US and THEM

US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US……..

I’ve never been able to work out why people refer to their football club as “us” or “we”. I’ve always felt a bit silly whenever I’ve referred to Bangor City like that but I’m the sort of person that’s jarred by internal questions; “Why did I use such a word?…… Do other people forensically question the precision of their language?”

I tried my damnedest not to refer to Bangor as “us” or “we” when I’ve been Radio Bangor’s co-commentator (The fan-controlled broadcasting service) but the white hot excitement of the Welsh premier league causes some acute mental shuddering.

I feel part of a “we” when I watch Bangor with my friends because I feel emotionally involved. I was born in the city and I’ve been going to watch City for nearly a quarter of a century. I look at the transitory players and it feels absurd to use “we“. Most of them have different feelings, they celebrate but they don’t feel like we do, they value trophies but they don’t look at glory like we do. I prefer it that way, feeling separated saves missing them when they’re gone.

………US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US……..

I’m amazed that people feel they can refer to clubs as if they’re personally part of them “We Won!…….We Lost!…….Who are you playing today?….. I see you lost again on Saturday”. I probably shouldn’t be surprised, people aren’t afraid to self-confidently elbow their way into conversations.

“Oh aye, I used to go all the time………Blah blah’s great isn’t he!……. So do you think blah blah will make a difference as manager?……… Blah blah was great though wasn’t he, they don’t make them like him anymore do they! ……….. How much would he be worth today?”

If only this kind of thing was confined to the post-Chester Races trains that drunk people use to get home.

The matey shroud that surrounds the opening jousts of these conversations evaporates when the conversation’s nature becomes clear, one protagonist emits earnest football chatter while the other humours a child. Thoughts are visible; “We’ve got another one here, someone else that thinks they’re integral, someone else filling the air for the sake of it. Actually fella, I’d rather be left alone”.

I was on my way to the recent West Brom v West Ham match when I alighted in Wolverhampton. I yearned to ride the tram to The Hawthorns so I went to the terminus. When I got there it was clear that the tram wasn’t running because of long-term engineering works, I quickly realised why Wolverhampton hadn’t been listed as the last stop when I had checked the timetable the previous day.

I stood as an unmistakable visitor so naturally a bloke walked up to me. I listened to the typically hospitable local explain precisely which bus services I needed to reach the temporary terminus in Priestfield. His words transported me back to my academic salad days, the time when anything within reason felt possible. I thanked the bloke, realised everything sounded too complicated and trudged disconsolately back to the station.

The next train to Birmingham was full of loud men discussing Tottenham Hotspur’s prospects. I presumed they were going to the early evening match as “we” was used extensively. Judging by the accents, and the fact that it was an Arriva Train Wales train, the men were from Shropshire. I wondered how they felt a connection with Tottenham.

The other week a dead passionate Liverpool fan from daaaahn saaarrrf was on 6-0-6 and his call was so memorable they made a feature out of it on the BBC website. It was pure stream of angry consciousness;

“It’s a circus at the moment mate and he’s the biggest clown of the lot mate you build a team from the back mate I’ve been waiting 25 years for us to win the league mate he’s got a worse record than Brendan Rodgers mate if we’d have won the league I would have been the most proudest Liverpool fan in the world mate”.

There are better things to be angry about than a football club that plays two hundred miles away from the place you’ve always called home.

I’ve don’t understood why those that only watch televised matches become angry when their team loses, they’ve only bought a polyester shirt. I don’t understand how a passing interest can be maintained in a premier league club. It takes astronomical sums of money and military-style planning to gain access then you’re obliged and encouraged to feel personally hard done by. Surely it’s cheaper and easier to be interested in a club that’s physically closer, especially when they will probably need your help in some way.

………US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US……..

It’s an obvious thing to say but there’s an essential link between a football club and the place in which it exists. Those that live nearby, those exiled by work relocation and those that adopt a club after moving to an area are able to view clubs as a “we” because they are being represented. I don’t understand how someone can feel truly part of an “we” by buying a piece of clothing that lots of other people have bought, anyone can buy a piece of clothing.

Take me and FC United. From the outside I may look part of it, I’m a co-owner, I go to as many matches as I can and I try to spend or donate as much as I can in the ground, but while I’m a part of it I’m apart from it. I’m separated from the “us” by a simple fact; I’m not from Greater Manchester.

I feel an affinity with the area because my Grandma used to live there and see Lowry painting on the streets of Salford but I’m not a local. I think I get FC United, I appreciate the club’s culture and I like the idea that it’s an expression of streetwise fortitude that’s part of Manchester’s rich historical tapestry of defiance but I’m not a local.

FCUM is an inclusive club but I feel like an interloper because I only became a member after I watched Looking For Eric. I can understand everything but I can’t truly feel it like a local does. I may be part of it but it’s an infinitesimally small part. I can’t kid myself along, I’m merely a fellow traveller.

I’ve developed an affinity with several clubs over the years for a variety of reasons, Port Talbot Town, Saint Etienne, Livorno, Hibs, Celtic. While I take an interest in each of them, and hope they do well, I’m a mere tourist. The only team I feel that I can manage a weak expression of “we” is the Welsh national team but even then I haven’t been to see them for years so I don’t really feel part of the “we” as much as I once did.

………US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US……..

Imagine three imaginary places in the same BBC region; the large town of Milltown and the reasonably large cities of Hillingdon and Athenwell. They are all about an hour apart so they form a triangle on a map.

Milltown has Milltown United. Hillingdon has Hillingdon Rovers and Hillingdon Athletic and Athenwell has Athenwell FC and West End. There’s a noted football rivalry between Hillingdon and Athenwell. There’s no such ill feeling between the Milltown and the other places because their football paths have seldom crossed in the previous four decades.

Now imagine that two people from Milltown are having a football conversation on the phone. Anyone listening could assume three things; they are Milltown area denizens, they both support clubs from Hillingdon (one Rovers, the other Athletic) and they both detest Athenwell FC.

If you were to ask them they have nothing against the city of Athenwell itself, they like nights out there, the shopping and that. It’s Athenwell FC and their fans that they can’t stand. They’ve always been full of themselves that lot, even their Athenwell supporting friends from Milltown are like that, they’re all living in the past mate.

Naturally they hope that one hundred and twenty two year old Milltown United do well but their eyes are on starrier sights, that glamourous elite aren’t going to watch themselves. The antipathy towards Athenwell FC shows that they’re full of modern football’s annoying unspoken assumption; “I support Team X therefore I should automatically hate Team Y”, in short they have adopted the behaviours of the local followers of “their” clubs,

A keen rivalry is extremely palatable as it adds a frisson to matchday but the idea of hating somebody else purely on the basis that they follow a different football club is absurd. Other fans live in the same sort of houses, work in the same sort of places and use the same sort of shops. Disliking a group of people simply because you’ve chosen to become involved in big glamourous football club is beyond pointless, expressing this rubbish publicly is beyond tedious.

………US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US……..

People make these choices in real life. The other week I was travelling home from Curzon Ashton v FC United by train. I had to go via to Crewe because of engineering work.

It was the same day that Manchester City beat Liverpool 5-0 so I was sat by a table full of understandably delighted City fans. It turns out they were from Crewe (we all alighted there). At some point between Stockport and Nantwich one of them related the phone conversation he’d just had with his Manchester United supporting friend;

“….So he says to me; ‘I’ll let you off that today ‘cause you beat the Scousers for us”.

They’re from Crewe but

“….So he says to me…..

….’I’ll let you off that today ’cause….

….YOU beat the SCOUSERS for US.”

Let that sink in, as the twitter cool cats say.

They like football and Crewe has its own football club.

Crewe Alex probably requires a little care and attention from the citizens of Crewe.

They choose to follow a rich club that doesn’t need their help/

They choose to self-identify as part of the “we”. 

When you view football like this there’s always a “them” to be judgemental about, Other people fall down the social order, players are always awful and everything’s crap or fantastic.

“Mate mate mate If you can’t be judgemental about things based on a purely arbitrary choice made when you’re younger mate, what’s the point in being a footy fan mate?”

It’s nonsensical to put so much store in an arbitrary choice made about incidental leisure time. I don’t know why it  happens? Is it the psychological need to belong? Is it the dislocation of a free market economy? Is it the alienation created by capitalism? Is it the premier league’s cultural imperialism?

………US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US……..

I’ve noticed a different tone to the conversation when it involves someone that’s from the “we”. Let’s return to the day of West Brom v West Ham.

My phone had told me that I needed to catch the 16.52 train from The Hawthorns. I ended up missing it because they closed The Hawthorns’ station footbridge “It happens all the time when the football’s on mate, you’ll have to go around to the front of the station mate”. This meant a train towards Birmingham with the away fans rather than a train towards Crewe with the home fans.

As I left the stationside footpath I bumped into some West Ham fans that were going the wrong way. I told them that the footbridge was closed etcetera etcetera. They thanked me and naturally I became part of the conversation “They think they treat us like C**** just ‘coz we’re football fans don’t they”. I smiled in agreement. I continued to smile as they chatted about old away trips. They didn’t seem particularly bothered by the stultified match that we’d all just seen. There was an unspoken recognisance that witnessing a dull match was just one of those things that happens to a person that goes to football.

I ended up next to some different West Ham fans on the train. One of them was hectoring his bored looking friend, it was clear that he didn’t like the idea of paying good money to watch a scoreless draw; “I don’t rate him, or him, or him, to get to the next level you need defenders that can play and those three clearly can’t. How do we get to the next level?” I didn’t want to listen, I didn’t want to be aware of his opinion, but I had to listen.

Given the choice it’s more palatable to listen to someone with a story than someone trying to prove how much they care by airing a loud opinion that somebody else has already expressed.

Maybe it was only fate that had placed me near a moaner at the exact time he was getting a lament out of his system, maybe he stopped speaking about football the minute he left Snow Hill station. Maybe the moaner was an experienced away day veteran and maybe the first group were Johnny Come Latelys relating second hand stories. It doesn’t really matter they are illustrative examples about the way different groups relate to football. There are groups to avoid.

………US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US……..

I know that I’m not vital to the world of football, I could stop taking an interest tomorrow and nobody would care. I know my place in the universe; I’m a speck of dust.

I wonder whether the people that worship premier league clubs from afar feel the same, or do they feel a sense of entitlement, do they feel vital to everything? Let’s consider a few stats about three “football hotbeds”;

Greater Manchester Inhabitants – 2.25 million,  combined capacity of the six biggest grounds – 223,000

Liverpool–Birkenhead Metropolitan Area  Inhabitants  – 2.25 million, combined capacity of the three biggest grounds – 112,000

Glasgow Metropolitan Area  Inhabitants – 1.4 million, combined capacity of the four biggest grounds – 170,000

The implication is clear, nobody outside of those metropolitan areas is required to take an interest in that area’s  football clubs. In fact only 5-10% of each area’s residents need to attend to ensure full houses. The idea that at least 10% of each area’s population would be interested in watching football is plausible.

On the other hand, what do my thoughts matter? Nobody’s committing a crime, people are only interacting with football in their own way. Some people may have no compunction about taking advantage of the prevailing conditions in football – Traditional fans may have been priced out, or lost heart, or may no longer feel welcome – but so what?

People are only interacting with happy shiny world of football while they watch look at me home made protest banners on a Splendiferous Saturday Lunchtime™. I don’t suppose it matters really, people are only doing something with their free time. I’m probably just jealous or something.

Sod all that.

“Mate, mate, mate, take an interest by all means mate, buy the shirt if you have to mate, just don’t pretend you’re a massive fan and more importantly, don’t go on about it mate. Everyone’s got interests. I could bore you with Ken Loach Minutiae or Czech New Wave banter. Do you fancy that mate?”

There’s nothing wrong with being drawn to a particular club, people are drawn to a variety of clubs for a variety of reasons. We all have soft spots for this club or that club, one day I will go to watch Livorno, but a passing attraction is nothing more than a passing attraction.

Mate mate mate if you’re going to treat football like a delicacy from the great leisure time smorgasbord at least use some imagination. My friend Gerry knows somebody that has season tickets for Inter Milan and Blackburn. This kind of situation is an ideal 21st Century situation. Why not access top quality European football on a monthly basis via a relatively cheap season ticket and cheap flights?

Then again why not simply go and watch your local club, they could probably do with your help.

I like to think that we don’t need to submerge ourselves in the bravado of a group, or submit to football’s PR industry. Call me a dreamer.

………US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US, US and THEM, THEM and US