@Sutters: I can completely understand your criticism of football, and for the most part I do agree. But I'm a football person myself. Been on almost every side of the game. Played it from a young age, went to the matches in my hometown. My own team was a typical blue-collar club from southeast Asia: mostly state-owned, sponsors are a local sportswear shop, you know where all the players come from. Half of them smoked.
They played many of our matches under heavy armed police escorts. We saw the politics, felts the players represent our state and club, and all the frustrations of our working dads and our selves vented on match nights. The football was terrible, the pitches were worse, the fans were probably of no better people than the ones you described. My earliest memories of football were the smell of piss, sweat, cheap liquor, cheap burgers, steamed nuts and clove cigarettes all rolled in one. It was rude, it was dirty, it was unpleasant... but even as a kid it was incredible. When your team won, when we made comebacks... people would pick me up and let me see above the heads. I recall a cup final in 1999 when we made it all the way to the capital. We lost to a rich team, got totally outplayed, lost 2-1, but it was so strange to see their small group of supporters all polite and seated... it was as if they weren't enjoying the game!
I've also managed futsal comps, played in a semi-pro league, and looked for sponsors for my team, so I see all the sides and yeah the commercial aspects are the shits. How kids could afford seeing games I don't know. Those tickets? Costs to watch a club play? I know I'm so privileged I could see Liverpool once in Anfield, and I coughed up so much for it I know my friends back home could never afford in a lifetime. But I know if any of them could, like we did in 1999, we'd borrow through our nose to watch our team play in 1 final, win or lose. Because we never won it in our lifetimes. Because the atmosphere sears itself into our memory. BEcause, you know, sometimes life was life and football was some kind of magic. Klopp knows it. Poch finally felt it. They all understand, I'm sure you all do too. Because we just love football =)
I agree with you. Sometimes it feels so not worth it And I'm watching Madrid with some kids in a quiet polite home...
...but that roar. That trembling of the ground beneath you when the 12th man is behind you. F*ck me.
I was mostly the same. I have both good, great, slightly intimidating and scary memories of going to football matches as a kid and I was obsessed with both playing and watching football as a child and it was my life up into my mid teens, but I lost interest quickly and found more enjoyment in girls and various arts and educational things. The sunday league team I played for actually won a couple of our county leagues. We even had a couple of players that got scouted for some professional youth teams but none of them ever made it past that. Football fanaticism to me is like something you expect most people to grow out of like wrestling, but many seem to get more radical as they get older. Don't get me wrong, I love to watch the big games but I don't really care who wins. I understand the escapism and tribalism, but ultimately to me it's just shallow and hollow behind the surface powered by the cogs of corporations and all they care about is profit and trophies they can boast about to their corporate buddies and the players are their pawns in that game and the fans finance it and I can't see past that now. I don't even really support my 'home' club any more and I just don't think I could ever find passion for them again. It's become like a new age religion for people, or more like a cult or something, but religion is something I also outgrew as I can see past the facade. I guess like religion most people don't want to put too much thought into the realities of it and just go with the flow to make their life a bit more enjoyable or comfortable and there's nothing wrong with that (Unless people start getting violent about it) but it's like once you've had your eyes open you can't really unsee the truth. Maybe I've become cynical in my old age but it just doesn't really mean anything to me any more other than purely entertainment.
I'll still enjoy the game as a spectator but I don't really care who wins though I do like to root for the underdog. I would rather have Liverpool won the league than City but I don't really care who wins the Champions league as long as it's a great game, but the fact that it's two English teams puts a bit of a dampener on it to me as it just makes it like another Premier League game really. I'm edging more towards Liverpool for the win as I like Klopp a lot, but that's basically all it comes down to for me.
