Football in Decline Suggesting That It Is No More the Cause of Football's Long Term Problems Than a Sneeze Is the Cause of Influenza
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
12 March 1981 Marxism Today critics like Brian Clough, is systematically ignored. First, though, a word about the myths. Dave Triesman THE 'VIOLENCE-CRISIS' MYTH I offer no apology for violence on or near football grounds but cannot refrain from Football in Decline suggesting that it is no more the cause of football's long term problems than a sneeze is the cause of influenza. The argument about violence comes in several forms. At its simplest, it is attributed to the anti-social attitudes of young people. Variants propose that the behaviour of players stimulates additional aggression in young fans, that Some nine months ago on a 'phone-in' programme devoted to the referees behave so inconsistently that it 'crisis in British football', Stan of Shepherds Bush advocated that injects frustration into players and supporters soccer's problems could be resolved over-night if all football hooligans alike. Remedies run the gamut from fencing were branded on the back of their hands. the supporters in, keeping them out, through proposals for identity cards, all-seat grounds The theory underlying this medieval senti- May Day. There is nothing new or unique and, as we've seen, branding. ment was that as the hooligan was convicted about current problems in football (or Let it be said from the outset that there is by drum-head court martial rather than cricket). It is just that they have never been no proven relationship between football appearance before magistrates, a branding solved. hooliganism and the level of gates. Indeed, would be immediately administered. He had other seasons have been vastly more violent thought the matter through and discounted The importance of football although not always reported. The battles dyeing or tattooing as messier, more likely to Some might conclude that routine anxiety between the skinhead gangs of 1969-70 from fade, and difficult to see on the skin of black about a mere game is not worth the energy the different 'ends' of football grounds, the youths. When a terrace recidivist had expended. They underestimate the place of near riots that brought us indellible accumulated three brandings, the zealots of soccer in British culture. It is the regular characters like Millwall's Harry the Dog, the turnstile would refuse admission to the sport of approximately one million men and Frankie Parrish and Dustman Bob of ground as they would be immediately able to three quarters of a million schoolboys every Tottenham, Arsenal's Johnny High and HJ detect three-time losers as they pushed then- week, forty weeks of the year. It is watched Greenaway of Chelsea, make the current gate money under the grill. A new rule would by a cumulative audience of over 25 million season look as sanitised as the famous North have to be introduced to the effect that those people each week, and the passions it American 'family' league. Even pitch paying at the turnstile must do so with their engenders defy normal description. In other invasions aimed at changing the result are right hand and would not be allowed to wear countries it has sparked wars, and in Britain hardly an invention of this season. Rangers gloves however inclement the weather. the territorial disputes at the terraces have at supporters did it at Newcastle in 1969. It Now Stan, who turned out to be the most least the appearance of running battles. In happened again when Manchester United moderate caller that evening, had advanced short, as an expression of physical culture, it were relegated and when West Bromwich this proposition to the then secretary of the arguably has greater leverage in culture as a beat Leeds in 1971. Attendance figures were Football League, Alan Hardaker, and more whole than any other single sporting activity. varied almost without regard to these events. than once. No reply had ever been received (a Its centrality to the culture of leisure lies in its discourtesy for which Stan thought Hardaker long history with roots in the fifteenth Machine-like football should be branded as well until I pointed out century, its universality in being played Nor has there been a clear-cut demonstration that Hardaker was dead). More of Hardaker, everywhere, in its expression of regional and of any relation between the number of later. local interests and in its relation to the lives of cautions or sending-offs of players and Stan's rescue plan for British football was working class men, whose sport it has always incidents of crowd misbehaviour. Not only conceived in response to the annual been. For all its importance, the sport is are such associations of events largely the declaration that the national winter sport was collapsing financially and it appears creation of the media, but they underline, in crisis. While he, and Frank of Camden incapable through its owners and graphically, that what is understood about Town and first-time caller Clive of Putney administrators, of saving itself. football hooliganism is itself largely attributed this to hooliganism, others had It is certainly worthwhile therefore to dependent on how and whether it is reported. focused on different problems, player consider why football should be in so parlous What is evidently neither understood nor behaviour, referees — naturally, the a position, why average attendances ('gates') reported is that the characteristics of bored or weather, and Isobel of Golders Green — the are down by nearly 17% since last season, and unemployed boys do not suddenly alter as Palestinians, and other solutions. Just as in their deepest trough since the war. It is my they come off the train and walk to a football every late May produces 'crisis in cricket' argument that it has little to do with the ground. They bring into football those fever, so football has a crisis each season in publicly proclaimed spectres, but a slow problems and experiences they have outside November. The regularity of these events is attrition, a cancer at the core of the sport that it, the difference being that they are collected such that they deserve national holidays in no one ever reports and one which, when into a large group and presented with a their own right, like United Nations Day and alluded to by outspoken, richly-talented powder keg of territorial loyalties and a Marxism Today March 1981 13 contest laden with passion. purchasing the right to see a game on a fairly services compete to attract their attention. What might hold their attention and divert regular basis, since casual consumption is Support for football has traditionally come them from mutual mayhem is, of course, unreliable in generating revenue. There is a overwhelmingly from working-class men, entertainment in sufficient quantity. But that refreshing simplicity about football that any whose disposable incomes have been limited has not been the raison d'etre of English monetarist would appreciate. To produce a by the usual range of financial constraints football clubs since machine-like game of football, one production company upon them. If football is to attract these combinations won the World Cup for consumers they must choose whether to pay England in 1966 or the double for Arsenal in they are collected into a large to stand, for the most part, on gloomy, grimy, 1971. The lone voices of Billy Nicholson and, worndown concrete terraces in the British again, Brian Clough, in the mid-70s were group and presented with a winter, in uncompromisingly bleak buildings regarded as faintly embarrassing as they powder keg of territorial that look as though anything after the first talked about their teams having to give value flush of the Industrial Revolution passed to those who paid at the turnstiles. So bleak loyalties and a contest laden them by. did matters become that Alex Stock with passion. Equally, they must choose not to spend the commented (1972) that 'Recently my coach (the professional club) must hire staff — same amount on other sports, leisure underwent a course on Attacking Football playing, managing, administrative and activities, or, quite simply, on shopping. run by the FA. He didn't see a goal scored in ancilliary — keep up a place of production, There is sound evidence for the fact that the whole week'. Inevitably, it will be meet routine overheads including trans- many more men of all classes now spend necessary to return to the question of who portation costs, and, on occasion, make Saturdays involved in family shopping. determines that football should not be capital investments in either premises or The blunt truth appears to be that the entertaining. Fans have frequently received playing/management staff. At any one time, consumers are doing other things and more entertainment at each others hands the majority shares of at least one club and spending their money in other ways. than from their teams. Suffice it to say that some 250 players are available for sale. To Moreover, as recession deepens, particularly the perennial contest between the fans and fund such an enterprise, the company must in a period characterised by high rates of the law, so hallowed by the press, is long in sell the right to attend the game (consume the inflation, all these issues accentuate. the making and not apparently, directly the product), the right to broadcast it (licence), a Football's consumers have a great deal of cause of football's degeneration. variety of subsidiary licences and products flexibility in these choices (there is what (programmes, team strips, cuddly toys, economists call 'elasticity' in demand for the FOOTBALL AND FINANCE momentoes etc), and participation in various product); people are also more inclined to games of chance (lotteries, a share of the recognise that the money they spend on The inner core of football's crisis, at least football pools etc).