Cheery Sunday reading: Rip Macc

td53

td53

Well-known member
https://mclfoot.blogspot.com/2020/09/the-golden-egg-rip-macclesfield-and-lot.html

This is a long read and it's probably not for everyone!

It's a first draft of something I want to make a bit (a lot?) clearer and tighter.

Some of you will probably disagree with it fundamentally and that's fine. I respect the pleasure you take in football. I also really enjoy Sean's blog and UTMP analysis so when I'm ranting about stats, I'm not having a go at them at all! Stats are great, I just get bored of TV/Radio etc saying nothing and dressing up games as more than they are. Used well they bring insight and both Sean and UTMP use them really well in a way I can't.

I'd be really interested in any insights, contributions or feedback. Particularly any experience that could put meat on the bones of some bits.

It's not finished, I think parts of the end are weak and it digresses a bit in places and lacks wider perspectives/voices but it's kind of there as a structure. I'm thinking of trawling Andy Holt's timeline and asking him if I can use some of his tweets as one perspective.

It's proof read and redrafted enough to be mostly readable anyhow!
 
"The EPL is a corrupt behemoth whose malign influence is global."

Behemoth!! That gets word of the day 😁
 
td53 said:
https://mclfoot.blogspot.com/2020/09/the-golden-egg-rip-macclesfield-and-lot.html

This is a long read and it's probably not for everyone!

It's a first draft of something I want to make a bit (a lot?) clearer and tighter.

Some of you will probably disagree with it fundamentally and that's fine. I respect the pleasure you take in football. I also really enjoy Sean's blog and UTMP analysis so when I'm ranting about stats, I'm not having a go at them at all! Stats are great, I just get bored of TV/Radio etc saying nothing and dressing up games as more than they are. Used well they bring insight and both Sean and UTMP use them really well in a way I can't.

I'd be really interested in any insights, contributions or feedback. Particularly any experience that could put meat on the bones of some bits.

It's not finished, I think parts of the end are weak and it digresses a bit in places and lacks wider perspectives/voices but it's kind of there as a structure. I'm thinking of trawling Andy Holt's timeline and asking him if I can use some of his tweets as one perspective.

It's proof read and redrafted enough to be mostly readable anyhow!
Click to expand...
Great stuff. As much as the FA Cup is entwined with our sense of history, since 1992, the FA have put all their eggs in their own League and from a financial perspective see the Football League as rivals, not something to be nurtured and encouraged. Inviting u23 teams into the EFL Trophy is like giving your kids a snake to play with. You're encouraging your fans to go along because it's a big club in town. It's demeaning.

The FA don't give a toss, yet still have control through the Council. It's madness.

In all seriousness, the best chance for clubs to survive is a break up of the EPL due to a European or even World League. After a while, the novelty would wear off, and the fans would want to see teams they can relate to playing local derbies, not Chelsea v BATE Borisov. Bring it on.
 
Wizaard said:
Great stuff. As much as the FA Cup is entwined with our sense of history, since 1992, the FA have put all their eggs in their own League and from a financial perspective see the Football League as rivals, not something to be nurtured and encouraged. Inviting u23 teams into the EFL Trophy is like giving your kids a snake to play with. You're encouraging your fans to go along because it's a big club in town. It's demeaning.

The FA don't give a toss, yet still have control through the Council. It's madness.

In all seriousness, the best chance for clubs to survive is a break up of the EPL due to a European or even World League. After a while, the novelty would wear off, and the fans would want to see teams they can relate to playing local derbies, not Chelsea v BATE Borisov. Bring it on.
Click to expand...

Cheers wiz. Yes, it maybe is. I like the snake analogy a lot.

I struggle a bit with the 'what the answer is' as I'm torn between new ideas and tradition. I don't simply want to be thinking 'how it was it how it must always be' but at the same time, I am really concerned that we don't value what football actually should be about. What I know for sure, is the answer is tied up with sharing money better, reducing precarious financial cliffs and increasing competition through other means than inviting more and more foreign super billionaires to join the party.

It's really odd. There's a strong nationalistic feel atm, for better or worse, (i.e. protect our history etc) but no one seems in the slightest bit bothered that 'we' (i.e. the English) don't really have control or ownership over our game. If our clubs are all owned abroad then by extension the decisions of the members club (i.e. the league) have absolutely no input from anyone remotely connected with the places the clubs notionally represent. I think that's something I might explore in this as I don't really understand why that is. I'm actually probably quite a bit more 'brexity' about football than I am about anything else in some ways. I suppose what it possibly is, is that superficially at least, English football is very powerful. And yet, in a lot of ways (the players, the owners, the managers) it's not 'english football' at all. Not sure where that fits in tbh, but I'm used to shoe horning in a digression.

Gonna keep drafting this and see where I get with it.
 
td53

congratulations. It's a marvellous read - I'm going to read it again, more slowly, tomorrow - and you are head and shoulders above anyone I've seen writing about football lately, let alone writing about Blackpool.

I don't think it is a weak finish - maybe a bit abrupt in the way that you shift back to the issue that got the article started. But I'm glad you did. There are a number of scandals in the way that football is run, and some are more obvious than others. Most people who have even a casual interest in the game know that FIFA has become a by-word for corruption, that money dictates everything in the way that the game is governed and that the EFL are about as much use as a one-legged man in an arse-kicking competition.

However, the fact that the tail wags the dog these days isn't as widely understood as it should be, so your Newcastle/Newcastle example is well chosen. I mentioned the other day that the people who run the game woo the armchair fan these days because they get their hands on the vast majority of the dosh that he/she wants to spend on football - usually through a TV subscription. They are much less keen on the fan who goes to the match and puts his disposable income into the club, the pub and maybe public transport. And so the people who give the "product" its very vibrancy get squeezed out. Or, at least they do until a pandemic comes along and the powers that be get a sudden reminder that the EPL without a passionate crowd is just a lot of dreary encounters between the likes of Palace and Burnley, and outside of Thornton Heath and East Lancashire no-one gives a flying fuck about either once the magic dust of passionate support has been removed.

You are right to say that there are plenty of things we can do to try to get change, although I think for the time being we should continue to demand more equity in the system we already have, rather than going for your nuclear option. It (the game) could be changed considerably for the better with just a few quite simple changes to the way that the money moves through the game, for example. Tacking the appalling state of governance is tougher, and won't happen until the current closed shop that allows the club owners' trade association to regulate... er.... the club owners is recognised for the whited sepulchre that it is. On the bright side, the more the EFL pisses about, the longer the list of club supporters with a grievance gets. One day soon, we might be in the majority.

Football fans are their own worst enemies, really. I'm constantly amazed by the number of OUR supporters - with our recent history - who look at Macc and Bury and shrug their shoulders, as if nothing can or should be done. They presumably will do the same if Wigan go the same way ; will they still be shrugging if Oldham and Southend go as well (as indeed they might)? When is enough really enough? But a lot of people can't be bothered to think about the danger, or are too busy having a wet dream because a Real Madrid reserve is coming back here to play for Tottenham, when he's not playing golf.

I've drawn a distinction between two types of fan above, but in reality some people sit on both stools, don't they? And to me, anyone who supports a club of our size and also has a Sky subscription automatically forfeits the right to moan about any aspect of the way the game functions - because they are part of the problem.

One thing you didn't mention - but I will - is that it would be very interesting to see where Mr. Sadler stands on all these issues. I think he and his team are setting a very good example in terms of community engagement and investment, but for now (understandably) their focus is very much on our club, our support and our town. I'd like to see them playing a bigger role nationally, because a lot of their instincts are very good ones, and a lot of the things they do could become a benchmark if they wanted to play a more prominent role at that national level. Put bluntly, we need more people like Mr. Sadler offering leadership, and less like the chancer who nearly ruined Port Vale and is (I read today) now sniffing around Wigan.

Anyway, you asked for feedback, and I really wouldn't change much. It's a great piece, you have a style of your own that melds imagery, poetry, pathos and whimsy ** into something that is very pleasurable to read.

** The New Teletubbies, obviously.
 
That was a hell of a piece to have written during HT on Saturday. 😃
It's taken me until now to read it.
It's an interesting personal perspective and there's far too many issues to deal with or comment on but I agree with the overall sentiment.
Just a quote from my Blackpool born (Wet Spam supporting, his Dad was an East Ender) Florida based school pal.
We were having a football discussion on WhatsApp a couple of months ago.
He said:
"All major sports are businesses at the highest levels. I strongly oppose unfettered capitalism but IHMO there are bigger causes to fight for than lower echelon sports teams."
That sums up what PL think about the have nots.
Keep up the good work. 👍
(And BS if you are reading this you know who I'm talking about 😉)
 
A couple of things:
Tonights game at Orient has been called off. Spurs paid for the O's players testing and offered their share of the TV money as well as their players match shirts to the Justin Edinburgh Foundation.
My local team, Maidstone United who are in the National League South have just received a donation of £15k from the Premier League.
Peanuts some may say but at least some support is being given.
 
"It's ** football not the large hadron collider, metaphysics or the writing of James Joyce"

Definitely quote of the day. Can't gainsay anything you've written. Excellent piece of considered thinking.
 
Hertsseasider said:
A couple of things:
Tonights game at Orient has been called off. Spurs paid for the O's players testing and offered their share of the TV money as well as their players match shirts to the Justin Edinburgh Foundation.
My local team, Maidstone United who are in the National League South have just received a donation of £15k from the Premier League.
Peanuts some may say but at least some support is being given.
Click to expand...

I think there are some creditable individuals in football, some real 'football people' and some good stuff going on.

What it isn't is a structural change. And that's what football needs. At least, that's what the broader sport needs. The top level business interests, nope.

I thought Kane doing Orient's shirts was grand, quite a few ex pros and ex players chucked money at Wigan, the players do a lot of decent things, some of them very quietly. There's doubtless good people. I'm just not sure they have much voice when people sit round the table and discuss 'what shall we do with all this telly money then?'
 
td53 said:
I think there are some creditable individuals in football, some real 'football people' and some good stuff going on.

What it isn't is a structural change. And that's what football needs. At least, that's what the broader sport needs. The top level business interests, nope.

I thought Kane doing Orient's shirts was grand, quite a few ex pros and ex players chucked money at Wigan, the players do a lot of decent things, some of them very quietly. There's doubtless good people. I'm just not sure they have much voice when people sit round the table and discuss 'what shall we do with all this telly money then?'
Click to expand...
It always seems to fall to the players to make these gestures. The organisation of the PL continues to take it in.
 
A very enjoyable opus; perceptive, thought-provoking and humorous and pretty much sums up my disillusionment with the game.
An excellent point about lower league football fans that slavishly give their money to Sky whilst condemning their club to perpetual obscurity.
 
Great article. Mirrors a lot of what I have always seen as the biggest problem of modern football. I'm proud to have never, ever spent a penny on televised football ever since the Premier League broke away and stole the vast majority of wealth from the rest of the clubs. I refuse to pay for a product that promotes an ever widening divide and monopolies for a handful of clubs, that guarantees such clubs can never be relegated due to perpetual unequal money distribution, that doesn't want the core competition to be competitive any more. As is said in the article, it's madness for any fan of a football league club to put money into the top of the game to fuel this situation further.
 
Once upon a time 'Super Sunday' was a special day when maybe two important games coincided. Nowadays it's just a n other Sunday.
Hype is everything, even at our level. Are Puma shirts better because they are manufactured to a higher standard of workers' wages and terms & conditions of employment. Of course not. Puma use Far East sweat shop labour as much as the next company. The notion that kits have to be demonstrably different from each other so people can tell the teams apart is outdated. Kits are now simply merchandise. Who needs a third kit? Nobody. As for kit designs, the world's your oyster. Why have a collar? So you can have a collar sponsor of course. Why are shorts long and baggy again? So more sponsorship logos can be fitted on them. How long before we have the Kop-end penalty area sponsored by Google or the Lloyds Bank centre circle? Instead of AFC Bournemouth we could have B&Q Bournemouth. After all, RB Leipzig may only be the thin end of the wedge.
 
A very interesting debate this, may I add some further comments?

Football today is a Business. Clubs are a Business, the EPL is a Business, Sky /BT/Amazon are Businesses. Just like M&S or Tesco or Barclays Bank. The aim of any Business is to grow, be competitive and make money. Where in the description of these Businesses is the word "Charity". Sadly, football as we knew it sold it's soul with the advent of the EPL and Sky and, as nice a thought as it is, the days of clubs sticking together and supporting each other are long gone. I am sure there are many Spurs fans who don't even know where Oldham is, what league they are in or their current plight. whilst I admire those who are trying to bring about change, and more power to their elbow, I fear that they are to an extent, pissing in the wind.

Turning to Sky, I have a subscription with them but I can't remember the last full football match I watched on there, I have it for the films, documentaries and many other channels they provide. It's bloody expensive but the point is it's not just a sports viewing provider.
Finally, football today is a direct result of consumer needs. Look how many pubs and clubs show matches (ignore Covid for a moment). Look how much revenue is generated form the far east etc. Look at the stupid kick off times set to match the requirements of viewers. As someone once said, you get the Football set up you deserve.
 
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