How much do you like football (soccer)?

[Liverpool Rover]

I used to watch football all the time but don’t watch it anywhere near as much now. All the money in the Premier League is off putting and I find the Championship a more interesting league to watch and if there was a channel that showed the Copa Libertadores regularly I would probably watch that more than the Champions League.

11 hours ago, Hela Wigmen said:

Ignorance. Those that claim to dislike it so much have watched very little or none of it and base their opinion off of that. 

It annoys me when people say “I don’t watch American Football because I don’t understand it”. Of course you won’t understand it if you don’t watch. Also when people say that they don’t like it they say it as thought they are proud of it which I find weird.

[HawkMan]

Perhaps someone can explain to me why so many are put off the EPL by the money in it. Money has ensured some of the biggest stars play in England. I want to see great players,  and I'm proud that this country has the most watched league in the world. There's a myth going round that in the good old days before Sky everything was more exciting and open which isn't true. Big clubs have always hogged the trophies   remember Liverpool in the 70's and 80's. Money has allowed Man City to make it into the big four, which is now the big six. So more money please,  more top players, obviously I like the gritty honest toil of the lower leagues too but that is not mutually exclusive of watching the cream. Sorry , rant over.

[Dunbar]

30 minutes ago, Liverpool Rover said:

I used to watch football all the time but don’t watch it anywhere near as much now. All the money in the Premier League is off putting and I find the Championship a more interesting league to watch and if there was a channel that showed the Copa Libertadores regularly I would probably watch that more than the Champions League.

It annoys me when people say “I don’t watch American Football because I don’t understand it”. Of course you won’t understand it if you don’t watch. Also when people say that they don’t like it they say it as thought they are proud of it which I find weird.

I take it that when you watch American Football you mean the NFL?

It's interesting that the money in the Premier League puts you off and yet the NFL is the richest sports league in the world and generates $13 billion a year and has 29 of the top 50 most valuable sports franchises in the world

[Angelic Cynic]

15 minutes ago, HawkMan said:

Perhaps someone can explain to me why so many are put off the EPL by the money in it. Money has ensured some of the biggest stars play in England. I want to see great players,  and I'm proud that this country has the most watched league in the world. There's a myth going round that in the good old days before Sky everything was more exciting and open which isn't true. Big clubs have always hogged the trophies   remember Liverpool in the 70's and 80's. Money has allowed Man City to make it into the big four, which is now the big six. So more money please,  more top players, obviously I like the gritty honest toil of the lower leagues too but that is not mutually exclusive of watching the cream. Sorry , rant over.

  Yes,Liverpool won quite a bit - but so did Notts Forest,Derby County,Carlisle United were once top of League1 before sliding down to the bottom division (4) Sunderland,in the second division won the FA Cup beating Leeds.Swinton Town won a League Cup.Oxford United won silverware.In soccer now the lower league clubs have got no chance,even in cup competitions.

   TV Money now swamps large attendances and the regulations mean the lesser clubs will take years to catch up - which they won't do as foreign consortiums and Royal Families are involved.

   They also bribe parents,and sign youngsters from around the globe for lots of money.

[headtackle]

Bet on it

can watch it live at any level

on tv bores me senseless 

[HawkMan]

51 minutes ago, Angelic Cynic said:

  Yes,Liverpool won quite a bit - but so did Notts Forest,Derby County,Carlisle United were once top of League1 before sliding down to the bottom division (4) Sunderland,in the second division won the FA Cup beating Leeds.Swinton Town won a League Cup.Oxford United won silverware.In soccer now the lower league clubs have got no chance,even in cup competitions.

   TV Money now swamps large attendances and the regulations mean the lesser clubs will take years to catch up - which they won't do as foreign consortiums and Royal Families are involved.

   They also bribe parents,and sign youngsters from around the globe for lots of money.

So we should get rid of the money,  to allow Forest and Swindon and hey maybe Preston and Blackpool to start winning things again, I mean Stanley Mathews and all that, stuff ever winning in Europe again. We like our league like yesteryear,  such a RL attitude,  remind me again, which sport is global, oh yes football.  Think forward,  push the boundaries,  I want RL to push forward to new heights,  it must embrace new  ideas and money. 

[Gerrumonside ref]

1 hour ago, HawkMan said:

So we should get rid of the money,  to allow Forest and Swindon and hey maybe Preston and Blackpool to start winning things again, I mean Stanley Mathews and all that, stuff ever winning in Europe again. We like our league like yesteryear,  such a RL attitude,  remind me again, which sport is global, oh yes football.  Think forward,  push the boundaries,  I want RL to push forward to new heights,  it must embrace new  ideas and money. 

Is it not getting a bit boring though watching the same cartel of clubs dominating the Premier League and Champions League though?  

The most valuable football club in the world are already run by people who hardly attend games and have little interest in the sport.

It wasn’t all honey pre the last thirty years, but surely you have to acknowledge there’s been downsides to the influx of capital into the game.

[meast]

On 30/05/2020 at 12:14, 17 stone giant said:

I read the following in another thread and it got me wondering how much interest in football do rugby league fans (the ones on here at least) have?:

I wasn't sure if this should be in the Any Other Sports forum, so Admin please move it if you think it should be. Thanks.

And thanks to all who answer.

I don't follow the premier league or the "champions" league, I mainly follow the  non league game, I used to watch it all, but slowly got bored and lost most of my interest in professional football, I still love the old game, I love the old world cup games and FA Cup games but money has ruined the cup for me as well now.

I don't particularly care for the premier league or its rich, greedy, clubs but I have a interest in the non league and lower leagues.

I love watching a non league game, beer in hand, stood up or sat down just enjoying 22 players playing a game they love as opposed to doing something for binloads of dosh.

[meast]

11 hours ago, Futtocks said:

One thing I really miss about international Football is that a lot of the mystery is gone. If a country produces some world-class players, money means they'll be playing for clubs in one of the major European leagues sooner rather than later. So you have an idea of what you're going to see.

Up to some point in the early Nineties, your country could find itself drawn against almost totally unknown opposition. Okay, quite often they were just a bit ordinary, but could sometimes be the tournament's surprise package or have a real star player. It all seemed more of an adventure then.

I find international football boring these days, as you say, the mystery has gone from it due to the globalisation.

It used to be that different countries had certain styles of playing, based in the culture in those countries, now it's all the same, all countries play the same way, there's no clash of styles anymore and no mystery or intrigue about other nationalities.

I have recently been watching the Euro 96 relived and was surprised to see and hear that on the opening game between England and Switzerland, none of the media, commentators or pundits knew anything about any of the Swiss players, apart from Alex Ferguson who knew one of the players from when Man United played Galatasaray, can you imagine that now?

[meast]

5 hours ago, GB120 said:

I have no/very little interest in professional football, but I really enjoy Non League, semi pro footie.

I regularly go and watch Selby Town in the NCEL, always see good, honest effort and endeavour on the pitch, the crowds are always friendly with good banter and the players always come into the bar and have a drink with the speccies after the game. Just like how it used to be in our great game.

I follow Emley and it's great, players and managers supping with the fans, it's usually pretty friendly, even in local derbies etc, how it should be really

[meast]

3 hours ago, HawkMan said:

Perhaps someone can explain to me why so many are put off the EPL by the money in it. Money has ensured some of the biggest stars play in England. I want to see great players,  and I'm proud that this country has the most watched league in the world. There's a myth going round that in the good old days before Sky everything was more exciting and open which isn't true. Big clubs have always hogged the trophies   remember Liverpool in the 70's and 80's. Money has allowed Man City to make it into the big four, which is now the big six. So more money please,  more top players, obviously I like the gritty honest toil of the lower leagues too but that is not mutually exclusive of watching the cream. Sorry , rant over.

For me it's ruined the game completely, I'm not bothered about the biggest world stars, I like/liked football for the excitement, the rush, not the players, I enjoyed watching certain players of course, but not to the detriment of the game.

Money has ruined the cup competitions, the FA cup was magical, the single biggest game was the cup final, now it's become almost meaningless as finishing 4th and 17th in the premier league have taken on more importance because of the money involved, the fact that this attitude has now trickled down the leagues and now you'll see mid table championship and league 1 clubs playing weakened sides because the cup no longer matters to them, the massive irony in this, is the biggest, or richest clubs are the ones who are dominating the cup competitions because everyone else is just passing it up in order to try and bank and extra £376m for finishing 15th etc.

Money has ruined the game for me because it's all the modern fan and player cares about, have a conversation with a young modern premier league fan and just about every conversation revolves around money, who is signing for who for how much, how much so and so is getting, how much such a player is worth, where is the next mega rich owner coming from and to where, I'm speaking from experience with work colleagues here.

Money has overtaken glory as the thing that was the reason for football, glory means little these days unless it comes with a billion pound price tag!

Oh and it's not called the EPL

Sorry for the rant but you did ask

[meast]

46 minutes ago, Gerrumonside ref said:

Is it not getting a bit boring though watching the same cartel of clubs dominating the Premier League and Champions League though?  

The most valuable football club in the world are already run by people who hardly attend games and have little interest in the sport.

It wasn’t all honey pre the last thirty years, but surely you have to acknowledge there’s been downsides to the influx of capital into the game.

With the odd exception, Leicester, for example the premier league title is between 6 ( in reality 3 or 4) extremely rich clubs, the rest are just trying to moo up as much of the money as they can without being particularly competitive or ambitious, I remember when Huddersfield got promoted and lots of their "fans" were so excited, but within a few months were bored of the negative tactics to try and not lose 5-0 every game, where's the enjoyment in that?

Same in the "champions" league, realistically,.it's the same cartel of extremely rich global organisations that are going to win it, the rest are just there to provide opposition so TV companies can show these global organisations to worldwide audiences, meaning they take in even more amounts of money that they know what to do with.

Most of the top clubs aren't even football clubs in the sense of it anymore.

[Number 16]

As a kid I was a Carlisle United tragic and followed them all over the place - anyone for Newport County away on a wet Tuesday night?

Then Carlisle RL started up in 1981 and I became a RL tragic - anyone for Batley away on a wet Tuesday night?

Nowadays I have very little interest in soccer in general, though I do still watch Carlisle a couple of times a year and I do still follow their fortunes.

For me Rugby League really is The Greatest Game.

[Tonka]

It's such a cliché but the rolling around on the floor really puts me off.  Also find long passages of play can be boring.  Watch about 1 match a year, if that.

[meast]

21 minutes ago, Tonka said:

It's such a cliché but the rolling around on the floor really puts me off.  Also find long passages of play can be boring.  Watch about 1 match a year, if that.

Very much a part of rugby league now sadly.

RL fans really shouldn't be taking the moral high ground anymore as our players have become as bad as milking and play acting as footballers

[Hela Wigmen]

10 hours ago, meast said:

With the odd exception, Leicester, for example the premier league title is between 6 ( in reality 3 or 4) extremely rich clubs, the rest are just trying to moo up as much of the money as they can without being particularly competitive or ambitious, I remember when Huddersfield got promoted and lots of their "fans" were so excited, but within a few months were bored of the negative tactics to try and not lose 5-0 every game, where's the enjoyment in that?

Same in the "champions" league, realistically,.it's the same cartel of extremely rich global organisations that are going to win it, the rest are just there to provide opposition so TV companies can show these global organisations to worldwide audiences, meaning they take in even more amounts of money that they know what to do with.

Most of the top clubs aren't even football clubs in the sense of it anymore.

I wrote a piece for a football website a couple of years ago saying that the Champions League needed overhauling because the group stages were monotonous and the group stage was dull with the same sides winning comfortably (I did all the statistics behind it around winning margins and favourites winning) and said that I much preferred the Europa League group stage because it was much closer and games were not as clear cut. 

The knockout stages are were it gets interesting but the bit before Christmas leaves me bored. I got a load of abuse from the faceless Twitter accounts and “lifelong” Barcelona fans from places like Nigeria and India as a result. 

[Angelic Cynic]

13 hours ago, HawkMan said:

So we should get rid of the money,  to allow Forest and Swindon and hey maybe Preston and Blackpool to start winning things again, I mean Stanley Mathews and all that, stuff ever winning in Europe again. We like our league like yesteryear,  such a RL attitude,  remind me again, which sport is global, oh yes football.  Think forward,  push the boundaries,  I want RL to push forward to new heights,  it must embrace new  ideas and money. 

 I've read my contribution again - and no,I didn't mention,anywhere,getting rid of the money.

 All I pointed out was that there were a variety of clubs,from around all parts of the country,who managed to lift silverware - and didn't mention other clubs who reached finals,or finished high in the leagues,that won't be repeating that any time soon.

  Soccer can have all the money this country can offer,all the foreign owners can offer,the highest amount,and number of broadcasting deals it can handle,all the off-shore accounts,all the money in exile and live long and prosper.

  I don't care.

  I wish the sport of soccer,and all those agents,all the 'new' ideas and money it can ever get.

  I don't even mind when the national side,be it England,Scotland,Wales,or either Irish side, demonstrate,every tournament, how much it has benefited them. 

   Best of luck to the foreign owners and foreign managers.Etc.

[Tonka]

1 hour ago, meast said:

Very much a part of rugby league now sadly.

RL fans really shouldn't be taking the moral high ground anymore as our players have become as bad as milking and play acting as footballers

Hmm, it has crept in a bit I agree, but I don't think it's on quite the same scale!  

[HawkMan]

15 minutes ago, Angelic Cynic said:

 I've read my contribution again - and no,I didn't mention,anywhere,getting rid of the money.

 All I pointed out was that there were a variety of clubs,from around all parts of the country,who managed to lift silverware - and didn't mention other clubs who reached finals,or finished high in the leagues,that won't be repeating that any time soon.

  Soccer can have all the money this country can offer,all the foreign owners can offer,the highest amount,and number of broadcasting deals it can handle,all the off-shore accounts,all the money in exile and live long and prosper.

  I don't care.

  I wish the sport of soccer,and all those agents,all the 'new' ideas and money it can ever get.

  I don't even mind when the national side,be it England,Scotland,Wales,or either Irish side, demonstrate,every tournament, how much it has benefited them. 

   Best of luck to the foreign owners and foreign managers.Etc.

I actually agree with your tone about the greed and vested interests in Football , the point is it comes with the territory of being global. I don't want to return to seeing the Premier league not attracting the best players and teams unable to compete with the best in Europe.  If you check out my thread  How Big Is Enough  I've posed the question whether RL fans want RL to follow suit if it means global reach but with the drawbacks that might bring.

[Hela Wigmen]

2 hours ago, Tonka said:

It's such a cliché but the rolling around on the floor really puts me off.  Also find long passages of play can be boring.  Watch about 1 match a year, if that.

You could easily be describing Rugby League there. 

[Tonka]

49 minutes ago, Hela Wigmen said:

You could easily be describing Rugby League there. 

That’s not how I view league but fair enough if that’s your view of it.

[Hela Wigmen]

Just now, Tonka said:

That’s not how I view league but fair enough if that’s your view of it.

That’s how you choose to. There’s a load of diving around and feigning injury in Rugby League, the crusher tackle nonsense is embarrassing at times. And the one out Rugby from some teams is dull as dishwater. 

[17 stone giant]

On 31/05/2020 at 10:13, Harry Stottle said:

I am it appears not the only Harry Stottle on these pages!

God help us all.

[meast]

6 hours ago, Tonka said:

Hmm, it has crept in a bit I agree, but I don't think it's on quite the same scale!  

In rugby league terms it has, it's spoilt the game for me, we used to pride ourselves on being part of a game where honesty and respect prevailed, we used to use it as a badge of honour that RL players don't backchat, argue or abuse the officials, we held our game in high regard due to the honest way in which players played the game, can we now?

Every game, whether it's on TV or not sees players arguing and abusing officials, feigning injuries, rolling around, all the penalty milking at the PTB etc, it's a complete mess at times and completely ruined the game as a spectacle for me.

At least in football, it's always been there, not as bad as it has been but it's been there.

[Liverpool Rover]

21 hours ago, Dunbar said:

I take it that when you watch American Football you mean the NFL?

It's interesting that the money in the Premier League puts you off and yet the NFL is the richest sports league in the world and generates $13 billion a year and has 29 of the top 50 most valuable sports franchises in the world

The NFL sees to it that the money doesn’t distort the league in the way that it does in the Premier League. In the highly unlikely event that a shady Russian businessman or oil rich Middle Eastern billionaires were allowed to take over NFL franchises that have nothing of note for years they wouldn’t be able to buy up the best  players and win championships like what happened with Chelsea  and Man City.