Is it Just Me or is Modern Football S**t?

Jim Keoghan

Description

Does the sight of half-scarves enrage you? Does transfer-deadline day make you want to throw a brick through the TV? Do the opening bars of goal music make your ears bleed? If the answer is 'yes', then this could be the book for you. Since English football's very own 'Year Zero' in 1992, the game has changed beyond recognition, rejecting the rough-and-ready days of the past. And like any change, not all of it has been welcome. The quality of the 'football product' might be better but it's come with spiralling levels of debt, yawning inequality and Neymar advertising batteries. These, and many other ills of the modern game, form Jim Keoghan's exploration of the nation's favourite pastime. Navigating a world populated by dodgy owners, celebrity referees and Ray Winstone's floating head, he searches for an answer to the question: Is it Just Me or is Modern Football S**t?

Informations

• Publié par: Pitch Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 10 mai 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781785319327
• Langue: English

Extrait

First published by Pitch Publishing, 2021
Pitch Publishing
A2 Yeoman Gate
Yeoman Way
Durrington
BN13 3QZ
www.pitchpublishing.co.uk
Jim Keoghan, 2021
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Any oversight will be rectified in future editions at the earliest opportunity by the publisher.
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A CIP catalogue record is available for this book from the British Library
Print ISBN 9781785317736
eBook ISBN 9781785319327
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Chapters
Acknowledgements
Introduction
A - A 4 Protests , A dvertising Hoardings , Football A gents , A rmchair Scouts , A utobiographies
B - B Teams , B alls , B etting Sponsors , A B igger, B etter World Cup , B oots
C - C elebrity Referees , The C hampions League , The C heckatrade Trophy , C orporate Partners , C ultivated Atmosphere
D - Edgar D avids Uncontrollable Ego , D eadline Day , D iving , D odgy Handballs , Adrian D urham
E - E ndorsements , E ng-ger-land Mania , The E ngland Band , E nglish Jobs for E nglish Managers , The E uropean Super League
F - The F A , F an TV , F antasy F ootball , F IFA 21 , F ormations
G - G areth Southgate - England Manager , G lory Hunters , G oal Music , G oals, G oals G OALS!!!!! , G oing Topless
H - H alf Scarves , H eat Maps , H ipsters , H oolie Lit , H yperbole
I - I Panenka , The I diot Box , I njury Porn , I nked Up , I tchy Trigger Fingers
J - J amie Carragher , J amie Redknapp , J ohn Sitton s Managerial Masterclass , J ostling for a Move , J udge and J ury
K - A Very Roy K eane Christmas , Richard K eys , If in Doubt, K ick Him Out , K issing the Badge , K its
L - L aps of Dishonour , L ike I Said L iving My Best Football Life! L ook What He Did! L osing the Right Way
M - Steve M c M anaman , The M agic of the Cup , M ascots , M ensworld , M odern Stadiums
N - N ations League , N et Spend , N ew FIFA , N eymar , N on-Celebrations
O - O riginal Celebrations , My O ther Team is O utraged by Shorts , O utrageous Ticket Prices , Michael O wen
P - P arachute P ayments , P hil Neville - England Manager , P itches , P lucky Little P oppies
Q - Q atar 2022 , Q PR Ritual Goblets , Q uarterbacks
R - I m No More R acist than the Next Bloke But R allying Cries , R ebranding , R ewarding Failure , Outside R ight
S - S logans , S occer AM , S tadium Naming Rights , S teve Claridge s S exual Magnetism , S treaming Misery
T - T ekkers , T im Sherwood , T ime Wasting T ransfer Gossip , T witter
U - Gordon Strachan s U nified Theory of Selective Breeding , U nnecessarily Inconvenient Kick-Off Times , U nscrupulous Owners
V - V AR , V ery Pleased to Meet You , The E V il Summer
W - W e Want Our Game Back , W embley , A Cold, W et Tuesday Night in Stoke , W imbledon FC s Misadventures in Modern Football , The Club W orld Cup
X - X Factor , E X iting Early , E X tremist Lads
Y - Y ou Only Sing When You re Organised in a Club-Sanctioned Singing Section , Y ou Spin Me Right Round , Y ou ll Never Believe
Z - Z ealotry , Year Z ero , Z illionaires , Z latan , Pundit Z oo
Epilogue
Photos
To Nicky, Jamie and Emma. Because you are everything to me
Acknowledgements
I WOULD like to say a big thanks to everyone who helped with this book, most notably Bev, Rob and Mike, with whom I ve spent the past few years navigating the ups and downs of the modern game.
Also, a big thanks to my brother-in-law, Aiden, who produced a cover so much better than anything I could have imagined. Particularly impressive considering how lightweight and poorly described was the brief I gave him.
At Pitch Publishing I m grateful to Paul and Jane for giving me this opportunity and would like to thank everyone else there who has been involved in the creation of the book.
On a personal level, my children, Emma and Jamie, have provided a welcome and much needed distraction from the daily grind of writing. And even though they ve monopolised my computer during the many lockdowns of the past year, meaning that I ve had to write this book in snatched moments, it has been a joy to have them around more.
But I save my biggest thanks, as always, for Nicky, without whom there would be no book. I don t know where I would be without your love and unconditional support. Still not nearly enough cups of tea (if any). But then, you can t have it all.
Introduction
MODERN FOOTBALL eh? It s a bit s**t isn t it?
Selfies, fan-cams, massive dancing mascots, Jesse Lingard, signature celebrations, corporate partnerships, escalating ticket prices, Jesse Lingard, half-scarves, Fan TV, celebrity refs, Jesse Lingard
It s not like the good old days. You remember them, right? When football was still the People s Game . That halcyon era when it only cost two groats to get in and the players earned less than a welder.
But those days are gone now. Blown out of existence by the shiny world of modern football.
Of course, you don t want to get too Yer Da about this. Football has always evolved. That evolution might have occurred at a more glacial pace prior to the arrival of the Premier League in 1992, but it took place, nonetheless. Rule changes, the arrival of TV, the abolition of the maximum wage - the game has possessed its own momentum since inception, one that restlessly sought change and improvement.
And even after 1992, as what we now refer to as modern football began to assert itself, not every change ushered in has been an unwelcome one.
I might look back on my first faltering footsteps as a fan in the early 1980s through rose-tinted specs, but I m aware enough to recognise that what I experienced was no footballing utopia. The crush of the terraces, the language used that should never be used, the absence of consideration for anyone smaller than 6ft and not built like a brick s**thouse.
And the play! It s a good idea to never look back at videos of the once great teams from your club s past. In your memories you imagine them like Pep-era Barcelona, a whirling symphony of pass and move. But just a few minutes watching the long balls launched and the hit-and-hope crosses quickly disabuses you of this notion.
For all its ills, the game today, at almost every level of the sport, is technically and tactically better than it was in the pre-1992 age. The players are fitter, better trained, more astute and, at the higher levels of football, drawn from the brightest and best of the world. In the days before the Premier League rolled into town, a club was considered to have a broad, international reach if they had more than one Scandinavian in their team.
And it still remains the game that we love, a game that continues to move us in ways that so few things can. For many of us, football, even in its modern guise, is something that we find it hard to live without, a reality that was made clear when the sport was temporarily suspended during the first coronavirus lockdown in 2020. Many fans were left bereft by the pause, untethered by the sudden absence of the season s cut and thrust. We might moan about the way football has changed, but few of us would be without it.
Despite this and the obvious improvements that have taken place, there s undoubtably a sense that modern football comes at a cost. For a generation of fans, most commonly those who have lived through the slow death of the pre-1992 world, there s a feeling that it s a cost that s often quite hard to bear.
Massive financial inequality, selfie-obsessed supporters, Michael Owen as a pundit - the crimes of the modern game are seemingly limitless. But a few definitely grate more than most. Which is where this book comes in, your guide to some of the worst things about the game today. It s not an exhaustive list, and you might not agree with every inclusion, but it should provide enough examples to probably answer the question: Is it just me, or is modern football s**t?
A
A 4 Protests
Picture yourself as the owner of a Premier League football club. You can choose what kind; sleazy Russian oligarch, reputation-washing Middle Eastern sheik or an asset-sweating, dead-eyed American automaton.
Now also imagine that the club is going through a rocky patch and there are rumblings that the crowd is turning against you. In your darkest moments, you picture in your mind something akin to the storming of the Winter Palace at the next home game, vast swathes of the great unwashed crashing against the directors box.
Imagine your relief then when you take your seat to find that these rumblings have merely amounted to a few fans holding up dog-eared pieces of A4 paper, upon which messages of protest have been hastily scribbled. Sipping on your expensive cognac, your feet resting upon the back of a crouching steward, you bathe in relief, letting your mind shift to more pleasurable considerations, such as which artisan cheese you ll opt for at half-time.
The construction of these signs represents a rare example in the game of deliberate, premeditated s**tness. Not for them the organised mass protest or the sophisticated online campaign. Not even the slickly produced banner. This is the f**k it approach - minimal input for minimal impact.
And frequently you wonder whether they ve even read the sign back. Multiple fonts and capital letters in the wrong place, they sometimes look more like the kind of letter a serial killer might send to the police to taunt them about their lack of progress in the on