The Passive Nature of the Modern Scottish Football Fan

[Mr Meeker]

I'm one of the getting older brigade who really stopped properly caring after watching the  start of the "Souness revolution" years. Won't ever get the proper passion back now as the game I think has changed forever.  I still care about my team but I'm not sure it's apathy. I'd honestly say it's anger at how we ended up here. Scottish football was great.  

[PauloPerth]

6 hours ago, HibsFan said:

 This isn't meant as a dig at anyone in particular, but something from the "Conference League" thread made me think about a wider point in Scottish football.

It's a feeling that I find myself coming round to more and more as bad decision after bad decision is made by those running the game in Scotland.

Take a look at just this season, for example:

• VAR introduced with virtually zero consultation of supporters
• Ticket prices raised again all over the country, not least for the semi finals (£38 for a Falkirk - Inverness CT seat in the North Stand)
• More Lowland League shenanigans and outright bribery to keep the colt teams in
• Only for that not to be enough because here comes the Conference League
• The general existence of Viaplay
• Even down to the minor things such as moving the Scottish Cup final from a 3pm kickoff to appease the TV companies
• St Johnstone's £30 cup tickets and whoring out three sides of their stadium despite fans' protests

And for every one of these decisions, I've raged about it on here, I've written to Hibs about a couple of them, I've actively stopped putting money into the club.

But for what? There are malevolent forces within the running of Scottish football who care about nothing other than furthering the inequality and extracting more money from every possible corner.

GreenGray makes a good point in some ways, is it better just to sit back serenely and admit defeat on fighting it? I and others get angry but it's not productive.

Although, as somebody pointed out, the 2012 Rangers debacle showed that the boardroom do listen to us on occasion; if the threat of closed wallets is there.

So my question to everyone is: how do we counter this sense of apathy in Scottish football and fight back, like we did in 2012? I am reminded of @craigkillie, who I'm pretty sure once talked about the need for some sort of Scottish Football Union for supporters. We have one of the highest attendances per capita and a TV deal that, at some level, needs fans in the grounds to drum up interest. Does the average Scottish supporter have a lot more power than they realise?

My theory on this is that we as the working / middle class are being ground down in every facet of life: fighting for fairer pay, fairer working conditions, even in other parts of football having to fight against stupid things like the Super League.

I just do not think I have the energy to fight another front against people who are, putting it generously, incompetent and, perhaps more accurately, trying their best just to line the pockets of a select few investors and stakeholders.

Anyway, incredibly long-winded post. So I've stuck a couple of polls in there too for good measure.

It’s a very good point and we definitely need strong action to stop this conference league nonsense going ahead.

I also think age comes into it a bit. Reading Mr Meeker’s post above it’s clear the turning point when football changes from being the golden passion of youth to something a bit more cynical is different for everyone.

I think social media in general is a good thing, but it also makes us lazy. Rather than protesting, running on the pitch and chaining ourselves to posts or going through to the SPFL offices midweek and barracking the orchestrators of this latest scheme, we type comments and think it’s enough.

I wonder how much it would cost to hire a plane to fly above Hampden on cup final day trailing a banner “Stick your conference league and B teams where the sun don’t shine”. 

 

[Kapowzer]

5 hours ago, Swello said:

The last time (the only time?) there was a properly unified front (excepting the obvious) that I can remember was when Rangers went into liquidation. It was probably the only demonstrable time where fan pressure caused owners of multiple club owners/CEOs to vote against what they perceived to be their own self interest and make the new Rangers play in the bottom tier of the SPFL (even if plenty of us would have gone further).

The fact it ushered in a time where multiple clubs actually won stuff makes it feel like that was a moment where the supporters knew best and resisted the media propaganda at the time. 

The supporter apathy around VAR and the fact that they got away with putting it in with no consultation was a watershed for me - it basically ended my interest in the "fan ownership" stuff at Motherwell (other than dutifully paying my subs) as they did a sham of a consultation very late in the day with no appetite to be the ones that scuppered it. Any idealistic view I had of the concept of fan ownership was killed by that.

The VAR thing is a dead rubber for supporters. When FIFA put the wheels in motion then it was inevitable. The SFA and their referee's did not want left out of UEFA competitions which would have been the case without adoption domestically. What we could have demanded was in its implementation such as a decision a maximum of 30 seconds after a contentious event. Now it seems it is just handringing at VAR HQ and as many chronic decisions with it as before.

The 5 subs thing, only us and one other Premier league club voted against it, why the other diddies did is mind boggling.

This conference league thing is a nonsense. Interesting to see who votes for it other than those top league clubs with teams in it, 2nd division sides facing relegation to it and the cherry picked invitees. What's to stop an invite being made to a Newcastle academy team? Would Si Ferry be up for not playing the OF 4x a season and their bribes?

In defence of the decision makers however I recall being in the room when WS members were invited to discuss the clubs response to Rangers demise. A show of hands being asked for showing how many wanted Rangers demoted before coming into the meeting and asked to keep their hands up if it was still the case after the issues and forecasts outlined provided by Weir and Dempster. The number of hands that went down was significant and the hands staying up switched to in the minority. I only cite this to illustrate that when furnished with details opinions have more objectivity.

I estimated our 14% ticket hike would net us between £150-180k extra. As @HibsFan conveyed I think a lot of it is down to looking what everyone else who published theirs before did and followed suit. It's maybe worth equating these figures mean to each club, it is proportionate after all. For my own club it's what we have to collectively contribute to the VAR pot give or take or £3k-3.5k/pw in wages. I think most clubs could identify a few players off their books to make that saving.

Personally I'm not prepared to pay £25 for entry to Scottish football. I think this is the season I've just had enough of the precession. When belt tightening happens my continued attendance is the first thing I look at. I'm a bit annoyed that as a fan owned club a 14% rise was even tabled.

The issue at our club is the two WS Board members who sit on the main club board is you'd struggle to find two bigger yes men. One is elected, voted again and again by his fellow grey haired peers and the other is was invited as a co-opted member. I'm pretty sure they don't advocate nor lobby the views of the majority, it would seriously limit their access to chicken pakora and prawn sandwiches.

Edited May 4, 2023 by Kapowzer

[Monkey Tennis]

4 hours ago, Kapowzer said:

The 5 subs thing, only us and one other Premier league club voted against it, why the other diddies did is mind boggling...

In defence of the decision makers however I recall being in the room when WS members were invited to discuss the clubs response to Rangers demise. A show of hands being asked for showing how many wanted Rangers demoted before coming into the meeting and asked to keep their hands up if it was still the case after the issues and forecasts outlined provided by Weir and Dempster. The number of hands that went down was significant and the hands staying up switched to in the minority. I only cite this to illustrate that when furnished with details opinions have more objectivity.

The first point above is a good one and illustrates the myopia that exists.  I remember a radio discussion on it and every pundit present saw it as a good thing because it would allow managers to change things during games.  Not one recognised it as something that would widen the gap at the top end further.  It's a failure of thought and awareness.

I'm not sure that the second part above makes the point you think it does.  Not admitting the Rangers rebirth (there was no demotion) to the top flight, was an objectively good decision for a club like Motherwell.  It could only be seen as negative in the stark terms of absolute income, divorced from context.  Obviously, at the time of the show of hands, this couldn't be known, but a Rangersless top division allowed Motherwell a second placed finish and gave them enhanced opportunities in Cups, which some peers exploited better than they did.  What you identify as objectivity in that example, is nothing of the sort.

[GallowayBlue]

I have seen a bit of a campaign online re Conference League but what else should we be doing?

Also, sign the petition!

https://t.co/muC32WMxhk

[Monkey Tennis]

As others have said, age probably does play a part here.

Far fewer young people are members of unions now than was once the case.  That's not their fault, but the sense of resistance and protest has perhaps diminished.  

I also think that the fact football as a genuinely competitive sport has been getting systematically dismantled for around 30 years now, simply means that memories of it ever being different, are increasingly absent. 

 

For example, you see on here all the time, an acceptance, and even embracing, of the catastrophe that is the CL.  

It's been going in the wrong direction for so long that people either don't recognise it as such, or we just shrug impotently.

Edited May 4, 2023 by Monkey Tennis

[Willie adie]

Scottish football fans, are mugs, we have sat back and allowed clubs to pillage, the soul of the game with not one tangible piece of resistance,

For years clubs have used fans as cash cows, and have never shown any regards for fans views, SPFL, SFA, and clubs they know that fans will not rebel in any great numbers.

We have put up with rising admission prices,  poor sponsorship deals,  disgraceful broadcasting agreements,  and generally a poor product, from a game obsessed with self interest and greed,

I'm afraid it's broken me , I've lost the passion and zeal of the game , I've lost the fight to get a fairer, more exciting game,

I've accepted that I will never see a club outwith Celtic or rangers win the league ever again, and what makes it worse is the other clubs appear to have too,

[RandomGuy.]

35 minutes ago, Monkey Tennis said:

As others have said, age probably does play a part here.

Far fewer young people are members of unions now than was once the case.  That's not their fault, but the sense of resistance and protest has perhaps diminished.  

Maybe the older generation shouldve bothered their fucking arses to "resist and protest" before we reached the stage we're at. For most of the younger ones its not a case of no sense of resistance, its because the lack of action 30 years ago, when the European competitions were being restructured to close the shop around those clubs at the top of their league and Sky were starting to throw money about down South, means the problems theyre trying to overcome are systemic and would take a complete reform of domestic and European football to overcome.

No doubt there'll be some excuse that makes it fine for older fans to just usher in changes to the game which completely demolished competition, while expecting the younger generation to overcome decades of financial disparity that are now hard coded into every country and every league in Europe.

Edited May 4, 2023 by RandomGuy.

[Dons_1988]

8 hours ago, djchapsticks said:

If there was it would just be a matter of time before Tory leaning Celtic supporters of social media would be demanding the majority of representation and power among the supporters as they have more supporters going to games than anyone else and shouldnt be answerable or held to same regard as Livi or St. Johnstone fans and it would just devolve into a bunfight. 

I mean sure, it would have challenges. 

But with respect, nothing would ever get off the ground if everyone approached with that suspicion. 

[Monkey Tennis]

33 minutes ago, RandomGuy. said:

Maybe the older generation shouldve bothered their fucking arses to "resist and protest" before we reached the stage we're at. For most of the younger ones its not a case of no sense of resistance, its because the lack of action 30 years ago, when the European competitions were being restructured to close the shop around those clubs at the top of their league and Sky were starting to throw money about down South, means the problems theyre trying to overcome are systemic and would take a complete reform of domestic and European football to overcome.

No doubt there'll be some excuse that makes it fine for older fans to just usher in changes to the game which completely demolished competition, while expecting the younger generation to overcome decades of financial disparity that are now hard coded into every country and every league in Europe.

And a sweary cross generational attack.  That should definitely help.

No excuses offered here.

I'm not having a go at those younger than me.  The damage was indeed done, or certainly set in motion, decades ago.  

Even my point about less willingness for protest today was possibly a reach, given that any organising around matters such as climate, tends to come from younger demographics.

 

Some of us objected at the time when the EPL and CL were born, but not enough people had any problem with it.

 

Calm yourself Man.

 

Edited May 4, 2023 by Monkey Tennis

[VincentGuerin]

The OP had me nodding along at every point.

I suppose folk like me are part of the problem in the sense that I've also just become jaded with it all. Posted about it a few times earlier this season, but I'll be packing in my season ticket at Hearts that I've had since I was at primary school (I'm pushing 40) this summer and will only be turning up to games from time to time to keep up with mates.

Basically, I've given up.

VAR was the final straw for me. No consultation, no interest in what the people who actually fund Scottish football think about it, no listening to those of us who correctly pointed out how shite it would be, no apologies or backtracking when those predictions came true. And I support 'The UK's biggest fan-owned club'.

But, to be honest, it was probably just the push I needed. Scottish fitba (at the Premiership level) is so badly run as to be infuriating. The entitlement of the Old Firm and the complicity of their cheerleaders in the media has got to the point where I just can't be fucked with it any more. This Cup Final thing is another example. Fucking amateurish and embarrassing.

I can get my fitba elsewhere, and I will. It's genuinely a deep sadness I feel though that this B-Teams idea is coming for the lower leagues. Those not following the Random Matches thread in the Misc section should look at @DoingThe42's sum-up post of his season on there recently for good reasons to defend the pyramid. But it won't be defended. It'll become just another vehicle for the OF, and it's shameful that my club are involved.

I can go and watch Coalville Town, and I will. But, I suppose the answer to the OP's post is that, aye, apathy has absolutely eaten Scottish fitba. There are fair points about European fitba generally and how we got to this stage. I understand @RandomGuy.'s point, but I think what happened in the 90s is more nuanced than that and deserves its own discussion.

[Dunning1874]

11 hours ago, thisGRAEME said:

I wouldn't disagree with this either, and I'm aware that this starts to get into the realms of the very boring, but for clubs with fan reps on their boards (Hearts, Motherwell and St. Mirren presumably all do as fan owned? I'm fairly sure a bunch of other clubs do as well?) Then those representatives need to be strong enough to hold their SPFL board representative to account on that front as well as to why they are or are not making decisions.

As you say this can quickly turn very dry and boring, but with clubs that are fan owned I'd be interested in the mechanisms for fans holding clubs to account. It doesn't seem any fan owned club has faced a meaningful backlash for failing to consult on VAR; even Morton being the only club out of 42 to vote against it and citing the impact on fans as the main reason for doing so didn't consult first.

Pleased to say Morton look like they've learned from that and yesterday MCT emailed all members to get views on the Conference League and B Teams, so when members inevitably deliver a resounding no the club will surely follow suit, while they know the rank and file membership have the power to go wild and start submitting votes of no confidence in directors if we're pissed off enough about something.

Do other fan bodies owning clubs have similar influence to force consultation? Are boards at fan owned clubs going to be emboldened by the lack of stick they've had over ignoring fans on VAR and continue to ignore them when it comes to B Teams or anything else? I'm thinking especially of Hearts here as one of the architects of the Conference League, but then it doesn't appear there was any backlash to putting a B Team in the Lowland League in the first place so it's possible FOH members/their fans at large just don't give a shit.

[VincentGuerin]

4 minutes ago, Dunning1874 said:

As you say this can quickly turn very dry and boring, but with clubs that are fan owned I'd be interested in the mechanisms for fans holding clubs to account. It doesn't seem any fan owned club has faced a meaningful backlash for failing to consult on VAR; even Morton being the only club out of 42 to vote against it and citing the impact on fans as the main reason for doing so didn't consult first.

Pleased to say Morton look like they've learned from that and yesterday MCT emailed all members to get views on the Conference League and B Teams, so when members inevitably deliver a resounding no the club will surely follow suit, while they know the rank and file membership have the power to go wild and start submitting votes of no confidence in directors if we're pissed off enough about something.

Do other fan bodies owning clubs have similar influence to force consultation? Are boards at fan owned clubs going to be emboldened by the lack of stick they've had over ignoring fans on VAR and continue to ignore them when it comes to B Teams or anything else? I'm thinking especially of Hearts here as one of the architects of the Conference League, but then it doesn't appear there was any backlash to putting a B Team in the Lowland League in the first place so it's possible FOH members/their fans at large just don't give a shit.

I've written to Hearts twice about VAR and my brother and several of my mates have too. Received nothing meaningful by way of response between us.

I've also written to Hearts about the B-Team issue more than once. I think I have my own bin at Tynecastle.

[HeartsOfficialMoaner]

5 hours ago, Kapowzer said:

 

In defence of the decision makers however I recall being in the room when WS members were invited to discuss the clubs response to Rangers demise. A show of hands being asked for showing how many wanted Rangers demoted before coming into the meeting and asked to keep their hands up if it was still the case after the issues and forecasts outlined provided by Weir and Dempster. The number of hands that went down was significant and the hands staying up switched to in the minority. I only cite this to illustrate that when furnished with details opinions have more objectivity.

 

This is one of the biggest problems. Clubs using/needing the Old Firm just to get by.  Basing their existence on Rangers and Celtic. 

And UEFA financial doping of the leagues in Europe to make their Champios League look good. Giving Celtic £30 million a year to make our farce league even more of a joke.

 

[RandomGuy.]

23 minutes ago, Monkey Tennis said:

Some of us objected at the time when the EPL and CL were born, but not enough people had any problem with it.

And what did you do to show that?

I'm just bored of this "the younger generation need to sort this" attitude from folk who allowed the dam to burst and f**k the game for a generation, who then all just sit back and exclaim theyre too old to do anything now.

Without the younger generation the whole Sevco situation wouldve been different. But aye, you continue mewling all over the website about how nobody ever does anything while you yourself do nothing, and then lay it all on the shoulders of younger folk.

[VincentGuerin]

20 minutes ago, RandomGuy. said:

And what did you do to show that?

I'm just bored of this "the younger generation need to sort this" attitude from folk who allowed the dam to burst and f**k the game for a generation, who then all just sit back and exclaim theyre too old to do anything now.

Without the younger generation the whole Sevco situation wouldve been different. But aye, you continue mewling all over the website about how nobody ever does anything while you yourself do nothing, and then lay it all on the shoulders of younger folk.

Not wanting to drag this thread down a wrong path, but I think you need to take a wee step back and consider what someone who supported QotS could have done to show his objection to the EPL or the Champions League.

Fans of normal football clubs have had absolutely no power in this process. The only meaningful things you can do are:

1) Stop going

2) Don't pay for subscription tv (I don't and never have other than Hearts TV)

3) If you support a team involved, protest

Nobody in power cares what a QotS fan thinks. Same as UEFA don't care what a Hearts fan thinks.

So, when you say people 'did nothing' about these things, I don't know what you mean.

Edited May 4, 2023 by VincentGuerin

[Dunning1874]

1 hour ago, VincentGuerin said:

I've written to Hearts twice about VAR and my brother and several of my mates have too. Received nothing meaningful by way of response between us.

I've also written to Hearts about the B-Team issue more than once. I think I have my own bin at Tynecastle.

Disappointing that a fan owned club can disregard their fans in this way, but I suppose it's easier to do so when you have over 15000 season ticket holders and around 9000 FOH members. Which brings us back to the point about fans organising and becoming far harder to ignore rather than lone voices, but you'd have hoped FOH would have meant that wasn't necessary in Hearts' case.

[RandomGuy.]

58 minutes ago, VincentGuerin said:

Not wanting to drag this thread down a wrong path, but I think you need to take a wee step back and consider what someone who supported QotS could have done to show his objection to the EPL or the Champions League.

Fans of normal football clubs have had absolutely no power in this process. The only meaningful things you can do are:

1) Stop going

2) Don't pay for subscription tv (I don't and never have other than Hearts TV)

3) If you support a team involved, protest

Nobody in power cares what a QotS fan thinks. Same as UEFA don't care what a Hearts fan thinks.

So, when you say people 'did nothing' about these things, I don't know what you mean.

Right. 

So the older generation couldn't do anything, for the same reason the younger generation cant, but the younger generation is a passionless group with no drive because theyre doing nothing to change anything and not joining workers unions. 

The younger generation have to just stop supporting their clubs though, in the hope that works, but the older generation couldnt do that at the time because reasons. 

Im glad its cleared up.

[thisGRAEME]

1 hour ago, Dunning1874 said:

Do other fan bodies owning clubs have similar influence to force consultation? Are boards at fan owned clubs going to be emboldened by the lack of stick they've had over ignoring fans on VAR and continue to ignore them when it comes to B Teams or anything else? I'm thinking especially of Hearts here as one of the architects of the Conference League, but then it doesn't appear there was any backlash to putting a B Team in the Lowland League in the first place so it's possible FOH members/their fans at large just don't give a shit.

Kind of where the disparity between what people think fan ownership will be and what fan ownership is. All you had to do was to look in Alan Burrows' mentions for most of his time as CEO and it was full of mile-oots demanding answers for things that in reality, were nuts, because "WE'RE FAN OWNED". For VAR they stuck an email out a few days before and then said the feedback was roundly positive for it, which I'd say I was surprised at. 

It wasn't brilliantly handled, it felt like it could have been better, but as with everything else at Motherwell (and indeed most clubs) you're reliant on a handful of people doing 25 jobs all at once.

I'd say the last part highlighted is a huge factor in all of this. You kind of forget with P&B and twitter that, probably the vast majority, of football fans in Scotland and beyond care about their own team, and not much else. On here and twitter, you have folk buried into other peoples clubs and whatever's going on, but the whole user base of P&B wouldn't fill Celtic Park.

[VincentGuerin]

6 minutes ago, RandomGuy. said:

Right. 

So the older generation couldn't do anything, for the same reason the younger generation cant, but the younger generation is a passionless group with no drive because theyre doing nothing to change anything and not joining workers unions. 

The younger generation have to just stop supporting their clubs though, in the hope that works, but the older generation couldnt do that at the time because reasons. 

Im glad its cleared up.

Having a bad day?

I think it's really simple. The only people who can do anything are the target audience.

Nobody has ever given a f**k what I think of the Champions League or the EPL.

I think the people on the hook for the apathy allegation (I include myself above) are people who routinely show up for Premiership matches, never put pressure on their clubs, subscribe to Sky, attend televised matches and register no protest when doing so.

It's not an age thing, it's an opportunity thing. It's why I think so much of the burden falls on the Old Firm support. They have a platform the rest of us don't have.

I think an Scottish football fan who subscribes to Sky Sports should be counted among the enemy, but that's just me.