Football is dead.

[morty]

Or nearly so. Mark frigging Hughes appointed manager of Southampton. Its the same old names trotted out, by desperate sides trying to save their Premiership skins. Fans are disconnected from clubs, everyone apart from Man City fans are pi$$ed off. Look at the glut of teams in the Championship who have little chance of promotion, clubs that you would label "big". The Sheffields, Forest, Derby, Leeds etc etc etc. Clubs that may never make it again into the big time. Look at the clubs desperate to cling onto Premiership survival, the whole thing is a huge joke. nothing more than a money making scheme for rich playboys.

Something has to change.

 

[GJP]

Get rich or die tryin'.

 

[OldRobert]

Most of it a boring joke as well Morty. Those who complain about our football being boring need to take a look at most of the PL rubbish. I have watched the game for a long time, and very little that I see today excites me, and it can't all be old age. Sure there are some excellent players in the PL, but the vast majority are nothing special churning out unwatchable boring carp, while most of the time they are outplayed by the 4 or 5 rich boys with the quality. We all know who is going to be in the top 6 in the PL for the next 10 years. What a yawn is that?

 

[Canaryboy]

I'm bored of football too actually.

And find the money in the game grotesque. I'm actually planning to try and follow a local non-league side to every away game next season, to see if I can get interested again.

Will have my work cut out because of all the postponed games etc at that level. E.g. postponed on a Saturday, so played on a Thursday night at 2 days notice or something.

Perhaps I should start a 'ground hopping' blog.

I think I could enjoy football again if I knew that the players were getting paid £50 a game (or £0), had to wash their own kit... and still didn't bottle out of 50/50's like a lot of professionals do these days

Plus you can have a fag and a beer while watching the game.

 

[Canaryboy]

The Premier League became the most famous league in the world because of the Zola's, Bergkamp's, Le Tissiers.... real characters. And those legends would earn perhaps £25k a week, and nobody would begrudge them that.

Now you've got Man Utd and Arsenal playing for a draw to 'consolidate'.

Boring game, full of boring c*nts, only way to save it is to put more power back into the hands of fans - like they do in Germany.

Open up the books, get the fans to vote on ticket prices, etc.

Even vote out the MD, or 'President' like they do in Spain when things aren't going well.

And FFS bring back safe standing (or at least get rid of the 'sit down' nazis) and let people take their beer to their seat in the 1st and 46th minute. Oh and smoking cages for home fans.

I'm not talking about going back to the 70's and 80's.... but to the 90's perhaps.

 

[Scott]

I couldn't be more excited about football at the moment if I tried! Sure Norwich aren't doing very well at the moment, but that doesn't mean I don't still get the same buzz come Saturday. Sure, this season is a write off for Norwich but next season I predict big things

Also don't forget guys we still have the World Cup to look forward to in June! which for some reason I am getting very excited about, I feel like a little kid again at 25 waiting for it to roll along. Not that I think England are going to do any good, I just love it.

 

[morty]

I couldn't be more excited about football at the moment if I tried! Sure Norwich aren't doing very well at the moment, but that doesn't mean I don't still get the same buzz come Saturday. Sure, this season is a write off for Norwich but next season I predict big things

Also don't forget guys we still have the World Cup to look forward to in June! which for some reason I am getting very excited about, I feel like a little kid again at 25 waiting for it to roll along. Not that I think England are going to do any good, I just love it.

I couldn't tell you the last time I watched a Premiership match and actually enjoyed it. Don't get me wrong, I still have that buzz for the Nodge, but football in general is slowly but surely disconnecting from me. I loved the last round of the cup though!

 

[hogesar]

See I think this season's relegation battle is going to go down to the last game and be pretty entertaining (since we're not involved in it!). The promotion battle in the champs is still pretty intense too.

There's a lot of boring games in the Premier League but that's no different to any other league - there are some right crackers at times too though.

 

[GJP]

As we come into the final few weeks of the season the majority of Prem and Champs teams have something to play for.

European places, play-off places, relegation avoidance and the Champs title is still very much up for grabs.

There is only a small number of teams who have got nothing to get excited about. Unfortunately Norwich are one.

 

[OldRobert]

I couldn't tell you the last time I watched a Premiership match and actually enjoyed it. Don't get me wrong, I still have that buzz for the Nodge, but football in general is slowly but surely disconnecting from me. I loved the last round of the cup though!

^This 110%. Well said that man.

 

[Fenway Frank]

I haven’t watched match of the day since we were relegated, although I do watch motd 2. England matches are way beyond anything described as boring at carra rud. Two fa cup matches on the telly at the weekend, I will have them on but will either turn over half way throug( the first one or be doing something else while they’re on.
Whilst it’s a different form of entertainment, I’ve just bought tickets to see Travis, and as a treat for Mrs Joe, Lionel Ritchie. It’s not just football that is pricing out ordinary people as I never thought I would be spending that sort of money for some live music.

 

[GJP]

Ken Dodd, Stephen Hawking, Jim Bowen and now football. What a week this has been.

 

[OldRobert]

Ken Dodd, Stephen Hawking, Jim Bowen and now football. What a week this has been.

And not necessarily in that order!

 

[Fenway Frank]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/43547533

 

[morty]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/43547533

Urgh

 

[Fenway Frank]

Chelsea chuck a bit of loose change at a young player knowing they can just ditch if it doesn’t work out. Crewe lose the chance to make some decent money., this needs to change. Chelsea really do abuse this at the moment, how many players have they got out on loan ?

 

[Fenway Frank]

Googled it, it’s 33

http://www.planetfootball.com/quick-reads/every-one-chelseas-33-loan-players-fared-far-season/

 

[morty]

Chelsea chuck a bit of loose change at a young player knowing they can just ditch if it doesn’t work out. Crewe lose the chance to make some decent money., this needs to change. Chelsea really do abuse this at the moment, how many players have they got out on loan ?

It does have to change, it stinks. Its killing the game, chances are that lad will never make it at Chelsea, he'll rot in their U23's then go on a succession of loans. It isn't developing players, its just greed.

 

[GJP]

Yeah but we do it too (not saying it makes it any better).

As for this particular deal, Crewe are in the bottom half of League 2. How many players are getting bought out of League 2 for more than £300k? Even if the lad broke into their first team next season and managed to score a few goals in that league he still isn't getting bought for more or much more than that and if he ended up coming up short maybe the big boys don't come in for him.

And the lad now gets to work with better players, better coaches and even if it doesn't work out at Chelsea it has probably opened more doors for him.

 

[Dubai Mark]

Good thread this, so many comments I agree with and feelings I share.

The last two or three seasons have really knocked the stuffing out of me when it comes to Norwich City and also the Premier League.

Maybe its my age as I'm getting fed up with other things too, but its just so frustrating seeing football go the way it is. I subscribe to the Premier League over here, get every single match live, I settle down to watch a few games and more often than not I turn over within half an hour or complain throughout about how boring the match is......then just occasionally you actually get a barnstormer, but you cant really judge what game it will be. I get fed up with it, in particular the diving and also the ridiculous bad mouths many of the players have, really is about time both were really stamped on.

The thing is that I see how popular our Premier League is here with many nationalities, huge in fact, although other than the UAE Canaries you will rarely see a City shirt amongst the sea of Citeh, Manure, Chelski and Arsenal shirts and feel that I'm not the audience anyway.

As for City, well being an expat I was heavily reliant on seeing our live matches when we were in the Premier League, but now only see the occasional live game and of course the one or two matches I go to when I am in the UK.......These last few seasons have been so frustrating too, and whilst I like that we do not have mega rich owners and that our owners love the club, I really think they have made a few dodgy decisions that have taken us to where we are right now, and I'm really just keeping my fingers crossed that the current "rebuild" is going to work out for us....felt really low after Millwall, but I have to be honest and say I have seen some signs that we could come through this and ultimately have a serious stab at promotion next season (as an outsider and play off place that is).....providing of course the rebuilding hasnt stopped and we get a couple of decent strikers on board....I may even start to like Weber if things are decent next season.....