The Role of the Football Supporter

[alanclare]

Professional football, as practised in the Barclays Premier League, has often been compared to a TV soap opera. It has it’s cast list of “stars” of varying importance at any moment in time; it has its goodies and it has its baddies. Some characters have brief appearances in the plot; others are perennials that go on for years.

In this scenario, we, the spectators, are popularly regarded as the audience for the show. The entertainment is put on for our benefit; after all, we pay to watch it. Like the audience at a Covent Garden opera, we are the aficionados of the spectacle and show our approval, or otherwise, accordingly.

However, in a recent article in the Times, Matthew Syed has suggested that contrary to this accepted view of the place of the supporter in the great soap opera that is Premiership football, we are in fact part of the cast. Our role is that of “extras” and we have parts to play. The true audience is the passive Sky box watcher, wherever he may be. He sees (and hears) us, and his appreciation of the overall performance is influenced by the parts we play.

If you doubt that we are bit-players in this show you should remind yourself of the character that you assume as you come through the turnstile. No more the obedient husband, the role-model father, the cuddly grandad. You shrug all that off and assume the mantle of the true Villain. You shout, you curse, you swear eternal hatred of fellow Brummies just because they happened to have been born in a different postcode from yourself. You and those fellow Villains who share your little part of the stage, play your parts to the full and leave the theatre well satisfied with your own performance, even though some of your favourites among the stars could have played their parts rather better.

The difference, of course, between ourselves and the extras in a play is that whereas they get paid, we pay to play our parts and it’s rather taken for granted that we will turn up on the night.

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

Interesting.
I doubt the massive Sky audiences would remain for long no matter how good the product (sorry players) on the pitch and perceived importance of the game if there was no live audience there creating an atmosphere.
Your point about how we assume a different role when in the ground is also true and has always been thus. We are able to behave in ways that elsewhere would at best get us strange looks if not worse consequences. I would just qualify the bit about "..no more the obedient husband, the role-model father, the cuddly grandad", as there is now a much higher proportion of women who have joined the congregation.

[TopDeck113]

An interesting article - and I agree with the sentiments that the TV viewing audience want the atmosphere that the paying spectator provides.  The much maligned Nick Hornby said as much in Fever Pitch getting on for two decades ago. 

However the cynic in me, based on too many years following the game, says that what the clubs themselves consider the role of the supporter can be summarised in three sentences.  They want someone who will:

Pay-up (tickets, merchandise, over-priced catering, etc).
Turn up (regardless of the inconvenience caused by the real paymasters, the TV companies).
Shut up (i.e. don't criticise).

[Bad English]

This thread is nothing without Brigada 1874.

[alanclare]

I would just qualify the bit about "..no more the obedient husband, the role-model father, the cuddly grandad", as there is now a much higher proportion of women who have joined the congregation.

You are right of course. It's just that I have an aversion to the contorted English that results when one tries to be politically correct

[darren woolley]

As long as we keep playing our part and playing it well and by that i mean get behind the team then the show we put on for sky can be watched and admired by everyone.