Todd boehly north v south

[Stratman Wolves]

Think my point is, US sports have a history and culture and a way of being played and televised which is (sort of) acceptable to the American public. I can accept no relegation, stoppages in play, loads of teams qualifying for the playoffs, all star games etc. as it is their sport and it's how they've decided to play it throughout their history. If Europeans started buying up NFL teams and gradually started trying to change the formats, structure and culture of the game there, American fans would be, quite rightly, outraged.

However, what's good for those sports and that history and culture is not good for ours. American money and owners coming into the game will mean a push for a closed shop (no promotion / relegation), more playoffs, changes that allow more money from adverts, and a push for the bigger teams to dominate. Relegation and promotion is a key part of European football history and culture, as is two halves of uninterrupted play, and a partisanship relationship between teams who don't want to team up into North v South battles (or however you want to divide it). We have internationals for that stuff. The US have absolutely no international competition in their main sports as they are generally the only country that play them to that level. Hence, they have to make up all star games and competitions between their various leagues. Also why they very cheekily call the champions of their domestic leagues World Champions!

So, US sports stick to your culture formats and we'll stick to ours.

The dirty secret is that Americans for the sake of advertising money and revenue growth have already changed formats, ruined the structure and culture of our own leagues! Americans just have had cultural and financial muscle post-WWII, and happen to be the ones with the money to splash. On the other hand, while American owners in the Prem have largely been incompetent to some degree, they cannot be blamed for ruining the beautiful game when FIFA is largely Eurocentric and UEFA forcing domestic leagues to adapt to their demands and schedules.

I do think it's a cultural thing, we football supporters tend to dedicate all of our concentration on the game being played before us. We'll plan our day around that 90 minis and focus totally on it. American sports seem to be more background in their daily routine.

First time I went to the States we sat down in the ESPN bar in Baltimore harbour and for me it was 'right, NFL game for the next three hours I here not moving from my seat, eyes on the giant screen and waitress service to the table, got my spot' and aside from toilet breaks that was it for me.

The locals were sitting down, staying for a bit, wandering off, presumably to other bars, and then early in the second half our friends said, come on we're going. I was speechless, this is your team (Redskins), he had an ST, and here he was "wandering off" mid game. I was "but, but I want to stay til the end" until they mentioned next stop was Hooters!!

Even then they were later happy to leave before the end saying because of the score the game was over. For different reasons now though I still wanted to stay until the end. But I will never forget that difference in attitude.

When you see how they are close up, you can see that something we are very precious about is actually a side show to them (and I'm conscious I'm generalising here). They will accept changes far more easily, teams can move across the country for instance, it's all part of the general fabric, whereas we want to hold onto the traditionalist principles of 1888 of which we are so very proud.

The culture is different largely because of both how big the US is compared to the UK, and how media access to the matches has always been readily available. For example I am a Miami Dolphins fan, and I live within an hour of the stadium. I can drive to the game, spend hundreds of dollars on tickets, parking (NFL stadiums tend not to have rail infrastructure around them), and concessions or I can just stay home and watch it on TV in comfort or at a bar. This option seems limited in the UK where the gov't and Sky have a tighter restriction on where the matches can be viewed so locals have no choice but to go to the ground. The NFL grew largely because of TV in the 1960s. Whereas the nearest Prem stadium to Molineux is Villa Park, some 15ish miles, the nearest away stadium to my home NFL team is a 4 hour drive. It is financially difficult for fans to travel, but there are those who do but it isn't anywhere near how supporters travel for football in Europe. Hope this context kind of helps understand the wide cultural difference. I admire English football supporter culture and how different it is, I am not exactly rooting for American interventionism here.

Its amusing to think that the American owners of Liverpool and Manure were just going along with their Italian and Spanish masters...

Its amusing to think that Florentino Perez, the highly influential and wealthy mastermind that controls Spanish football media and the winningest European club is going to cede anything other than mere invitations to Americans they don't particularly care to trust or like. This isn't what you think it is.

 

[Wonder Boyo]

Its amusing to think that Florentino Perez, the highly influential and wealthy mastermind that controls Spanish football media and the winningest European club is going to cede anything other than mere invitations to Americans they don't particularly care to trust or like. This isn't what you think it is.

Well argued points but completely invalidated by using the term 'winningest'. I expect a lifetime ban please mods.

 

[Stratman Wolves]

Well argued points but completely invalidated by using the term 'winningest'. I expect a lifetime ban please mods.

I will accept any punishment, that word was included to drive the point further Hopefully my post helped with the context of some of the differences brought up.

No amount of cups can take away that Wolves were the first champions of Europe

 

[Very Proud (AKA Still Proud)]

The dirty secret is that Americans for the sake of advertising money and revenue growth have already changed formats, ruined the structure and culture of our own leagues! Americans just have had cultural and financial muscle post-WWII, and happen to be the ones with the money to splash. On the other hand, while American owners in the Prem have largely been incompetent to some degree, they cannot be blamed for ruining the beautiful game when FIFA is largely Eurocentric and UEFA forcing domestic leagues to adapt to their demands and schedules.


The culture is different largely because of both how big the US is compared to the UK, and how media access to the matches has always been readily available. For example I am a Miami Dolphins fan, and I live within an hour of the stadium. I can drive to the game, spend hundreds of dollars on tickets, parking (NFL stadiums tend not to have rail infrastructure around them), and concessions or I can just stay home and watch it on TV in comfort or at a bar. This option seems limited in the UK where the gov't and Sky have a tighter restriction on where the matches can be viewed so locals have no choice but to go to the ground. The NFL grew largely because of TV in the 1960s. Whereas the nearest Prem stadium to Molineux is Villa Park, some 15ish miles, the nearest away stadium to my home NFL team is a 4 hour drive. It is financially difficult for fans to travel, but there are those who do but it isn't anywhere near how supporters travel for football in Europe. Hope this context kind of helps understand the wide cultural difference. I admire English football supporter culture and how different it is, I am not exactly rooting for American interventionism here.


Its amusing to think that Florentino Perez, the highly influential and wealthy mastermind that controls Spanish football media and the winningest European club is going to cede anything other than mere invitations to Americans they don't particularly care to trust or like. This isn't what you think it is.

I totally understand your point on attending games, in all the time I've spent at friends houses in the US over the years I've always wanted to attend an NFL game but never quite managed it. Nearest I got was a Dolphins game but, as you say, that would have entailed a long long journey, getting up at 5:00am and driving up from Key West and was a non-starter.

I guess watching it in a bar differs because of the length of the game and how it is broken up. I can liken it to a Hindu wedding I was a guest at where people dipped in and out of the actual ceremony throughout the day as and when they felt like it, whereas at a Christian you were in and present the whole way through.

Our natural fear of "Americanisation", if I can use that term, is we end up with the game punctuated by stoppages (VAR is bad enough), lasting three hours and losing its identity. Yes I know that's unlikely but every time something chips away at the way we do things, that fear comes back (think Alexa being the thin end of the wedge in some kind of SkyNet masterplan).

You're a young country and in the grand history of football you are a dot in time, whereas we have a long history and consider ourselves the founders of the game, there will always be that snobbery/resistance whenever and American comes up with a bright idea in our wonderful world of soccer

 

[GoldenHorseshoe]

What happens when 11 teams are owned by the yanks?
Goodnight to the game as we know it?

Las Vegas consortium hopes to buy Bournemouth

 

[CelebrityWolf]

What happens when 11 teams are owned by the yanks?
Goodnight to the game as we know it?

Las Vegas consortium hopes to buy Bournemouth

To be fair, the game as we know it is falling apart without the Americans help.

 

[GoldenHorseshoe]

To be fair, the game as we know it is falling apart without the Americans help.

Are you trying to cheer me up?