AMF: The cry of an age
Words: Tom Reed
Cover Image: Damiano Benzoni
There is nothing that screams “for the fans” more than a German businessman recording a video for a Madrid fronted European Super League, in a corporate corridor, as happened yesterday.
Nothing that speaks of the romance of football than the piece to camera going straight in with a ruling from the European Court of Justice on cross-border competitions.
The psychological play was subtle, from Master of Ceremonies Bernd Reichart, who name sounds like a benign German therapist, wearing a shacket rather than a suit and relaying the proposals from the A22 group, which itself sounds like a nondescript road through rural England.
The delivery from Mr Shacket was given deadpan, like a mini-address from the Prime-Minister, less proposal, more government directive and yet the graphics presentation looked more akin to the timetable for a primary school maths programme.
There was a “Star League” and a “Gold League” only falling short of a “best behaved kid” division, with Real Madrid and Barcelona, who Sports Illustrated said can be be expected “to back” the plans, potentially in the naughty corner with football supporters from across Europe, who can still remember the protests against the last European Super League breakaway.
Surely a serious football competition wouldn’t call one of its leagues “Union” which is literally the name of a complete different sport in Rugby, or “Blue” in a game where shirt colours are all important in identity and heritage? You can imagine the fans of Stade Reims and Nottingham Forest loving playing in the Azure division, not that they’d likely get a seat at football’s top table for long.
And yet, here we are, with what Gabriele Marcotti has said might mean 246 matches streamed during midweek in an already bloated football season.
Kieran Maguire, the football finance expert posted in his usual concise style.
“Against Modern football” is the cry of an age, the image of the old fashioned ball and the laurel leaf standing for a nostalgia to sporting principles we had as children but are beaten out of us by the time we become teenagers.
Money in football is the equivalent of micro-plastics in the eco-system, making a malaise that we all feel but is difficult to diagnose even though the symptoms are varied.
We can see that it’s unworkable for players to be paid such huge sums in a time of war in Europe, a cost of living crisis and rising child poverty. And yet we turn a blind eye to players turning up to stadia in high-end cars, when we can barely afford the bus.
Ticket prices, make going to the match a decision with real consequences for our families, our fan culture is monetised at every turn, even in a market for retro-shirts that were made when our teams were crap and football wasn’t glamorous.
New football stadia are modelled on airports and hotels and conference rooms and mapped out by marketing executives rather than the places where we want to spend our time and support our teams.
When all we need is a roof, a terrace and a decent beer, we get “super stadia”, seats and a flat, expensive pint.
While football grounds fall quiet, the white noise of football content is a constant hum, as competitions and tournaments become indistinguishable, football becomes a by-product of TV instead of the other way round.
Our precious Saturday football has become an every-day of the week consumable and the international tournaments that separated the best of the best and produced lifelong memories have become just another event. The World Cup, a dirty glass in football’s dishwasher.
Maybe the answer to football’s A22 breakaway is to turn the table on the conspirators and for fans to breakaway themselves?
It needs the supporters’ groups of the teams likely to play in the contradiction in terms “Unify League” to realise that the sport they grew up loving is about to change for good and to reject the corporatisation of the game outright.
©Han Balk/ Terrace Edition.
Rebel clubs like FC United of Manchester and HFC Falke in Hamburg are workable alternatives to supporters who want to reclaim the game.
Alternatively, given the many thousands of football clubs that make up the fabric of European Sport, it’s not unthinkable to reason that some might join together themselves and kick the super league clique out of the nearest exit.
New giants would emerge, the cheers would resonate. Weak become heroes.
The intrinsic frailty of the Unify concept is its anchoring to centuries old leagues and the real bread and butter of football that binds us all and makes us get out of bed at the weekend.
You won’t see a proposal to break away completely, as the shacketed elites realise their brands mean nothing without heritage, tradition and fan culture.
And yet supporters are most organised in getting to matches over land and sea but terrible at the cross border organisation that super leagues excel at.
Maybe all it would take is for fans’ organisation from a European giant to record their own video, say Bayern Munich for example, and say enough is enough?
Perhaps that would lead to a dialogue from the dissposessed, the locked out and the “legacy fans” tempted to sell their dad’s prized jersey on eBay to fund the next ticket or premium streaming subscription.
Do it in the stands rather than a corridor though. Wear a scarf instead of a shacket.
Up in Sweden, somewhat insulated from the boardroom excesses of mainland Europe, they have member-owned clubs and have seen off VAR and investment from overseas investors.
Maybe we should be listening to Stockholm more than Saudi and Malmö rather than Madrid?
“We are convinced our way is the right way. We don’t want to become a McDonald’s” says Erik Wibaeus, supporter of Djurgårdens IF, the member-owned club currently playing well in the Europa Conference League.
Until there is a manifesto for change, for a sport for supporters by supporters, then “Against Modern Football” will remain the cry of an age, a line on a banner, a pain in our guts.
Tom is Terrace Edition Editor and can be found on X: @tomreedwriting
