to whatever else is popular at the drop of the hat. There's some like that, to be sure, but I would guess that there's also a large portion who wouldn't. Feel free to go after those who are actually plastics, but you seem to be using 'plastic' and 'foreign' interchangeably.
Well with the exception of expats they are plastic fans. Are they English? No Then why support an English team? These Newcastle fans in North America, dont they have MLS teams to support who need the money a lot more than English clubs. Id like to know what their connection to Newcastle is, if the answer is they watched them on TV and liked what they saw or they liked their strip, im sorry that is not a connection to the club. I think a lot of foreign fans away in the developing football countries underestimate what it means to be a fan. I would class you as followers not fans. Anyone who argues you can support more than one team is talking absolute rubbish.
You could say the same within the US. Why do some fans from a certain region support colleges teams of universities that they have never atteneded? Same for NFL, MLB and NBA. How many people love the Yankees that aren't from NY? So international boundries aside...there are fans all over the world that support certain clubs and their reasons for doing so are theirs and theirs alone. If you choose not to, fine, but unless you know what goes through everyone's mind when they choose to support a team, any team of any sport, you are better off not putting labels on them.
Presumably the same goes for players then, no? Or is it just foreign fans that should be excluded and have such hostility directed towards them? It must have been hellish for you everytime a foreigner like Quinn put on the Sunderland jersey, given he has no real connection to the team. I would say in quite a few cases, no. Even if you consider USL, there's still a large amount of the populace that doesn't have access to anything that resembles a decent level of soccer. You don't think that something that starts somewhat trivially could maybe develop into a meaningful connection to the club? I assume that last comment is directed at me? Cause when I started following Chelsea, there was no decent soccer anywhere near where I live, but when TFC started I naturally started following them. Presumably you would have me 'drop' my fanship/followship or whatever to Chelsea, but that would be the same sort of fickleness that you are accusing foreign fans of in the first place. I guess I just don't understand why you seem to show such hostility towards foreign fans, as it's not something I see from every other English fan on this site, and rarely (if ever) from Italians towards Serie A fans or Spaniards towards La Liga fans.
As far as colleges go they represent the community/state. I see the Hokies and Cavaliers as representing Virginia (plus we dont have any major pro teams here). Its also nice to support a team that will never relocate because we refuse to build them a stadium. The thing about the big coverage with school sports is due to the fact that are sports didnt revolve around social/athletic clubs like in europe but instead revolved around high schools and colleges. As far as supporting the yankees and not being from new york, its like supporting Man U and being from London; glory hunting.
Once again I agree with you. I really like the people on the Newcastle board but apart from the tiny percentage that were actually have a true connection with the club I know that they don't have the same connection as I or any other person from Newcastle can have. The same goes for anyone on these boards that isn't from the place that the club they support is from. Support is tribal and just choosing a tribe isn't the same as being part of one.
I think the big reason that many Americans follow English (and other European) teams is because, like mentioned by others, there just are no close professional teams to them. In England, each of the first four levels and much of the fifth have fully professional teams (~100 teams in my estimation) in a country 50,000 square miles big. In the U.S., there are 30 (counting MLS, USL-1 and USL-2 teams located solely in the U.S.) in a country 3.8 million square miles. There just aren't that many teams here. And I know that there are also some people who do live near a professional American team who still would rather follow English football simply because the quality of the football and the atmospheres are so much better. Personally, I also like the format of English/European football where everybody plays everybody twice, once home and once away and the team that finishes first wins the title without the need for playoffs (which is one of the reasons I absolutely hate the idea of adding a 39th game). I do agree that you should support one team - you can have other teams that you follow, but you only support one team. But that team can be thousands of miles away. With that said, however, I do completely understand and agree that it there is no way that will ever replicate going to games on a regular basis and actually "living" the club. But something needs to be said for fans who are thousands of miles away and watch every game they can possibly can on TV and/or the Internet, win, lose or draw, because that does take an impressive amount of devotion.
I understand this, but I still don't see the need for some English fans to act so hostile towards foreign ones. Yeah, we don't have the same connection to the club, but why do some feel the need to rub that in our faces by using terms like plastic?
I totally agree and asked the same question in a different thread. Growing up in the same city as the club you support obviously gives you a stronger connection to the club and most people will probably agree that the most hardcore fans are these ones as they are near the club and usually have inside information outsiders won't. But some people here make it sound like it gives you a mandate to talk down fans who aren't from there which is wrong. You can be a 'fan' or 'supporter' without being born in that city. There seems to be an overemphasis on geographics. Telling a Man Utd supporter in Asia he's not really a 'fan' because he wans't born in Manchester is almost like telling someone who loves to eat sushi they don't really like to eat sushi because their not born in Japan. Kind of ridiculous don't you think?
If money could be made from Hurling, Niall Quinn wouldnt have considered buying Sunderland in the first place. Although Quinn is considered God in Sunderland there are elements of the club which he doesnt quite understand. I watch Spanish, Italian, dutch etc leagues, doesnt make me a fan though. Watching on TV and attending the odd game a year would not develop a real connection to a club. That connection needs you to live and breathe the club 7 days a week. Im interested did you start follwing Chelsea when they had Kerry Dixon in the team or Gianfranco Zola. Because you will be the start of the death of the sport yet you dont realise it.
Maybe this highlights my point best, you choose your club on certain criteria: A) Hometown B) It was your familys club C) You played for the club (rare) Choosing a team just because you like them is not being a supporter.
What? How will I and others like myself 'be the death of the sport'? A tad overdramatic, no? I've admitted I don't have the same connection to the club as a local, but what exactly is it about me watching Prem games that takes away from your experience as a fan? I'm not advocating for this absurd games abroad idea, remember. You seem to think that all foreign fans have no respect for the traditions of English football. There are some like that, but for others like myself, the traditions are part of the attraction to the sport. Again (and I feel like I'm repeating myself), if we are such a 'threat', why is it only a small minority of English fans like yourself that seem so xenophobic? I've never heard comments like yours above from the English posters on the Chelsea boards, they seem quite welcoming of those who show a genuine interest in the club. And why do Italian or Spanish fans not see the need for this hostility towards foreigners? Why is it such a uniquely English phenomena? Edit: I also find it somewhat odd that someone who labels North American fans as the 'death of the sport', you are registered on an American soccer forum where you are bound to interact with more of this plague on football that is foreign fans.
I didnt say North American fans, i only used the term plastic. Those who follow a club in England but their main team are in the MLS i dont mind. However there are some who claim to be supporters of English teams with multiple teams on their avatar. If it seems that I am xenophobic or these posts have been directed at you i apologise. The reason English fans react the most though is that its our league which is affected the most. Kickoff times at stupid o clock just so its at a watchable time half away across the world. New replica kits every season just to make more money from their global fans, meaningless preseason games in the summer against foregin opposition when our lower league teams are going out of business.
Wouldn't kick-off times be at all times of the day just for U.K. broadcasts? I always thought the games were broadcast at ~noon and ~5 p.m. and various times on Sunday so that British/Irish TV stations could show games outside the normal Saturday at 3 p.m. time slot. I didn't think it originally had anything to do with overseas viewers, but I could be wrong - you're in England, so you likely know much more about that than me. New replica kits are extremely stupid. Here in America, our major sports teams (i.e. baseball, football, etc.) don't change uniforms every single year and that is one part of soccer that I am not a fan of. And it really bothers me when the U.S. national teams change their kits all the time (especially since they're usually ugly! or, in the case of our women's team, to a color that is not even one of our national colors: gold/bronze). What's wrong with preseason games abroad? And how is that hurting lower league teams? I do understand the point that lower league teams are being hurt overall by the international involvement (i.e. the difference between the haves and the have-nots increasing at a fast rate). I have always been impressed with just how strong the lower leagues in England really are and that does disturb me that those are being hurt. As you fully know, there is much more to English football than the Premier League, and that has been steadily hurt the last couple decades.
The kickoff times should be at 3pm on a saturday only or at least limit the number of live games to one a day. Its a joke when the majority of games are played on the Sunday, this is tradition in italy and Spain but not England. The big teams should be playing lower league sides fighting for their futures to help them attract the fickle fans for one game to make some money. The only side that do this at the minute or Liverpool who play Wrexham quite often, the others either field XI teams with one or two names but the majority are youngsters. Teams whinge when the fixtures get congested late in the season, ie playing to early on the weekend after a european program this is just but when they fly half way round the world for a few preseason games then complain about injuries or international games it really irratates me.
My only point with the TV was that I believed the TV companies switched up all the game times with the original purpose of gaining TV money within the United Kingdom. In other words, that the international interest in the game was not a contributing factor to games being played at all times of the weekend. At least that's what it looks like from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_football_on_television Good point regarding friendlies - I didn't think of that.
I don't think friendlies are a major issue. Of more concern is the inflationary effect the premier league has on wages. That's all that's trickling down to the other leagues, not the wealth that Scudamore claims does.
It's business, like it or not. I saw England play the USA in a friendly in Chicago several years ago and it wasn't a whole lot different than some games I've been to in England. 55,000 fans....a little more than what usually attends a game in the UK, aside from Emirates and Old Trafford. The pubbing and prematch buildup was basically the same. The big 4 might play well over here, but as far as a Mackems match, I'm not so sure.