[Football] My first time at Amex Stadium attending Brighton Home match ❤️

[Han Solo]

FFS. Am I misunderstanding this the same way you’ve misunderstood me? So that’s the sort of abuse you dish out when I try to pay you a compliment?

How f***ing dare you accuse me of small-minded xenophobia. I’ve spent more of my adult life living and working overseas than I have in the UK. I absolutely loved the Bundesliga experience and was a STH at my nearest club for a couple of seasons. The atmosphere and flag-waving on the terraces was amazing but there are cultural reasons why this wouldn’t work in England, some of which you so admirably and comprehensively detailed in your impressive post.

I’m annoyed.

Ok.

If you dont want people to bite back, dont compare their culture to North Korea. It certainly comes across as xenophobic whatever the intention of the intention was.

 

[pigbite]

Supporter culture in Europe and from everything I've heard/seen/read (a LOT) about English football culture - I'm a Swede and haven't actually been there - are significantly different. I'm going to try to explain my thoughts to you without stepping on too many toes out there...

1. No Italian influence in English supporter culture
Drums, pyros, etc. in football originates from Italian football culture, which has had a lot of influence on the rest of Europe. The smaller country, the more influence from "football superpowers". So Italian ultras culture has had a lot of impact in a lot of countries, but not England as it is a football superpower of its own. The main spread of the Italian ultras culture also started happening in the 80s and early 90s, when England were banned from European football and as such didn't play Italian teams... meaning it had no real chance of being a source of inspiration.

2. Safety and security
In England, football has caused or at least been the arena for severe societal problems in the 70s and 80s. If you read old British papers from the 70s, football often both gets the blame and to be symbolisation of the collapsing industrial society and the consequences that came from it (lots of alcoholism, unemployment, violent and whatnot). After the Hillsborough and Heysel incidents along with lots of crowd violence, the Bradford City stadium fire and whatnot... English football had to be sanitised. Not just to the point of "not dirty/dangerous" but to the point of "clean and safe".

Whereas football in countries like yours and mine has been allowed to slowly break down all sorts of safety-think, this development has not and will not be allowed in England. Like, the recent trend in the Ultras world of firing fireworks towards the pitch... if that happened in the Premier League I have no clue what the consequences would be, because its so very unthinkable. But I'm guessing the club and its fans would get in a lot more trouble than here or rest of Europe.

Neither English football nor English society wants football violence, bangers, uncontrolled pyro etc.

3. Demographics
The Premier League crowds are quite old compared to how it looks in most parts of Europe, likely as a result of costs and the high demand that keeps people in their seats for a looong time. And while older fans can be very passionate they're just less likely to go batshit crazy. Unlike in the rest of Europe, people also often bring their families, which also calms thing down. In most European leagues there are games where you really shouldn't bring children but thats not the case in the PL it seems.

4. Tradition
British people appear to have a larger than usual thing for tradition; change is scary everywhere but perhaps a bit more in England than in many other places. If for example you turn up with a drum, people will look funny at you - not because there's necessarily something wrong with the drum; it has just never been there and so they don't want it. Post-Hillsborough football in England quickly created a football culture that is essentially just a bit low key; its not "supposed" or desired that it takes the form of chaos, because the way its working has been working well for 35 years; the football is fun, the stadiums are comfy and everyone comes home alive.

A lot of what is common football culture in Europe will be considered "foreign & weird", "tacky" or "tinpot". Take the concept of a capo for instance... the English rather sing three different songs at the same time than having some maniac with a megaphone directing stuff.

5. Owner-supporter power spectra
Clubs in England became professional VERY early while in almost every other European country (with some exceptions), football was strictly amateur driven until the 1950s-1980s (depending on where you look). Not paying someone to do stuff requires a higher level of organisation among fans and members. As far as I know, the in Europe very common concept of a few hundred ultras meeting up every week to paint banners, sewing gigantic flags and pictures together and whatnot... to my knowledge it doesn't exist in England.

The early professionalisation of English football gave club owners more power to run things, but also more responsibility of making sure everything is provided and not needing to be created. People go to football to enjoy the game, the club, their friends, the beer, the food... not so much "doing all we can with very little" like was the case under a very long time in the rest of Europe.

These are some reasons... and then there's the more culturally complex stuff that is too sensitive to discuss.

Basically, European football culture won't be a thing in England because a) they don't want it and are quite happy as they are, b) most things going on when watching Slavia or AIK or Feyenoord or Galatasaray or Lech Poznan etc are just omega-illegal/socially unacceptable in England, c) European football is activism-oriented whereas in England the clubs are expected (and handsomely paid) to bring that to the people.

TLDR:

- They don't want European football culture and you're not going to change it.
- They can't have European football culture and there's little indicating any deteroiation of safety norms.
- They don't know how to create European football culture because they never had the need.

While I understand you and your well meaning intentions exactly, you're kind of stepping on their souls now...

I'm going to England at one point or another to watch a game myself and from hanging around NSC etc. for many years, I have understood that to fully appreciate it, I have to ignore my experiences and find the other, different values that exist in the English football culture. If I go there to be bombarded with bangers and firework, I will be disappointed, so I'll go empty handed in that regard and just explore it like a newborn. I do think this is the approach you need to have rather than "this is nice, but lets change it".

Very interesting synopsis of the difference in culture.

I would add that much of European football, especially the further east you go, is still (a) far less expensive than the top two or even three tiers in English football and as a result, (b) far more accessible to local and younger supporters. I think it's also fair to say there is still issues with racism, homophobia and other similar anti social behaviour in parts of Europe that has have been far harder to break down because a more aggressive ultra style culture is accepted. I'm not suggesting all European ultras are racists, just that the environment and less corporate dominance of top tier football in other countries makes it harder to tackle unwanted behaviour. The post Hillsborough and Sky TV Premier League environment has made it far easier to stamp down on that but at the expense of the hardcore soul of support that helps generate atmosphere.

 

[Algernon]

@fiki
No drums because people are sleeping.
Did you manage the ascent to your seat without oxygen?