Interesting Martin but unfortunately I think you are banging the same drum and it's still unheard. The clubs will not change and are far too short-sighted to see that the next generation of fan watches from home or as a special visit on a birthday or celebration. I wrote this piece back in July when football first came back on the TV after lockdown. We are all wasting our time though!
FOOTBALL IS BACK!
Or is it?
Premier League football returned to our screens last week, but it seems a long way off until the fans are allowed back in the stadiums.
So, is football really back? Have you watched the games? Are you watching with or without the added atmosphere being supplied by the broadcasters?
The one thing it has shown us, is how important the fans are to the overall product.
The same product that is sold throughout the world for billions of pounds.
I would suggest that you could break football down into three parts:
The Premier League product, (The Show).
The Players (The Cast)
The Audience (The Fans)
The only difference here being the fact that the audience rarely participates in a West End production……….but it does in a comedy. Ask a comedian about performing to an empty room; why do you think TV comedies are filmed in front of a studio audience?
So, do the footballers feel the same way?
The FA Cup Final at Wembley behind closed doors. How does “The Cast” feel about that. I think we all know the answer and, as much as the fans have shouted their importance from the terraces, the game has never been in a position to test out the theory…………..until now.
The fan groups that have been formed in the last few years to try and hold their beloved clubs to account are now in a position to say, “I told you so”.
Fan groups that were never required in the 20th Century because the working man left the factory and got on the bus with the performers that he was about to spend his couple of shillings to watch. Performers that would join him after the game in the local public house and discuss what had just happened. Happier times?
Topflight footballers today are kept in a bubble (Literally at the time of writing) and have absolutely no idea what is happening in the real world. It is not their fault; the game is awash with money and as the stars of the show, surely it is only right that they should be paid accordingly. Club owners, that are desperate for success, throw money at them.
The stars get all of the money, so what about the supporting cast? Fans are being asked to pay more and more as the demand for tickets gets greater. The price of tickets has spiralled out of control and the ordinary man on the street has been priced out of the game.
The fan groups protests have fallen on deaf ears (Although they would refer to the Twenty is Plenty campaign that saw the price of tickets for away fans greatly reduced).
Well now is the time for the biggest revolution that the football fan has ever seen. The clubs, the players and, most importantly, the TV companies have realised that the game without the fans just isn’t the same. They have tried to replicate it with cardboard cut-outs and piped in crowd noise but it doesn’t work; the game is a live product that feeds off of emotion and reaction.
So, what do we do about it?
The fans must unite in support of a protest that demands all ticket prices in the Premier League are reduced by 50%. They must boycott games until the people at the top realise that they are a serious part of the product and desperately needed to make it the global entertainment sensation that people all around the world worship and adore.
The TV companies must already be sharpening their pencils in readiness for the next round of negotiations. They will demand that the crowds return or the price will be greatly reduced because the product just isn’t the same. How long will it be before the foreign TV corporations realise that the audiences are dropping?
Already people are turning off and unless the fans return quickly, a large audience may realise that they have been hoodwinked all of these years and that actually, the game isn’t quite as great as the marketing would suggest.
In the Premier League the money taken at the turnstiles is no longer a significant part of a clubs turnover but just in case they start crying that they cannot afford it I have the solution.
Make savings in players wages because, after all, it turns out that they are not as important as we thought they were.
Interesting thoughts BUT purely from a Spurs angle consider the pent up demand for season tickets. I think there will be more than enough fans to fill any void created by the possible change in attitude
Excellent, Martin. Football’s age-old growth strategy had been based on nothing more than inertia, habit & hope. This article brilliantly dissects that. Have shared.
Agree about the umbilical cord between fans and clubs being broken and how for quite a few it may never be fully restored. One hopes that the deeper sense of community that we have all been feeling during these troubled times will be also reflected in the world of football.
Interesting Martin but unfortunately I think you are banging the same drum and it's still unheard. The clubs will not change and are far too short-sighted to see that the next generation of fan watches from home or as a special visit on a birthday or celebration. I wrote this piece back in July when football first came back on the TV after lockdown. We are all wasting our time though!
FOOTBALL IS BACK!
Or is it?
Premier League football returned to our screens last week, but it seems a long way off until the fans are allowed back in the stadiums.
So, is football really back? Have you watched the games? Are you watching with or without the added atmosphere being supplied by the broadcasters?
The one thing it has shown us, is how important the fans are to the overall product.
The same product that is sold throughout the world for billions of pounds.
I would suggest that you could break football down into three parts:
The Premier League product, (The Show).
The Players (The Cast)
The Audience (The Fans)
The only difference here being the fact that the audience rarely participates in a West End production……….but it does in a comedy. Ask a comedian about performing to an empty room; why do you think TV comedies are filmed in front of a studio audience?
So, do the footballers feel the same way?
The FA Cup Final at Wembley behind closed doors. How does “The Cast” feel about that. I think we all know the answer and, as much as the fans have shouted their importance from the terraces, the game has never been in a position to test out the theory…………..until now.
The fan groups that have been formed in the last few years to try and hold their beloved clubs to account are now in a position to say, “I told you so”.
Fan groups that were never required in the 20th Century because the working man left the factory and got on the bus with the performers that he was about to spend his couple of shillings to watch. Performers that would join him after the game in the local public house and discuss what had just happened. Happier times?
Topflight footballers today are kept in a bubble (Literally at the time of writing) and have absolutely no idea what is happening in the real world. It is not their fault; the game is awash with money and as the stars of the show, surely it is only right that they should be paid accordingly. Club owners, that are desperate for success, throw money at them.
The stars get all of the money, so what about the supporting cast? Fans are being asked to pay more and more as the demand for tickets gets greater. The price of tickets has spiralled out of control and the ordinary man on the street has been priced out of the game.
The fan groups protests have fallen on deaf ears (Although they would refer to the Twenty is Plenty campaign that saw the price of tickets for away fans greatly reduced).
Well now is the time for the biggest revolution that the football fan has ever seen. The clubs, the players and, most importantly, the TV companies have realised that the game without the fans just isn’t the same. They have tried to replicate it with cardboard cut-outs and piped in crowd noise but it doesn’t work; the game is a live product that feeds off of emotion and reaction.
So, what do we do about it?
The fans must unite in support of a protest that demands all ticket prices in the Premier League are reduced by 50%. They must boycott games until the people at the top realise that they are a serious part of the product and desperately needed to make it the global entertainment sensation that people all around the world worship and adore.
The TV companies must already be sharpening their pencils in readiness for the next round of negotiations. They will demand that the crowds return or the price will be greatly reduced because the product just isn’t the same. How long will it be before the foreign TV corporations realise that the audiences are dropping?
Already people are turning off and unless the fans return quickly, a large audience may realise that they have been hoodwinked all of these years and that actually, the game isn’t quite as great as the marketing would suggest.
In the Premier League the money taken at the turnstiles is no longer a significant part of a clubs turnover but just in case they start crying that they cannot afford it I have the solution.
Make savings in players wages because, after all, it turns out that they are not as important as we thought they were.
Interesting thoughts BUT purely from a Spurs angle consider the pent up demand for season tickets. I think there will be more than enough fans to fill any void created by the possible change in attitude
Excellent, Martin. Football’s age-old growth strategy had been based on nothing more than inertia, habit & hope. This article brilliantly dissects that. Have shared.
Agree about the umbilical cord between fans and clubs being broken and how for quite a few it may never be fully restored. One hopes that the deeper sense of community that we have all been feeling during these troubled times will be also reflected in the world of football.