Man Utd epidemic

Talking to many kids at my school with my lovely arsenal kit on (yea i hope you can forgive me for that), there have been many expressions of disgust. They say they like Man U. I ask them why and they all say the same thing... Cristiano Ronaldo. Yes he is a great player (just look at how many goals hes scored this year) but why like an entire team for ONE player. Last time I checked there were 11 on the pitch and a few more on the bench (im drawing a blank). This has just been getting on my nerves as it seems everyone i talk to says this except my hardcore yank friends that hate the sport (which depresses me).

 

Arsenal kit? Are you serious? In England, they are just as bad as Liverpool and United...oh well!


As for following a player around to the teams he plays for, instead of the team itself, that is the real epidemic in America. It all started with Nike and Jordan when, in his prime, he was on every advertising media known to man. All of a sudden everyone had his shoes and followed the Bulls! Since then, sports companies have put every great player in every sport on a pedestal and kids then look up to them as a hero. An icon of what they want to be, thus they grown an affinity to the player and the name instead of the team.

In the case of Man United/Ronaldo, this works two fold. Man United is the biggest team in the world and Ronaldo the best player in the world. From a very shallow view, it’s the perfect combination.

 

My experience w/ stateside Man Utd fans is that it is very easy to beat them at their own game -- and I say this as a former MUFC fan. Ask them a few questions, like what was the big anniversary that they commemorated earlier this month? What was Munich? Who was Matt Busby? Who was George Best? For that matter, who is Nemanja Vidic or Darrin Fletcher, or any other current player whose name is not all over the magazines? This is basic football 101 level stuff, and I bety a lot of people will not have a clue. Let us know how that goes :wink:

 

RE: Re: Man Utd epidemic

Dont worry about it. Fifteen years ago it was everyone wearing Dallas Cowboys jung.. and fifteen years before that...

And dont forget 'Yankees' marketing {remember 5 years ago Yankees and ManUre signed a 'co-marketing' agreement.

Do have to say if you were wearing Fulham kit you'd have the moral advantage... but yes I understand the economics involved. I'll give you time. Also the first shirt I ever bought was a polo with the Gunner badge.

In early eighties ..'cause it was cool, meaning better than an alligator.

{just happened to think.. kids dont know about IZOD, do they!}

 

RE: Re: Man Utd epidemic

I think that there are many people that are members of this site because of a player versus the club itself. I am one of them. McBride caused me to watch Fulham many years ago, and the addition of more US players strengthened my affinity for the club.

It is difficult to support a club in England or anywhere overseas for that matter without some sort of affiliation. Most of the time support for a team is based on proximity with the old adage - "support your local club because it is your civic duty." Given that statement, I am a LA Galaxy, Raider and a Laker supporter and have been for my whole life for the latter ones (I was a California Surf fan for NASL). And, of course, I am a USMNT fan.

But, like Fog mentioned, it is the power of marketing. My first exposure to the English game was watching Man U. There was such limited exposure that the choices were limited as well.

 

RE: Re: Man Utd epidemic

I was a Man U. fan when I was a kid through to my very early 20's after which I gave the whole sport of soccer a miss for two years. Then, after a trip to London, my first ever live match was to see Fulham and one Fulham fan was so gracious that I pledge a lifetime of support to the club.

I'd rather have a fanship of 'real' supporters which doesn't attract these plastic supporters of Arse, Tottenham, Man U, Chelsea, and Liverpool.

 

I am not sure you should ever judge a fan on what they do or don't know about a club, or the lenght of time that they have supported a club. When you come from a different culture and country and you decide to pick a club to follow then why would you chose someone down the bottom? What criteria did you use to become a Fulham fan? For me it was a family thing.

I am a Cowboys fan because I got bought a hat from Dallas when I was a kid and I am a redsocks fan because I got given a hat while watching them play at the Oval. I can tell you little about their history, players, grounds, capcities etc. but I keep an eye on their results and I get that sports happiness when they win. I had no idea how either team was viewed until I started reading on this forum, and I am a little sad that the Cowboys are much malligned.

I couldn't change who I support now as I have an irrational emotional attachment to those teams.

 

lol Stu about the Cowboys (they are the ManU of the NFL, hence the slings and arrows directed towards them).

When it comes to the big clubs (regardless of the sport) they have legions fans that most of us would regard as "fringe-type". They don't follow the team religiously, pay attention only for the big matches, and really need a "superstar" to peek their interests. Ronaldo has the "it" factor marketing people drool over. My wife basically doesn't follow footy outside of the WC, but she even knows who Ronaldo is.

 

I must admit that the number of American players on Fulham is what drew me to the club but i like my fanhood to go beyond that. Some of the people in question are in the know but others follow C. Ronaldo and the FMF. It was just nagging at me and reminds me of how I myself really knew nothing about the sport until a couple years back.

P.S. Do not panic I will soon be purchasing a wonderful Fulham kit (maybe with McGod or Dempsey on the back =])

 

Fair enough, I gues my point is to care a little more about your team than just saying I like MU because of Ronaldo, or I like Arsenal because they have nice uniforms. I'm glad that an American fans cares enough about the game to choose a team, even if it's the Undead (shudder). Or Leeds (shuddering more). But at the very least, take your team and do a search in Google, or Wikipedia. Man United was around for 125 years before they had Ronaldo. Learn at least a little about them if you are going to call yourself a fan. I once spoke to a kid at a tournament and he said he was a United fan, and I asked him about Munich (this was last year), and he had no idea what I was talking about. So I told him to type United, 1958, and Munich in Google and read a little about what he finds. I have no way of knowing if he did that or not.

Again, I'm glad that a kid or old fart has a favorite footy team, but I just get dismayed when someone just assumes that they pick a team, and don't learn anything about it. It'll probably be one of the Big 4 as that is the power of marketing -- hell, my reintroduction to the sport was David Beckham and Roy Keane off the late 90's United teams. And if someone overseas picks the Cowboys or Yankees because you have a hat with their logo on it, fine, again, it's better to give a damn about the sport than to curse a fan because they pick a front runner. You can find that nonsense on a Man U or Liverpool forum. It's great to get excited because your team is winning, I certainly did that with United before Fulham started captivating my attention with heart and great fans (if not results that didn't make me curse up a storm), and if a Brit is pumped over the Cowboys or Yankees, again, that's fantastic. It's better to care about a team and a sport than to curse a standard of fandom.

 

I guess we better put a little light on it for you, GBFC, everyone at least admired the Cowboys records and their prowess. But well, put it this way... suppose ManUre and a lot of the media, referred to themselves as 'England's Team!'

It struck a chord for a lot of fans. Doesnt matter what they actually MEANT it to mean {it was largely based on national tv ratings.. thus they had reason}, the words and the implicit arrogance were enough to cause me to hope for them to lose, no matter who they played.

 

RE: Re: Man Utd epidemic

I think part of what annoys me when someone picks a frontrunning team to support is that they're doing it for the wrong reasons. Sports is about emotion: the agony AND the ecstacy. Picking a team like Man U requires very little imagination and the only reason anyone in America picks them is because they're good. But to me, that's an unsatisfying fan experience. How can you experience the joy of a win if you don't understand the pain of a loss? With a team like Man U, there are no surprises and no imagination required. It's like cashing in without risking anything.

Now, I am a Yankee fan. But not because I've jumped on the bandwagon...I'm from New York. But if a Brit told me he wanted to start following Baseball and asked me for advice on which team to support, I would tell him to support any team except for the Yankees.

 

Correction:

So Don's right.. I misrepresented {or mis-assumed} the real source, but it didnt matter if everyone ELSE called them that, did it?

Would it matter in the end if Sky and BBC started calling ManU 'England's Team'?

Read down the rest of the article... Dallas still IS considered that in a national poll; second pick is the team I hated BEFORE, for the same reason, the 49'ers.
But I hated in the sixties that they were picked to be national broadcast almost every week.

I wont bother pointing out that Don got his timeline wrong... prior to the Dallas / Green Bay freezer bowl... In fact, before Staubach, Dallas were hardly all that popular.

 

Re: RE: Re: Man Utd epidemic

Liverpool fan convinced of their underdog status... seems eerily familiar. I've seen the error of my ways and apologize for all the garbage I surely dumped on this board.

I've seen the light.