It’s not easy being a fan of your favourite team. Especially when that team’s success is cyclical and their fans are as fickle as the team they support. After all, who wants to be associated with a one-hit wonder that sporadically comes out of hibernation every 20 years or so? To make matters even more difficult, there’s now social media to answer for your inane posts, gifsets to explain away the sheer weirdness of things you used to love and the internet at large is an unforgiving place for nostalgia junkies.
With everyone else getting excited about their new favourite club or product, it’s no wonder why we fans find ourselves more and more ostracized from the community at large. As such, we no longer stand out and are instead lumped together with everyone else who has ever been let down by our beloved football club.
The players aren’t good any more.
When a football club is the definition of success, it’s inevitable that the players you choose to put on the pitch will eventually be exposed as the frauds that they are. For every Suarez, there’s a dozen or so Walcott’s, Suarez’s, Rooney’s and Kompany’s that combine to make up the whole of the modern-day football player’s resume.
With so many other options for top level sports entertainment, the demand for mediocrity only increases, which means that the truly bad players get to stay in the game for longer. It’s also worth remembering that modern football is a results-driven industry, so any player who doesn’t consistently contribute to the on-field success of their team is going to be exposed sooner or later.
Your local rivals are now way better.
There was a time when your local rivals in the Premier League were miles behind you in terms of quality. Whether it was administrative incompetence, poor management or a combination of the two, it’s now a near-forfeit certainty that your local rivals will now be way better than you are.
The financial advantages of being in the top flight have meant that most of your main rivals have been able to invest in their squad more meaningfully, while the increased TV revenue from the aforementioned financial advantages have meant that the richest clubs can now even afford to compete on a global scale. With all these advantages and resources, your local rivals are now able to challenge for the league title on a yearly basis, meaning that you’re never going to realistically challenge for the league title as long as you’re in the same city.
It’s only safe to support local clubs or your own country’s national team.
Let’s face it, when all the big clubs have gone abroad, you’re never going to support a foreign team. It’s just too risky. Whether it’s the potential humiliation of the opening game, the potential interference of the opposing manager who just happens to be from that country and/or the potential injury risk of an overseas visit, it’s now just too risky to support a team from abroad. Instead, you’re going to have to take your lumps and swallow your pride and support your local club, if you have one, as they chase a title that’s probably too low for them, while you’re just happy to have some form of affiliation with the football club again.
Off the field issues have become too much of a distraction.
The modern football club is a living, breathing organism, so it stands to reason that their problems off the field are going to be a distraction from the success on it. Whether it’s financial mismanagement, a player trying to jump ship due to power struggles with their manager or racism allegations, your club’s off-field issues now have the potential to be a distraction from the success on it.
With the increased focus on social issues such as equality and inclusion, football clubs are now required to come under the spotlight for their off-field behaviour, with the potential for issues such as homophobia or misogyny to be highlighted by the media.
With fans expecting a higher standard from their teams, and the increased scrutiny from the media and social media, it’s now a near-forfeit certainty that your club’s off-field issues will be a distraction from the success on it.
Fans no longer trust the manager and board.
There’s no way to get around it: the fans no longer trust the manager and board. In their eyes, the biggest mistake your club ever made was when it hired a manager who has a track record of failure. Once the fans start to doubt the decisions of the board, it’s all but guaranteed that they’ll stop trusting the manager and board.
With resentment growing toward the manager and board, the only way for a football club to recover is to do something that fans never want to see happen: fire the manager and make a serious change to their board. It’s also worth noting that this trust issue is far more pronounced in the lower leagues, where it’s common for fans to have to rely on the manager and board themselves to resolve any issues that may arise.
New rules or ticketing policies have been announced that make you hate your seat.
From the new rules about music to the new ticketing policies about refunding, there’s a seemingly new way for your club to piss you off every single year.
From the new rules about music to the new ticketing policies about refunding, there’s a seemingly new way for your club to piss you off every single year. With the increased focus on safety and security from the media, it’s now a near-forfeit certainty that your club will take steps to make sure that you can’t be too angry or too drunk at your seat.
From the new rules about music to the new ticketing policies about refunding, there’s a seemingly new way for your club to piss you off every single year. With the increased focus on safety and security from the media, it’s now a near-forfeit certainty that your club will take steps to make sure that you can’t be too angry or too drunk at your seat.
Too many bad stadium move proposals have been floated around.
The stadium move has become a bit of a running gag in football, with a seemingly new way for your club to screw up every year. From the new stadium move proposal to the new stadium move proposal, it’s a near-forfeit certainty that your club will propose a stadium move every few years.
With the increased focus on sustainability from the media, it’s now a near-forfeit certainty that your club will pledge to do something about their stadium’s sustainability issues. From the new stadium move proposal to the new stadium move proposal, it’s a near-forfeit certainty that your club will pledge to do something about their stadium’s sustainability issues.