Loyalty

[Guest Stevie]

Do you know what I used to think I was as loyal a fan as anyone who watches the toon. If ever my support for the toon is brought in to question I always mention a gate of 10,004 against Oxford when I was there, for an end of season nothingness of a game, as if to demonstrate my loyalty.

 

Now though and baring in mind I have just bought my season ticket there, I feel no loyalty, I'm sick of watching shite, and feeling upset on a weekend, of which I was many times last season, just fuckin frustrated and sick. Like a kid who chucks his dummy out of the pram. I'm at the stage now where I'll go next season, but if things don't pick up with NUFC this season am never going back, because it's like a relationship where you put everything in but get little back, that's how it feels to be a toon fan, and I'm not prepared to do it no more.

 

Danny B would have a field day reading this, but my loyalty is on the wain, there's normally comments of "Newcastle fans are no more loyal than the rest" which I think is bollocks, but for me I'm less loyal than many toon fans because I feel like giving up, and just becoming an armchair fan if things don't improve. It's total frustration, like a single bloke with no hands, that's how bad it feels right now, nothing ever changes.

[Tom 14000]

I think it's because before there has always been a 'cause'. I'm not sure because of my age but surely even under McKeag as much as the board were all about selling the best players to an extent I can imagine they were pulling in the same basic direction as the fans.

 

Currently under Ashley we have nothing and it doesn't look like anything is happening.

 

So it's hard for people to get enthusiastic about a club that is effectively going stale.

[The Fish 10429]

It's not so much a pride thing and now an obligation. I love the club like there a member of the family that I don't get on with. I might not think kindly of them, but I'd still give up a lung for them.

[Guest Stevie]

I think it's because before there has always been a 'cause'. I'm not sure because of my age but surely even under McKeag as much as the board were all about selling the best players to an extent I can imagine they were pulling in the same basic direction as the fans.

 

Currently under Ashley we have nothing and it doesn't look like anything is happening.

 

So it's hard for people to get enthusiastic about a club that is effectively going stale.

Were they fuck. McKeag and the rest were 10000000000000 times worse than Shepherd, and worse than Ashley even in my view. I was at the age then though where football was still new and exciting, and you always knew SJH would get us eventually.

 

I'm losing enthusiasm though no doubt about it.

[Guest alex]

Probably a combination of the way football is going in general plus the way NUFC has gone under Ashley. Plus, maybe more importantly, it's difficult to see any light at the end of the tunnel (the natural pessimist in me sees things getting worse). Hard for anyone to maintain their enthusiasm.

[Tom 14000]

I think it's because before there has always been a 'cause'. I'm not sure because of my age but surely even under McKeag as much as the board were all about selling the best players to an extent I can imagine they were pulling in the same basic direction as the fans.

 

Currently under Ashley we have nothing and it doesn't look like anything is happening.

 

So it's hard for people to get enthusiastic about a club that is effectively going stale.

Were they fuck. McKeag and the rest were 10000000000000 times worse than Shepherd, and worse than Ashley even in my view. I was at the age then though where football was still new and exciting, and you always knew SJH would get us eventually.

 

I'm losing enthusiasm though no doubt about it.

 

I said I wasn't sure

[snakehips 0]

Do you know what I used to think I was as loyal a fan as anyone who watches the toon. If ever my support for the toon is brought in to question I always mention a gate of 10,004 against Oxford when I was there, for an end of season nothingness of a game, as if to demonstrate my loyalty.

 

Now though and baring in mind I have just bought my season ticket there, I feel no loyalty, I'm sick of watching shite, and feeling upset on a weekend, of which I was many times last season, just fuckin frustrated and sick. Like a kid who chucks his dummy out of the pram. I'm at the stage now where I'll go next season, but if things don't pick up with NUFC this season am never going back, because it's like a relationship where you put everything in but get little back, that's how it feels to be a toon fan, and I'm not prepared to do it no more.

 

Danny B would have a field day reading this, but my loyalty is on the wain, there's normally comments of "Newcastle fans are no more loyal than the rest" which I think is bollocks, but for me I'm less loyal than many toon fans because I feel like giving up, and just becoming an armchair fan if things don't improve. It's total frustration, like a single bloke with no hands, that's how bad it feels right now, nothing ever changes.

 

They're just passing thoughts, Stevie. I guess most would agree that supporting NUFC at present is crap, and that our love is barely a flicker compared to the flaming torch it has been up until the last season or so.

 

My Mrs once asked me - during the 80's shite - why I still went. I told her that it's not just the football (I fuckin' LOVE football), it's everything that goes with it: the pints, the walking to the ground, the banter from the fans. And that's why a few (a lot?) of us have seen our love dwindle, because not only has the football been shite, but the atmosphere and craic has been virtually non-existant.

 

If the football doesn't improve, the crowds will diminish and we can start moving around the seats to where we want to be, and the people around us will open up and express some of the humour/madness that we as football supporters love but have been sadly missing. If the football improves, the atmosphere of supporting the team will improve. Either way, I hope that things will get better for a supporter of NUFC in the next season(s).

 

Basically, I know what I mean but cannit express it the way I want:D

 

As Kate Bush sang so sexily to Peter Gabriel, Don't Give Up.

[NJS 4256]

I've said before that I've been falling out of love with football in general and especially NUFC for the last 3 or 4 years. I don't know whether its age or just being worn down by the drudgery of game after game after game with no real pleasure.

 

Having served my "apprenticeship" when we were really shit I honestly thought those days were behind us and mid-table premier league mediocrity was the worst thing that could happen. I've tried to be positive by playing the novelty factor for some different/new places to go this season but I can't see that lasting beyond a year.

 

As for home games, I was finding it hard enough to be arsed to go see "big" teams so I can't see many trips in the near future.

[Tom 14000]

Probably a combination of the way football is going in general plus the way NUFC has gone under Ashley. Plus, maybe more importantly, it's difficult to see any light at the end of the tunnel (the natural pessimist in me sees things getting worse). Hard for anyone to maintain their enthusiasm.

 

I suppose this will also be a major contributing factor. Success is basically a lottery outside of the top teams and who can't see Man City eventually winning something? Chelsea won the lottery and Manchester United have spent big.

 

The money getting dotted around now - even to compete - is completely stupid. Our record signing is Michael Owen at £17m, when a transfer of the same fee goes through these days nobody bats an eyelid, like when Zhirkov went to Chelsea.

 

Then you have to think about the wages...

[Fop 1]

This season has the potential to be an utter fucking disaster (much more so than this time last season). That's just reality.

 

 

And whilst we'll likely never see days like the early 90's here again, it's not looking like we're even going to see days like Sunderland have seen any time soon (as a best case scenario) the way Assley is "running" things.

 

 

Edited July 27, 2009 by Fop

[Guest alex]

This season has the potential to be an utter fucking disaster (much more so than this time last season). That's just reality.

 

 

And whilst we'll likely never see days like the early 90's here again, it's not looking like we're even going to see days like Sunderland have seen any time soon (as a best case scenario) they way Assley is "running" things.

 

 

You renewing Fop?

[Renton 20420]

For me it's not just NUFC that's dead, it the whole of football since Chelsea and especially Man city got mega-rich owners who don't give a shit about the good of the game. It just feels utterly pointless now, there's no competition.

 

I would have genuinely loved to see us be a competitive force in the Championship with a realistic target. Now though that fat cunt has robbed us even of that. If things don't improve by Christmas I'm cancelling by direct debit and will go when I want to next year. At the end of the day, we're treated like customers now (very shoddily, I might add), so why go when it gives no pleasure? There are better ways to spend the time and money.

[trophyshy 7058]

Football, particularly the English Premiership, has become an obscene tumor on sport, representative of capitalism at its worst.

 

We played our part in the gang bang, and another gang banger has come in and gang banged us all.

 

I shudder when I hear the figures discussed in football. It was just us lot kicking a ball about on a field 130 years ago.

 

What to do though? You can't turn away for good, can you?

[Guest alex]

For me, the real killer is that it's fucking boring man. Football in general and the match itself.

[Renton 20420]

Football, particularly the English Premiership, has become an obscene tumor on sport, representative of capitalism at its worst.

 

We played our part in the gang bang, and another gang banger has come in and gang banged us all.

 

I shudder when I hear the figures discussed in football. It was just us lot kicking a ball about on a field 130 years ago.

 

What to do though? You can't turn away for good, can you?

 

 

Wish it felt like that tbh.

[johnthebrief 0]

For me it's not just NUFC that's dead, it the whole of football since Chelsea and especially Man city got mega-rich owners who don't give a shit about the good of the game. It just feels utterly pointless now, there's no competition.

 

I would have genuinely loved to see us be a competitive force in the Championship with a realistic target. Now though that fat cunt has robbed us even of that. If things don't improve by Christmas I'm cancelling by direct debit and will go when I want to next year. At the end of the day, we're treated like customers now (very shoddily, I might add), so why go when it gives no pleasure? There are better ways to spend the time and money.

 

Agreed

 

The sooner Manure, Chavski and co fuck off to form their euro super wankfest the better

 

Then the rest of us can get on with a competitive competition that's actually entertaining to watch

[Papa Lazaru 0]

Even though i'm still going next season and will do probably til i die, i feel the same way. I'm sick to death of the whole thing from top to bottom and at times am seriously pissed off that i have to go to the match when i have other things i'd much rather be doing. Then you remember that not only are you giving up time to go to the match and be depressed, enraged and sickened, but your paying arseholes for the privalege!

 

And as Alex says in the past when it was abd you thought, better was just round the corner, or it'll all turn out fine in the end. Now we know fine well that if this mess continues then at best we're stuck in the championship for a while falling further and further behind the prem teams, at worst we become like Leeds and drop further with massive finacial troubles, or we end up imploding and facing point dedutions and more!

[Park Life 71]

The rules have to be changed reg:

 

Budgets for players per season

Wage cap

Squad size

Debt ceilings

Supporter involvement

[Papa Lazaru 0]

For me it's not just NUFC that's dead, it the whole of football since Chelsea and especially Man city got mega-rich owners who don't give a shit about the good of the game. It just feels utterly pointless now, there's no competition.

 

I would have genuinely loved to see us be a competitive force in the Championship with a realistic target. Now though that fat cunt has robbed us even of that. If things don't improve by Christmas I'm cancelling by direct debit and will go when I want to next year. At the end of the day, we're treated like customers now (very shoddily, I might add), so why go when it gives no pleasure? There are better ways to spend the time and money.

 

This is one of the things that really got to me. I'd got to the point where i'd accepted relegation and started thinking, you know what with Shearer and Dowie sorting the cub out from top to bottom and having the full suppost of us fans, with some of the crap shifted and some younger, hungrier players identified by Big Al coming in alongside the better players we kept we could have a season where we won games, scored goald and did well, remember those days!

 

A quick promotion ending up with a better squad than we went down with and a hcance to quickly build again with more money and Ashley the cunt wrecked all of that and plunged us into a state i never imagined possible, i really do hope something fucking horrible happens to him!

[Ayatollah Hermione 13594]

For me, the real killer is that it's fucking boring man. Football in general and the match itself.

 

That's where I stand on things. I mean, what is there to be excited about with football these days? Watching the Sir Bob match yesterday got me thinking about his time here and how that excitement is totally gone. There was a time under him where it really felt like we could break through the glass ceiling, especially when we were hammering Arsenal and Leeds in back-to-back weeks and football in general just felt a bit more competitive. Then Chelsea got the mega bucks and the whole state of the game went to shit. Now, there's nothing exciting about seeing the top 4 (and now Man City, I suppose) having the pick of the bunch then leaving the rest of us to battle it out for a trip in the totally shit UEFA Cup or an "exciting" cup run that will be ruined as soon as the top 4 don't have an important league game on the weekend. There's a depressing feeling that we'll never win anything unless we get bought out by some mega-rich tycoon and football really shouldn't be like that.

 

As an aside, does anyone have that bat-shit post that HTT made about football just being entertainment like movies or music?

[Guest Stevie]

For me, the real killer is that it's fucking boring man. Football in general and the match itself.

 

That's where I stand on things. I mean, what is there to be excited about with football these days? Watching the Sir Bob match yesterday got me thinking about his time here and how that excitement is totally gone. There was a time under him where it really felt like we could break through the glass ceiling, especially when we were hammering Arsenal and Leeds in back-to-back weeks and football in general just felt a bit more competitive. Then Chelsea got the mega bucks and the whole state of the game went to shit. Now, there's nothing exciting about seeing the top 4 (and now Man City, I suppose) having the pick of the bunch then leaving the rest of us to battle it out for a trip in the totally shit UEFA Cup or an "exciting" cup run that will be ruined as soon as the top 4 don't have an important league game on the weekend. There's a depressing feeling that we'll never win anything unless we get bought out by some mega-rich tycoon and football really shouldn't be like that.

 

As an aside, does anyone have that bat-shit post that HTT made about football just being entertainment like movies or music?

Despite growing up in Newcastle - First toon game at 17, first home toon game at 18....our survey says...

Edited July 27, 2009 by Stevie

[Guest alex]

I'm always suss about people who like football but never liked it as a kid. What's that all about?

[Tom 14000]

Maybe they just weren't introduced to it at an early age.

[Guest alex]

Maybe they just weren't introduced to it at an early age.

If you didn't play at school etc. with your mates then profess to like it later it's dodgy imo. No excuses Tom, unless you're a raspberry ripple mebbies.

[Guest Stevie]

I'm always suss about people who like football but never liked it as a kid. What's that all about?

Totally agree. I reckon from the age of 5 to 14, 95% of my living thoughts were about football. Even worse though are blokes who just don't like football, I haven't got one male mate who is a football hater, I don't think I could have neither. How can you have a mate who doesn't like football?