Cod Almighty | Diary
A hill of beans
30 May 2019
With very little noise coming out of Blundell Park at the moment, East End Diary found distraction last night in watching the Europa League final. Sometimes, as much as you don’t like someone, you have to applaud their achievement, and last night I was doing just that. UEFA actually managed to make me feel sorry for Arsenal fans. Further still, in spite of their victory and embracing of Roman Abramovich’s somewhat suspect money, I even felt some level of sympathy for Chelsea fans. If this was a glimpse into the future of football it painted a pretty miserable picture.
Even watching on Youtube, it was clear that half the fans hadn’t taken up an already tiny allocation of tickets because of how inconvenient it was to get there. Then, if you manage to overcome those obstacles, to be that far away from the pitch in an environment with such little atmosphere that our trips to Gateshead seem positively iconic in comparison, you deserve sympathy.
The sad truth, though, is that despite how awful that would be for a fan, the people in charge at UEFA would regard it as a huge success. They would observe their money pile and how the furore over tickets, travel and a player being unable to play due to the political implications will quickly blow over. Attention will move quickly on to speculation on whether Maurizio Sarri will keep his job as Chelsea manager after 'only' achieving a third-place finish and losing one cup final on penalties while comprehensively winning another.
Even further from the media spotlight, fans can be sidelined further, with Shaun Harvey being handed uncritical press coverage to air his views – although if you want to cheer yourself up on a Thursday, the replies to the EFL tweet featuring Shaun looking back with satisfaction at his job performance are certainly worth reading. But as fans seem to get pushed further and further away from the action – literally, in the case of fans attending the game at Baku – I am starting to feel a little hope.
Just maybe the incompetence of those in charge of our game will lead to a European super league. Maybe clubs will regularly play in front of people with no connection to the club, and the 'big six' will sod off, to be replaced by phoenix clubs representing what they used to. Maybe the Premier League will cease to be a financial powerhouse bringing in millions from TV revenue and fans at the matches will become the most important asset to those clubs once more. Maybe football will have to refocus itself on fans and this will trickle down to all levels.
The fact that this is what I am starting to dream about is a surefire indication that summer is here and there are no GTFC games to focus on. I may spend nine months of the year moaning about Town's performances, but one month away from domestic football and I realise something, I bloody miss watching the Mariners. For all our faults and the often poor football played, it will always be better than watching a video stream of two teams I don’t care about playing in front of a lot of corporate sponsors.