Is modern footbll going to the dogs??

[SPARKSY]

http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/row-zed/r ... ns-9071173

[Rugby Gooner]

It is not going to the dogs,it WENT about about 10 years ago,coincidently about the same time we moved to the "corpratourist bowl."

[flash gunner]

Yes it has

[OneBardGooner]

It is long dead and sadly shall never return.

The launch of the prem was the death knoll of Football.

[Allgunsblazin]

Before this becomes an ageist/racist point the finger at so and so thread, as time has moved on so has football in the UK.
Consider a few factors in this order from the late 60's....

Foreign club owners
Foreign Coaches
Foreign Players
TV
Sponsorship
Gate receipts/ ST's, Arsenal highest prices!
Merchandising
Mega Player salaries
Football timetable changes for TV
All seater stadia, grey concrete blocks
Outrageous food and drink prices
Poor transport/parking

So after a couple of generations football has now placed itself in a sanitised politically correct environment and has turned its back on your average supporter.
Give it another few years and the posts will move again to a European League for the big boys, the EPL started it all off, they created the monster, now the monster will turn on the EPL for more moolah!....

[Clash]

Before this becomes an ageist/racist point the finger at so and so thread, as time has moved on so has football in the UK.
Consider a few factors in this order from the late 60's....

Foreign club owners
Foreign Coaches
Foreign Players
TV
Sponsorship
Gate receipts/ ST's, Arsenal highest prices!
Merchandising
Mega Player salaries
Football timetable changes for TV
All seater stadia, grey concrete blocks
Outrageous food and drink prices
Poor transport/parking

So after a couple of generations football has now placed itself in a sanitised politically correct environment and has turned its back on your average supporter.
Give it another few years and the posts will move again to a European League for the big boys, the EPL started it all off, they created the monster, now the monster will turn on the EPL for more moolah!....

Good points mates. The changes are vile.

Modern football is shit. I don't like any club or any team or any players. Including ours! Especially ours!

And I am sick of being told these changes to the game are 'progress' Progress for who? Not the average supporter who makes the effort to attend games. The people who now have to pay many times the amount for something less enjoyable.

They made a big thing on Monday about how, after redevelopment, it was the biggest crowd Man United had faced at Anfield for 40 years. But it proves ground capacities used to be bigger. And with that, atmospheres and the whole experience much, much better.

Highbury had a bigger capacity in 1973 when I was born than the Emirates does now. Is it progress paying £70 for the privilege of sitting when you preferred standing? Is it progress being made to games on a Sunday for a lunchtime kick off just to suit those staying at home or in pubs?

I really do hope the whole grotesque circus collapses and dies and that I live to see it.

[Gunner Rob]

in my opinion yes it has gone to the dogs and especially in the last 2-3 seasons the life has been sucked completely out of the atmosphere.
I have been going to non league football instead which I get more of a buzz out of than going to the Emirates sadly.

I have pretty much given up going to Arsenal this season - my first visit will be next week where ironically the £10 cost of a ticket to the league cup tie is lower than a non league match

I had hoped that in this new era of mega wealth in the Premier League that we would see better quality footballers, but I really dont think we are, we just get to see better paid footballers.


However......having said all that modern football is probably more popular than ever before - football is king like it has never really been. Other sports nowadays rarely get a look in outside of the Olympics and Wimbledon. My office is always aware of the main football matches, but these days is totally uninterested in a cricket test match or the Open Golf Championship for example.
Look at the attendances - 60,000 at the Emirates for EVERY match, at prices which just keep going up and up. Back in the so called "good old days" of the 1980s you used to get about 25,000 at Highbury for a Saturday afternoon league match, and you could just turn up and pay on the gate.

so there you have it - yes a more sanitised, boring atmosphere but one which is more popular than ever. the bubble is a long way off from bursting.

[Skooner]

In general yes, but it's a reflection of the wider society which is obsessed with celebrity. So many people going to the games now are doing it to say "I was there" i.e. at something important. Look at all those Liverpool "fans" taking photos of Mourinho on Monday. 20 years ago he would have been getting dogs abuse from everyone in the stadium.

Hillsborough was also a catalyst for some of this. I know people loved the 80's football but in general the stadiums were shitholes and in a number of cases potential death traps. The disaster brought that to a head and once all seaters came in there was a limited number of tickets per game then the clubs could sell it in advance as more "exclusive". Coincide that with the 90's clamour for all things famous and demand massively outstriped supply for the first time in the history of the game and tickets started rising quickly.

The money involved is completely ridiculous but I don't really begrudge the players, better they get it than the corporate owners.

[Topside Northbank]

Football used to be the working man's opera.......how times have changed cheaper to go to the opera or theatre.

The sort of people that wouldn't of been seen dead in a football ground not so many years ago now step forward your new selfie taking half and half scarf bandwagon jumper.The new breed and so welcomed by the PL 'brand' yet another reason I don't miss going.

[Bradywasking]

Would agree with above post the Hillsborough was the catalyst for what football eventually became.. The Taylor report was to make recommendations to make football safer to watch, what it did was open greedy eyes to a financial killing.
Football has lost its soul,clubs no longer belong to the fans..There is no access to the players anymore..The players are generally unemotional about the club..no more Tony Adams types now, all about the player and his agent.
I wouldn't feel that attachment to Arsenal that I felt in the 80s up to 2006...I think it is a combination of things that he me like that..Most of those are money related..I don't feel the same about going anymore.. The smells and sounds of Highbury, waiting for the players to go in, waiting at the Clock End for them to leave are all history.
The FA Cup destroyed by the FA themselves.. Allowing the holders in 2000 not defend the trophy, semi finals at Wembley with kick off times dictated by TV..
Saturation coverage on TV is another issue, players are celebrity now..Football is an accessory, spending your hard earned in the club shops is a mark of support. It used to be emotional attachment that defined support..
International football is pointless, tournaments do provide some relief but they are too big and cumbersome.. The two years between tournaments is tedious, the games are tedious..
Again the money dictates this.
I suppose Monday night sums up modern football, all hype and product but no substance.. Some day it will eat itself..what happens then?

[StuartL]

Not many dog tracks left for it to go too either !

Its nothing like the game I fell in love with

About the only thing left is our Red and White kit

[augie]

Of course the answer to the question is yes, but I don't like the suggestion that the influx of foreign players and foreign managers, is one of the reasons why - frankly I think that suggestion is very xenophobic and totally ignores the non british talents (Bergkamp, PV4, pires etc) who totally bought into the style and traditions of AFC and brought extra class to them

Personally I think the better question is "will football ever become a game for the people again" ? These days football is all about greed - greed from the owners, greed from the players and greed from the tv companies, and if that disappears then we might see a product that is more in line with the traditions of the game.
I know most will say that the greed and the wealth is here to say, but all of that is totally dependent on the ginormous money being poured into the game by tv companies - so far this season sky's viewing figures are down by 19% and if that trend continues, how long before the amount of Wonga they contribute will decrease ? People will suggest that a decrease in tv revenue will see all the worlds best players avoid the premier league (honestly wont affect us much), but my feeling on that is that such a collapse will see a domino affect all across Europe - in the last decade, English tv deals has set the bar and many of europe's top clubs have been dependent on money from the champions league, so should that figure drop, it will affect them and their wage budget too

In many ways I see the salvation for football, in the same way as I see the salvation for AFC .............. we will need to go through a few years of pain in order to come out stronger the other side. Yes we would likely see an exodus of top talents from the premier league for a few years if the tv cash drops, but it would also see a lot of the new age footie fans fcuk better to rugby (or whatever shithole they crawled from) and maybe a drop in popularity will see a drop in ticket prices and bring the proper fans back

[flash gunner]

Are we all just getting old? Football is evolving, as an example new technology like camera phones are making taking a pic of a player/manager so easy that many people do just that and don't get into the atmosphere (as seen at the scousers united game the other day )

Did people who were around in the 30's or 50's supporting Arsenal look at Charlie George in the 70's with his long hair and players jumping on each other celebrating goals instead of a firm handshake or the short shorts in the 80's instead of the old baggy Stanley Mathews shorts and say its going to the dogs then???

Just a thought

[DB10GOONER]

Are we all just getting old? Football is evolving, as an example new technology like camera phones are making taking a pic of a player/manager so easy that many people do just that and don't get into the atmosphere (as seen at the scousers united game the other day )

Did people who were around in the 30's or 50's supporting Arsenal look at Charlie George in the 70's with his long hair and players jumping on each other celebrating goals instead of a firm handshake or the short shorts in the 80's instead of the old baggy Stanley Mathews shorts and say its going to the dogs then???

Just a thought

I think a few probably did, but those things were cosmetic changes. I think that the game has fundamentally changed for the worse now and it isn't just a case of old geezers like us hating change. The disinterest, apathy, alienation, bitterness and social disconnect have become widespread. My son who is 11 years old watches the old match DVD's I have and he thinks modern football, footballers, crowds and atmospheres haven't got a patch on the stuff in the 70s, 80s and 90s.

Also, I agree with augie, it's ridiculous to blame "Johnny Foreigner" for this. Blame the owners, the bankers, the parasitic agents, the stadium developers, the cable and satellite stations, the FA UEFA & FIFA - and the new JCL fans that have adopted football as their latest "thing" to brag about in work on a Monday morning, despite having no knowledge of, or history with, the club(s) they claim to support.

[Nos89]

I think it's interesting that matches are now built on the reputation of the managers not the clubs with Maureen being the main protagonist. Primarily it is sky doing this but every week it Maureen v Klopp, not Utd vs Liverpool, Maureen v Pep, not Manchester derby. It seems the clubs stature is secondary to the manager, unless of course it Real Madrid, Barcelona and Bayern Munich.
No individual should be bigger than the club.