I’m not referring to an overlooked penalty-shout, a red card, or a goal scored against us that should have been disallowed. We’re not after anything quite so dramatic. Instead, we’re looking at something much more mundane: train schedules. Monday night’s match at Sheffield United kicks off at 7:30 GMT, which means that the last direct train back to London will have departed Sheffield long before the final whistle. The last, best chance at getting home will be a 10:10 GMT train that would involve a 20-minute walk from Bramall Lane and an arrival at King’s Cross at around 1:14 am. What gives?
That’s asking a lot of our away-fans. Hell, it’s asking a lot of the home-fans, many of whom may find themselves trudging home at 10:30 at night ahead of a long, dreary working week. Monday night fixtures are an anomaly at best, and for the FA to set one at that late hour challenges all involved. Even those home-fans will face a dilemma. Win, lose, or draw, their night’s sleep is ruined one way or another.
The dilemma for the away-fans is somewhat dicier. Even if we who support the Arsenal can pin hopes to securing all three points long before that final whistle, there’s still the drudgery and toil of schlepping home into what amount to the wee hours of the night. While all (well, most of us) will grudgingly admit that broadcast revenue is one of numerous geese that lay golden eggs, the FA would do well to avoid making one of those geese a golden calf whom they worship at the expense of what truly matters.
The lifeblood of the Prem is still, despite what balance-sheets and earnings-projections insist, the fans who attend matches. They’re the ones who shell out precious pounds for tickets and memberships and matchday concessions; they’re the ones who sing and shout and chant and stamp their feet until they’ve burnt off most of the calories they’ve spent on said concessions. While I understand that the bean-counters will point out that the televised revenue far outstrips what’s spent by those in attendance, the reductio ad bsurdum of that argument brings us back to the COVID-lockdown days.
Do you remember watching matches played in front of empty stadiums? For as fascinating as it was to hear more clearly what players shouted to and at each other, it felt…hollow. It felt bereft of the intensity, the passion, the energy that makes watching matches so meaningful, For myself, I fell in love with this club when I stumbled across a match on the telly way back around 1980 or thereabouts. The fans were engaged in that classic call-and-response, “we are the North End, we are the North End, we are the North End, Highbury” followed by “we are the Clock End, we are the Clock End, we are the Clock End, Highbury!” At first, I didn’t get it. This side of the pond, fans only cheer after a momentous, stupendous moment. Here was a stadium full of fans chanting irregardless of what was happening on the pitch.
They had passion. They had dedication. They supported the squad regardless of what was happening on the pitch (which, to be clear, was something close to nothing). By scheduling at match on a Monday, with a kickoff time of 7:30 GMT, the FA is prioritsing that all-too-precious television revenue over the match-day experience. Sure, Blades fans can probably count on getting to bed at a more-or-less reasonable hour. Even that, however, is asking a bit much of them. It’s not as if either one of us played the Thursday prior, thereby necessitating a Monday fixture. Our last match was 24 February, a full nine days before this fixture. The Blades’ previous fixture was 25 February, a full eight days before.
We’ve already seen and almost become accustomed to how profit has come before practicalit, and this sordid little episode is hardly the most-egregious example. It may not even be the most-recent example. It does stand, however, as just another example of how the FA is puting profit ahead of the matchday experience.
At a risk of coming across as too dismissive of the Blades’ chances on Monday, I really do hope that we race out to an early lead—not because I bear any ill will against our hosts, not because I underestimate them, not because I blithely assume that we deserve to win—none of that. My only real motivation for putting this one to bed is to give all of the fans a comfortable decision to make about their travel-plans and their bed-times. Scratch that. My other, additional motivation for us putting this one to bed is to make the televised broadcast, and its attendant advertising revenue, to bed even earlier than those fans.
If we can kill off the match early (apologies to Sheffield United supporters for the presumption), maybe—just maybe—we can drive a wooden stake deep into the heart of the FA’s vampirical deisre to extract every last ounce of profit from every last minute of every last match over which it has jurisdiction. If they’re so hell-bent on extracting every last pound of flesh, they might just want to consider looking into Man City’s 115 alleged violations of Chelsea’s profligate spending instead of going after the likes of Everton or Reading or Nottingham Forest.
Something tells me they’d reap richer rewards from even the mildest of sanctions against Man CIty or Chelsea than they would from the harshest of sanctions against these “smaller” clubs, but I digress.
At the FA’s indubitably benign request, we have no choice but to make the long slog to Bramall Lane and back, late into the evening.
I just hope the trip is worth it, on many levels…to many entities…just not the FA itself.
nothing to do with the FA. Look to the corrupt premier league instead.
remember the days prior to the premier league. Superb football with home grown players who wouldnt get a kick these days
thanks for the correction, Gary. I think I picked up from The Guardian that it was the FA and ran with it. I do remember those pre-Prem days (vaguely as I was young). Going global has of course changed the sport immensely, in many ways good.
Err… by ‘Home Grown’ I suppose you mean British not English? I mention this because, to name but a few, there were a lot of Scottish (Alex James, Frank McLintock, Kieran Tierney) and Irish (Frank Stapleton, Pat Jennings and the incomparable Liam Brady) players and there’s no difference at all between using players who play for another country’s national team in Britain or players from France, Italy, Spain, Brazil or any other country. Unless you think they’re just pretend countries and are all English really? Lastly the only time the football was ‘superb’ back then was Don Revie’s Leeds team the rest was exciting but far from superb. Lots of ‘home grown players’ in the lower leagues. Where they belong.
fair points, Kev. For me, I owe my love of this club to Brady and other Irish players like Stapleton, O’Leary, Jennings, and Devine among others. While I understand to some degree the nostalgia for the days when British football was, well, more “British,” we can certainly enjoy the thrills that players from the Continent and further afield have brought us.
It’s not just Arsenal fans that have to deal with transport & late kick off issues. Following their recent 4-1 defeat, Newcastle fans had to put up with an even later finish, the game having started at 8pm, and with Arsenal & Highbury underground stations making supporters queue, to avoid crush, to get to the trains, leaving early is almost essential for distance travellers. It’s the TV stations who schedule these games with the Premier League who are to blame.
Exactly! And particularly for teams that travel so far, they have probably made arrangements, bought train tickets, maybe even booked hotel rooms before the match is moved to a work day. But we still put up with it.
What a good article to read, well done, it was interesting relevant and humorous and I am a Blade to boot, so yes your points are all well valid even for us Blades who live some distance from the ground but unfortunatly no-one who matters will bother reading it and if they did it would be water off a ducks back, but don’t let that stop you mate, keep saying it and maybe one day the tooth fairies will do something about it eh, you never know! Anyway, have a good trip up, enjoy Sheffield and enjoy the match (take a bit of pity on us fans though, keep the score down below 5 please) and get home safely. Regards. Tony (Blade)
Hey, Tony – thanks for popping in with a kind word. I respect the spirit and hope Wilder can work a miracle (not on Monday, of course, but in the long run).
Very nice to read a response like this from an opposing fan rather than the usual abuse which is as common as the football authorities contempt for actual match goers. I wish you well in your fight against relegation but after Monday!
The game was sold a long time ago. Remember the outcry by the media, FA, PL and sundry politicians when the ‘Super League’ was announced? Then it was all about the fans and how ‘their views were being ignored’ and how ‘ they were the most important stakeholders’.? That lasted as long as it took to see off a potential rival for the pig trough.
They really do not care about the fans at all. Don’t let the broadcasters off the hook either. It is they do pick the dates and fixtures for their own purposes.
well said, cb. We’d be naive to believe that the proposed Super League was a departure from the trend that dates back decades if not further. The globalisation of the game (from which a distant fan like me benefits) means that decisions will be made based on television revenue rather than stadium revenue from time to time, with only tradition/custom standing in the way of it happening more often.
An excellent article and well done for reminding us all how anodyne the Covid games were. Yes, we all wish Sheffield United the best of luck, but not too much of it during the Arsenal game please.
The difference in FFP treatments between Everton, Notts Forest and Reading in comparison to Man City and Chelsea is difficult to understand. It seems disgraceful to me.
It boggles my mind that Everton, who cooperated, have been docked but Man City, who are resisting at every turn, still are unpunished for (alleged) violations that date back a decade. The lesson to other clubs is clear.
Not really. Everton admitted that they were intransigent and they were spending money on wages that they could not afford for years. 95% of their income went there and, of course that continued to spend on transfers. They were guilty as charged. Five years in the red.
If teams seek to gain an unfair advantage by cheating, ie, not obeying the rules, they should be punished in any competitive sport. Rules do make sport.
It is tempting to believe that City are being treated differently. Perhaps they are but I suspect that they are just throwing shedloads of cash the way of their expensive corporate lawyers. They are a complicated business.
Let’s wait and see what happens.
Yes. Be bought by a corrupt oil state. Or one that imprisons, tortures and/or murders journalists. Sorry but football needs reminding sometimes how far it is sinking into the gutter.
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