Football Disillusionment

[Terrarian]

Personally I’m sick of the diving and the referees giving free kicks , games constantly being stop start, it’s boring , the slightest contact sometimes apparently has a player crumble to the ground.

Technically the players today are good however I find there is a lack of guile, rather than taking players on, they choose to pass sideways or back (I’m not just talking about us) . It’s very boring.

Plus I think there is a lack of characters in the game.

I definitely hate the way you can't tackle anymore, some of the free kicks are s soft it does my head in. There's a lot about the modern game that has become soft, pampering to the millionaires.

 

[Khalekan]

If we won yesterday and got champions league or fa cup win these worries would be gone...

I get your point but, this new muted European league is the latest bug bear of mine, when is enough enough.

Fans and the majority of clubs should have begged for a Salary cap like they have in the NFL, the focus then would be on developing our own players and being screwd in the market. City can keep pumping 50m on defenders until they get it right.......

The Bosman case and the no limit on foreign players changed football.....

I wonder if it's the better for it.

No, it definitely isn’t IMO.

The Bosman ruling was the worst thing that ever happened to football.

 

[Tipp blue]

There was an article on this on GOT a little while back: https://www.grandoldteam.com/2020/08/21/losing-my-religion/

But yeah, for me - the money involved/VAR/the media with the continual WWE like narrative... football isn't what it was. It's got worse, and Covid just showed the Premier League up for what it was.

I think not being able to get to Goodison has compounded a lot of the disillusionment.

The money involved I think is a lot of it, when you have bad to poor players picking up 50K+ a week and looking disinterested on the field, how can the average fan earning 400-450 (give or take) a week for doing real work maintain interest?

 

[Cameron Manning]

I’ve been supporting Everton for over 60 years, through great times, good times, not so good times and dismal times but I’m now getting really disillusioned with football in general and with Everton in particular. Covid lockdown hasn’t helped and has probably just brought this disillusionment into focus. However, after yesterday’s abysmal performance I sat and thought about the main causes of my discontent and these include some major issues and minor irritations (not necessarily Everton based) but I’m sure everyone can add to this list (including me!).

• Ridiculous transfer fees: you could build 5-6 primary schools for the cost of one iwobi* (£28M)
• Obscene levels of wages: You could employ 74 nurses for one Iwobi* annual salary (£2.6m)
• VAR: where do I start?
• Feigning injury: the obligatory scream of agony and the holding of the head, thigh, knee, shin, ankle after every hard (and not so hard) tackle. Mainly to disrupt the oppositions progress when you’ve just lost the ball!
• Throw-Ins: players from both sides holding up their arms and yelling ‘our ball’ every time there’s a throw-in, even when it’s clearly obvious who the ball last touched.
• Commentator’s terminology: ‘high press’ ‘low block’ ‘high line’ ‘tiki-taka’ ‘false number nine’ ‘box to box player’ ‘playing in the pocket’………..meaningless phrases that make me cringe every time I hear some half-wit commentator and his Stan Laurel side kick trying to appear ‘knowledgeable’.

* = or substitute any other expensive, overpaid, not very talented premier league player.

Of course if we beat Man City next Saturday all will be forgiven until next time!

Great post Bazza, and it looks like plenty of fans on here are in agreement with the way you view football and the way it is played now, also the Demi gods who play the game, the pundits who prostitute themselves for money to give their take on the game. It’s definitely not the same honest game of football I started watching many years ago, I became disillusioned, slightly about five years ago, that has grown massively and not being able to go has also put me off football, but it is the cheating and winning at any cost that, literally,sickens me. I don’t think it is going to change.

 

[degsy]

Not as many seem disillusioned when we win a few - strange that

 

[peteblue]

Not as many seem disillusioned when we win a few - strange that

Winning lifts us up, losing puts us down, losing against crap teams when we have a chance of top 4 makes us disillusioned......but we always get over it.....

 

[jaycee]

Its more than likely a generational thing,if you grew up watching in the 50s,60s then you were watching probably the peak of English football,world cup winners,70s/80s football on TV was a rarity and players were still largely accessable,you would see them in nightclubs and could approach them,most teams still had a local feel to the team,if its 90s onwards your used to wall to wall games so a lot of the excitement from live gsmes has gone,the people who are just starting out watching will get used to VAR and wont see it as a real issue in a few years

 

[Cool_Blue]

Can I add my little bugbear to the excellent points in this thread?
MOTM awards........and the ones on here too. No need, no point, who cares?

 

[Cameron Manning]

Not as many seem disillusioned when we win a few - strange that

degsy, you are an old timer, are you still in love with football, the way it was when you started watching as to how it is now.
I can honestly say that winning, losing or drawing has nothing to do with the way I feel about football and everything to do with how the game is played and how people connected to running the game have little feelings for the game in general, hardly any honesty or integrity used, especially when it comes to making money, money that is the god they believe in and worship. Amen!!

 

[ForeverEverton]

If Everton were successful again I`d bet everyone on here would be engaged, the fact that we havent been for 30 years, some dont know anything other than seeing "Other" teams lifting trophies and never us.

Thats where the disillusion comes from, constantly seeing us be 5h1t season after season after season. Even now some glimpses of what could have been but as some have said in other threads we are 2 or 3 windows away from competing, thats potentially another 2 "transition seasons" so it isnt going to end any time soon.

 

[brieverton]

I have taken a good deal more interest in local football, and some other amateur/semi-professional leagues as well in recent years. The footie is less predictable, more evenly contested, and I don't have any attachment or emotional interest in the outcome. The quality isn't great but with some of what I see in the Premier League, you'd wonder at times.

If Everton were flying high it might be different. As it is I rarely watch any Premier League football outside of Everton simply because I find it so tribal. It always seems I'd need one side to win over another, even when its not Everton, so the RS, or because team x/y is above/below us in the league, or because I just don't like that side - which more or less applies to all of the now commonly-understood "Top Six" sides in different measure. I much prefer the European leagues, especially Serie A.

I have to continually question why I put so much emotional investment in Everton when they find a way, eventually, to let me down with a bang, like last Saturday. I say to myself this isn't worth it at all with everyting else going on in my life, and in the world. The feeling of being trapped by my allegiance is quite real. I could go a week cold turkey, but always come back for more punishment.

What I particularly dislike is the propaganda industry that surrounds elite football. 99% of managers in a post-match interview are more annoying to listen to than a politician on a Sunday morning show. Predictable, boring, moaning, even they must toe the party line in all circumstances. the media are a mere reflection of this mentality.

Football seems much better as a neutral. But I hope crowds will be allowed in soon. Apart from local football, I would watch most of what I see on TV and the empty stadia do distract from the product hugely.

 

[degsy]

degsy, you are an old timer, are you still in love with football, the way it was when you started watching as to how it is now.
I can honestly say that winning, losing or drawing has nothing to do with the way I feel about football and everything to do with how the game is played and how people connected to running the game have little feelings for the game in general, hardly any honesty or integrity used, especially when it comes to making money, money that is the god they believe in and worship. Amen!!

Everton win and football is the greatest game ever, nowt wrong with it, etc, etc.

When you're smiling etc, etc,

*Reports that arl fool Camo for stereotypical ageism

 

[kev101]

Footbollocks!

 

[Cameron Manning]

Everton win and football is the greatest game ever, nowt wrong with it, etc, etc.

When you're smiling etc, etc,

*Reports that arl fool Camo for stereotypical ageism

I’d have to report myself for ageism Degs, I think I’m as old as you. All I asked was a simple question.

 

[Joey66]

Not as many seem disillusioned when we win a few - strange that

I kicked the cat & we haven't got one - their first goal the wife opened the living room door, & I blamed her for that goal lol