... level, becoming boring? Is there too much football available and does the constant background of radio and TV programmes like Sky sport news make it feel like it's being done to excess. ...? The reason I say this, is that programmes like Match of the Day, I no longer bother watching and even during live matches we have someone say..."this is boring". My one concern over this, is that just maybe it's starting to filter down to the lower divisions and could be part of the reason for falling gates.

You might be right there Snowy. You used to have to grab the chance to see football when you could, now it is so hard to avoid that you have to be selective. Maybe that pick and choose mentality is spreading down the divisions and to live matches too. Once the habit is broken it doesn't necessarily come back fully even if a team are good to watch, tickets are cheaper etc.

When I was living in Northumberland it made night matches difficult but I felt a compulsion to get to all Pools home matches and hated it if I missed one, whatever the reason. Over here I don't have the same link to the club so, although I go to most matches, I'm not that bothered if I miss some. Who they are playing, how they are playing, what else I've got on and how much money I've got spare all make a difference when the compulsion isn't there. I suppose that is what its like for a lot of the less committed fans that put an extra thousand on the gate when times are good football and money-wise.

The constant exposure of pundits and players saying nothing drives me daft. I've got a good mate who has coached young players to a decent level and watching a game with him is a real education so how come ex-internationals and top level managers tell us nothing of interest? The England match tonight might be an OK way of passing the time but the coverage will annnoy me so much that if my wife says lets turn over I'll probably agree. Football on telly used to be sacred.

None of that would matter if only made a difference to viewing figures but if even a minority of lower division fans turn into choosy customers a lot of clubs will be in very deep shyte.

Am surprised this thread hasn't had a bit more interest.

The quantity has definitely lessened my interest in the game snowy which is quite sad considering how much I used to love it. You can't move without hearing about the Premiership now, Sky Sports News (which was brilliant when it first came out) is now made up of 85% of stories that are of little significance. How many times do you see 'Breaking news' along the lines of 'Bolton third choice right back Jordi Gorgosson will be unavailable for Saturday's game due to a thigh strain'. They've got so caught up in the supposed importance of the Premiership that they don't realise what they are reporting is actually very dull.

It's not just the overload of football, you only have to look what the FA and Alex Ferguson has done to the FA Cup. I honestly believe the two ripped the soul out of the competition in 1999 when they'd rather play in the fooking World Club Championship (an utterly fucking meaningless competition) and something I'll never forgive them for. How anyone could be so disrespectful to one of the great sporting institutions is beyond me and the Finals since have all been shyte. Then of course the League Cup has become a meaningless competition because of more disrespect from the top managers which has slowly filtered it's way down the divisions.

Then there is England, I won't need to preach about these fuckers without stating the obvious but everyone knows how utterly shyte they are now. I didn't even know they were playing tonight until yesterday thats how uninterested I am now. I used to love watching them years ago too.

To top it all of the offensive amounts of money these top players get has made me lose all respect, I see Kidderminster were struggly to scrape 155k last week to stop going into Administration. On the same day I saw Fernando Torres will be getting in the region of 200k a week to play for Chelsea. Is this what it has come to? There is something seriously wrong when one player (who has been shyte all season and was most definitely shyte on Sunday) is worth more for one appearance than a whole football club that has been in existence for 125 years. I don't blame Torres, I'm not really sure who I blame, I just think the whole situation is very sad.

All very depressing for me but otherwise I'm OK.

agree with all of the above. I know I mentioned Barcelona the other day, but when you look at the way they play, and then compare them to ANY premiershit team, and its like watching a different sport. Whilst the money at the top level has gone through the roof and beyond, the standard of the players has gone through the floor.

For example, could Frank Lampard get a game for any of the top nations in world football? Would he even get in their squads? I doubt it. He cant control the ball, and is slow as fook.

Yet this bloke is captaining Ingurland tonight. Because he scores goals at premiershit level, the media automatically call him great. Ex play fawn over him, because they have to.

So we have got overloaded with football,whilst the football has got worse.

Managers claim players play too much, and rest them and so it goes on.

Anyone who thinks players in the premiershit are better today than they were in the 70's, 80's and even 90's is bloody stupid.

Given equal fitness levels, and the technology available today, the Leeds team from the early 70's, the Liverpool team from the late 70's/early 80's, the Aarsenal team from the 90's etc would wipe the floor with the best teams now.

Yet we hardly saw them live on the tele.

Overkill of shit football.

I do get a bit sick of the attitude amongst the ex pro's who become pundits on these shows and go on and on about how they have a special insight into the game that the average fan never can. Now as the average footballer at the top level seems to combine the ego of a god with the IQ of a radiator, I have to ask myself what this so called 'insight ' is, that the rest of us can never comprehend, yet these sporting Einsteins can.
Football is a fairly simple, entertaining game, elevated to a status by those with a vested interest, way beyond the bounds of reason. I can forsee the day when the brand that is the Premiership will control all the game in this country and football as we know it will be just a memory .

Very true.

When I played football at 13 years of age, we played in a Hartlepool sunday league with 2 divisions of 14 teams.

All of the under 13's teams today play in the Teesside Junior Football Alliance.

In the under 13 section there are 5 Hartlepool teams.

That means in real terms that 55 13 year olds in Hartlepool run round a football pitch once a week, compared to 308 in 1980. A shocking statistic.

Thats a whole different topic chip.

15 years ago the only way I could see my mates was by phoning them or going to their houses, which meant walking or riding my bike. Now they just message each other on facebook.

Meanwhile blokes who wanted to moan about how shite Wadsworths team selection would have gone to the pub or club and bought a few beers and had a smoke. Even then they could walk home cos it was safe and the weather was much nicer back then. Now we have the internet and cheap cans from Lidl.

Times are changing, but it's hard to care about a game that has elevated it's players to a level whereby the ordinary supporters on the terrace are having trouble identifying with them any longer. School sport provision isn't really what it used to be and the idyllic dream that non competitive sport is OK is just so much nonsense and while it may tick all the right boxes for some, it's a death Knell sounding for sport. Not forgetting, the average kid is much more feminised in the sense that aggression, in the sense of a will to win, is much more frowned upon in sport at junior level. The end result being that it emerges in some other form, not necessarily for the better.

I can see the day when there's one mega North East team in a mega stadium competing in a money bags league. It'll be hyped to death and those with money will be able to buy life season tickets and bought by those with the cash as a status symbol ... the rest will be brainwashed into watching it at home, in the pub or maybe more likely, at cinema screenings under the auspice of the super league to make even more income for them. Football under that level will be patronised and looked on as quaint in the same way as some motorists look down on others for the cars they drive and eventually the majority will conform.... the one consolation being that the same fickle 'fans' these people are chasing can quite quickly desert you for some other passing, over hyped fad that is in vogue.

I just hope that Premiership club owners from Russia, America, Arabia and Asia etc all get bored and pull out of their respective clubs. Causing them to collapse under billions of debt, effectively reaping what they sowed.
Benifiting clubs who have run clubs correctly, creating a void of 8-12 spaces in the Prem. In turn allowing 'mass promotions' from all lower leagues.
Can only live in hope...

well if the terrorists are going to fly planes into things, then I hope it;s in the middle of the pitch at Old Trafford when man utd are playing chelsea