What do you get from being a football club supporter?

T

TikTikTikTikTik

*****
7 August 2004
Liverpool
This may seem like a strange question, but recently I have started to think about what point there is to follow football, support my club. I'll likely be moving out of my parents house in the next couple of months and I was thinking about how much time I spend / lose around football (websites, live matches, discussion on here, etc) and the cost to watch the matches televised.

Now I'm not a football supporter in the manner that I want to watch every game. In fact I only watch matches with Liverpool and the other important matches that relate to Liverpool; top 4 matches, CL knockout rounds, etc.

Offcoure there are a number of different types of supporters; armchair, glory, local and hardcore. I myself am an armchair supporter being abroad, with my dad being from Liverpool being the reason I support them.

So with that said I was wondering what point there is. If you look at a football match there is actually very little "beautiful" football being played, for example a Ronaldo dribble, Gerrard strike, great passing move, dirty tackle, handbags, etc. Half the match the ball is out of play, the majority of whats left is often fairly scrappy and boring midfield/possesion play. You are left with maybe 5 min. of football that is enjoyable to watch as a neutral. Yet you spend about 2 hours for it.

Now most of us are probably top 4 supportes so we get to enjoy succes, but for most teams thats something that will never happen. With the fact that a teams performance actually has an effect on someones mental state (happy, sad/frustrated, etc) I am wondering why we should let an organisation have that impact on you based on some artificial bond you have made to them.

So again I'm left with the question of what you GET from being a club supporter? It's not WHY you are a supporter (hometown team, same as mates, dad's team, favorite player, etc) but what you GET.

I remember I used to "support" Ajax when they were the top team in Europe just to wind up my mates as they all supported Feyenoord, equavalent to Liverpool and Manu. However I quickly got bored of that and now have no interest in dutch football. So what I GOT from supporting them was the fun of winding someone else up.

Now with Liverpool, I don't GET much at all, when they win it cheers me up somewhat. However thats only for about 20 min. and then I get back to whatever else I am doing. When they lose it gets me down, frustrated. But again thats for about 20 min. and I go do something else. Yet for those short positive and negative moments I probably spend about 1 hour a day on footie websites and about 4 hours a week watching the live matches. Offcourse when I move out it will also cost me 15e a month. Not much offcourse, probably a bargin for english standards as I get every prem game live every weekend and the mid week games aswell as all the CL matches live. They also show the dutch/german/italian/spanish league matches live aswell. But even so, it will no longer be just time lost to football but also money by that point. And I'm left wondering what point there is.

So that's why I've posed this question to see what you lot GET from being a football supporter?
 
a broken heart , a rollercoaster ride of emmotions , a sence of belonging.
 
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we get the ups and downs which the club has , its like one big family you all have this thing in common with people even though you might not even now them, watching Man Utd getting relegated by a Dennis Law goal gives you the ultimute footballing low while watching Teddy and Ole snatch two goals at the end to win you the European cup (also Treble) gives you the ultimate footballing high and shows how the club which is like a family how far you have come :)
 
I get to stand in the rain and cold most weeks in grounds which can only be best described a pub team pitches, with worse facilities, watching terrible football most of the time, oh the joy of the Irish League!
 
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I get satisfaction from supporting Man United.Victories burns my passion ever so brightly and it also feeds my euphoric needs.

If you said all of the above tiktiktik and still feel empty at the end of the day,I suggest you dig deep and ask yourself mate...is football really for you? Try a something different for a change,golf perhaps?
 
Well M8.

I feel depressed and football affects my life and relationships with others when Liverpool are in a bad patch, and really I should get some perspective. A crisis for us is dropping to Fifth with a game in hand just a couple of points of Chelsea, who won the title 2 years running. A crisis for us is loosing only 2 league games so far.

On the other hand when we do well I'm exstatic. 2001 was immense, beating the mancs in the mickey mouse cup in 2003 was bliss, 2005 was orgasmic, 2006 was nearly just as orgasmic. I've never felt such a high watching the Istanbul miracle. I was proud even at half time, and whilst I thought we'd give a good account of ourselfs and send the fans home singing proudly, I never thought we'd win the thing. Really these successes should tide me over, because other real lower league fans etc just do not get that, but I supose they get more satisfaction out of a routine league win than the big clubs supporters.

I do not find football boring at all. I even quite enjoyed the 2007 FA Cup Final! Why because it was a tense game, with great defending, between two domestic titans, won by a simple piece of magic in a giant, famous stadium. I play the game and I love watching different teams from different countries. The variety of play is excellent , I love scouting players from neutral games.

Football fans should realise that football isn't always as easy as you think it is. It is physical, and you need to keep your concentration, and you need to be confident and happy in your abillities and team-mates for you to be successful.

Football brings me what life in general brings you. A rolley coaster of emotions.
 
I used to watch Stockport County on Friday nights and Saturdays when United weren't playing and I enjoyed it just as much although the standard of football was pretty poor. What did I get out of it...? They are my team. They're are the first team I ever saw play live. It was great if we only lost 2-0 at home and fantastic if we managed to beat a top club.
 
I usually just like watching my team to get away from things for a while like work and the missus and just life in general. So I guess I get a couple of hours of peace or thinking of something different. I'm not too distraught at when Arsenal lose as long as they are giving 100% is what I really care about, once they do that you have faith they will be okay.
 
Some interesting reply's

If you said all of the above tiktiktik and still feel empty at the end of the day,I suggest you dig deep and ask yourself mate...is football really for you? Try a something different for a change,golf perhaps?
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Yeah maybe not, I probably enjoy watching the tour de france more then watching matches. But then I dont care about the runners but just get impressed by the physical exursions(sp?) they do, even with doping :D

When I was younger I watched any football I could as I played footie daily and it gave me examples to try new things. Now I hardly ever play, maybe a few of times a year at 5-a-side matches.

I think it might also have to do with your surroundings, like you say, you get satisfaction but surely that is related to others around you not getting it. Thats maybe also a reason why I dont see the point anymore as there is noone in my surroundings that follows football, let alone english football. Ive noticed that when going through the different levels of schooling; collegelevel nearly everyone watched football, bacholar level a couple and master level no one does. Im about to finish my masters degree and in the 2,5 years Ive been there I havent met a single person that follows football. And with that there isnt any / a lot of satisfaction, you tell someone Liverpool won the CL last night and they go, "the what? oh football? oh ok".

It's partly down to Liverpool not doing "well" atm, but its more to do with the general state of football. For example my GF enjoys watching the iceskating races, and I do aswell. Its not about who wins as such, but more about how impressive it is and how generally fair it is. If you are the best and race the best you are likely to win.

Yet football is so far away from that now, you only have to look at how crap the refereeing has been this season. Its not only decisions against Liverpool, also ones for them and poor poor decisions throughout the games played. A ball is a meter over the line and they cant even f@#king see it! Or the inconsistentcy from ref's, or the general bottling to give any important decision. And when they do half the time its wrong aswell! The continued lack of technological development in the game to adress this. After all, the time it takes to actually take a penalty with the moaning, showing of cards, getting everybody to stand correctly ect you could have easily watched a number of replay's to judge it correctly. We do at home watching on the tv so why cant they do it at the ground when they have a tv in front of them!

And thats just the ref's, I wont even get started on the obvious cheating everywhere. My gf sometimes watches highlights with me and she's always asking, why dont they just check it?! And whats the point of it as a "sport" as it is so unfair most of the time.
 
I agree with your first post Tik tik... last year at the emirates stadium.... i saw some guy cheer like no tomorrow during a preseason game and i watched him and said i dont have this passion for football anymore, so i have decided to take the a back seat...... i watch but not with my heart or head..just cos i am bored and to see what the sporting giants Nike/Adidas are up too?

i guess its a temp thing..who knows maybe if i get to see de oranje play in euro champs it will come rushing back!!!!

some of us just have the natural progression.. we fall out of love with things we used to so love!!!
 
Its an escape from everything else in my life not that my life is bad, its really good but its a chance to lose yourself in something you love. I do not know what I would do without football.
 
I still jump around like a madman for CL games! I used to watch a lot of football, but now I only watch Milan and big European games. I still watch Milan every week in the Italian bar, because I feel its become a regular thing. I also feel very passionate for Italy, like all Italians. Italians seems to be extremely passionate about their football, a lot more than what I've seen in the UK.
 
It's just another form of entertainment for me. It's like saying, why do you watch movies, or why do you music?

Plus, it has that emotion aspect as well, attachment to your team. It's just another aspect of my life. I have my friends, my family, by band members, and then football fans. It's just another aspect that I relate to. Plus it's a way of spending time with yourself. Sometimes, I just feel like not going out, or partying. Football is a great way to pass that time.
 
It makes me laugh, cry, shout, sing, run, dance, argue, debate, drink, depressed, happy... get the picture? Football has given me every emotion known to man and still does to this day. Football is a very big part of my life.
 
Jamie-G said:
I get to stand in the rain and cold most weeks in grounds which can only be best described a pub team pitches, with worse facilities, watching terrible football most of the time, oh the joy of the Irish League!
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The joy of being a linfield fan :lmao:
 
I think it gives you a chance to feel alive to be honest. I've never felt so many emotions as I did against Roma last year. The violence before the game, the electrifying atmosphere (yes, electrifying, at Old Trafford...), the beautiful football, and then the physical pain after jumping around like a mad thing, singing and shouting for over 90 minutes. If you can't say you would enjoy experiencing that, then football is not for you.

Sure not every game is like that, but you watch it through the good and the bad because eventually a game will come along that sweeps you off your feet, and you'll be in love with football again.
 
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