Friday evening sees the beginning of the football season. It seems only a few days ago since the last kick of last season happened.
It was.
The football league season ended on the first weekend in May, but the Premier League season limped on, well I am a Norwich fan, for three more weeks, then we had the play offs, the Champion League Final, the Europa League Final, international friendlies, then the world cup. By which time, the new season as already under way, as the very early rounds of the European cups had already begun by the beginning of June. Or so it seemed.
Then the world cup went on until, what was it, the 13th July. By that time, not only had the European games already begun, so had the pre-season friendlies. As I write this, the Premier League teams have criss-crossed the world, playing games before returning home for another round of friendlies, before their season begins next week. And then 38 league games, up to eight FA cup games, six league Cup games, 15 European games. All in all, a lot of football.
And most of it on TV one way or another; live Football League on Friday nights, Premier League games on Saturday lunchtime and teatime, and up to three games on Sunday afternoon, with maybe another game on Monday evening. Champion’s League on Tuesday and Wednesday, Europa League on Thursday, and with League Cup games mixed in as well.
That is a lot of football. And a lot of games for the top players to play. No wonder they are so tired. I got tired just writing that down. I make something like 67 games, plus internationals all over 9 months, 40 weeks. That’s too much football. And that’s coming from someone who likes football. A lot. But not that much.
Less football, and players playing less games, so that at the end of the season they are not shattered and the World Cup or Euros are a celebration of what is best in the game.
My plan is for players to play no more than 25 games a season in the league, ten in Europe, so that clubs would have to give others a chance, thus increasing the players pool of those who get a game, hopefully, some of which would actually be English. Maybe.
Norwich begin their first season in League 2 for four years, and the chances of promotion are slim: only 3 out of the last 21 relegated clubs have bounced right back. So, with a rookie manager, players who can’t score, we’re up against it. Probably. I will always support them, but it will not define my weekend, but it will be a relief to actually win a few games this season, hopefully.
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There are now some three days to go before the new premier league season, and it is not just because Norwich are not taking part, but I really don't care that much about it.
Only three teams can really win the title, and probably that is really just two, Citeh and Chelsea. I think Man Utd could give it a real go as they have no European games to worry about this year.
But to me, whether it is either an Arab or Russian billionaire whose team wins it, really makes no difference. To me.
As for the rest, well, some think Arse stand a chance, but with the same number of players as last season, they will run out of gas at the end of February.
Again.
Liverpool lack bit this season. See what I did there? With Suarez gone, who will score the goals, and will they have the squad to compete on four fronts. And do I care?
No.
The rest will really we a long, long way back, with very little to separate eight with 17th, and the difference between survival and relegation is going to be tight.
Again.
But as long as the TV money keeps sloshing around, the clubs won't care, and ticket prices keep going up.
I was going to write in this blog, all what I saw wrong in the game, but it won't make any difference, football will carry on sucking at the TV teat, caring not one jot of the people that make the game what it is.
The fans.
We are just a resource to be exploited, and we will be. On a grand scale.
Tomorrow, the sky dish is taken down, and we will only have free to air TV again, and won't really notice the difference, and not one penny will go to fund the football gravy train.
Good riddance.
So, here are some of the problems facing the game today. In no order, bust just as they occur to me.
First, the domestic game:
1. There are now three organisations that control the professional game. The Football League, The Premier League and the FA. Football needs to be unified, so that the decisions take benefit the whole game, not just those at the very top.
2. The inherent unfairness of the Premier league where just a handful of teams can win it, and three quarters of the teams competing cannot. How long can this situation continue before the fans, even those of the teams at the top get bored.
3. Sky, the BBC, and the media claiming that the Premier league is either, the best, the most exciting or and most laughably, the most exciting. The only thing unknow is the order the top six or seven teams will finish in, that there will be an interloper from outside those teams is unlikely.
4. Ticket prices. How long will fans stand for the situation where we have to almost mortgage our lives to follow a game which is played by multi-millionaires? I refuse to support this, and so i have binned both Sky sports and Sky.
5. The Premier league's assertion that there is nothing wrong with football. It has a black heart and is money obsessed and cares not a jot about the most important part of the game: the fans. A game of football without fans is nothing, with thousands of passionate fans on the terraces it is high drama and compelling.
6. The money has taken sporting element out of football. How can anyone challenge the dominance of the teams at the top without the backing of a sugar daddy?
7. The almost complete failure of all teams in the top two divisions to develop and bring on young British talent, instead relying on spending money, ever more money on ready-made replacements from abroad. Clearly this is even worse by the teams at the top of the Prem, but all clubs are culpable.
8. The average age of the Premier league fan has gone up by a decade since the start of it 22 years ago. There are very few seats, and for the price of a kings ransom for most games, the failure to develop a new generation of fans will harm the game in the future.
9. Even football on TV is expensive. I don't know what the cost of Sky is, possibly eighty quid with the movie package. I won't pay it, nor will I be bribed by BT to change my internet so I can watch the Prem. From next year even European games will only be on BT, none on free to air. So, more free time for me then.
10. I don't want English teams to be successful, I just want to be entertained. I will never have a 'favourite' prem team if norwich are not in it. I support Norwich and no one else. If an English club wins the Champions League, it will have zero effect on my club, therefore I care not.
As for the European game;
1. The entire premise of the Champion's League is the continuation of the status quo. The league phase smoothes out 'rogue' results so that a poor result can be overcome.
2. Prize money is not based just on how far a team gets, no, it is based as much on how much advertising revenue is made in the club's country, so that a club from say, England would make more money than a club say, from Holland for getting to the same stage. Thus protecting the bigger clubs fro the more populous nations.
3. Twenty five years ago, there were three very successful European competitions. Now with the Champion's League being anything, the Cup Winners Cup was killed off, and the Europa League is seen as very much a cinderella competition, played as it is on a Thursday night, and for the most part games shown on obscure digital channels.
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