Franchise and football.

[chalkies_shorts]

When it comes to these cunts the rules should be very simple. Do not engage in any form of communication with them. Don't look up their views - they are fucking worthless. The only way to treat them is to completely isolate them. Just do not engage in any form of exchange with them. Apart from Winkelman don't even smack oine.
They are beneath contempt. I hate The Scummers because of who they are, I hate these cunts because of what they are. 

[DiV]

blah blah blah Franchise blah blah blah wimbledon.

we should be thinking of more important things, like ourselves.

[Ardiles]

Jesus wept...

'Proud that MK has got such a go-ahead club, befitting the go ahead city I have been proud to live in for the last 20 odd years.'

Go ahead city?!  This really is an exercise in self-delusion, isn't it.  Milton Keynes is a fucking planning accident , dreamed up in the 1960s and still being suffered by its residents (and anyone else unfortunate enough to have to visit) today.  A plastic town (yes, folks, it's a town) and a plastic franchise.  The two deserve each other.

I am proud never to have watched a game of football there.  And I never will.

[chalkies_shorts]

DV - you need something to take your mind off our current predicamant. I don't think I can cope with our shirttyness 24/7. The Abomination provide an outlet as long as its one way.

[flammableBen]

I don't think anything like MKFranchise will be allowed to happen in the football league again. And there's encouraging signs that teams have started to realise that they'll never be able to successfully chase the marketing dream. Yeah there's extra revenue to be made from good ground facilities and gaining connections with business and other stuff, but it's becoming more and more apparent that it is extra revenue.

I think we're starting to see the beginnings of a push back towards using the best natural resource teams have - a connection with the local community (as sort of mentioned above). Hopefully a realisation that just rinsing out a dying group of hardcore fans, who will go whatever the cost, is unsustainable. I think we're starting to see it now with reduced season tickets at some stuff. Hopefully it works out.

I'm not under the illusion that there was some golden time where clubs were ran with no worries with regard to finance, but it's definitely taken a leap to the extreme in the last two decades.

Unfortunately It's clearly going to be too late for a lot of football clubs, with the league being unable/unwilling to enforce the "fit and proper" to run a football club rule - and the vultures about willing to strip a club of anything of value.

And the top "super"clubs are too far gone in their quest of global marketing to be pulled back now. It's only a matter of time before the pressure gets too much and the pre-season tours of Asia take the step up into the occasional competitive fixture played out there. An undoing of the "football brand" will be much easier where it hasn't been a success.

I'm not really sure where that essay came from. One of those starting to type and then just carrying on jobbies. I'll re-read it in a bit and decide it's all nonsense.

[axs]

Put standing areas back in the grounds, the atmosphere will be much better and more people will attend.

[dell boy]

I cant understand why they try to defend themselves.
They are what they are, plastic fans.

It is getting very tiresome keeping having a go at these new world fans.
Very similar to Reading fans in a way, you see them walking to the grounds all their new scarfs, new shirts, new Reading this and that, you never see an old shirt, old scarf or come to that old supporter ... bandwagon get on it.
Where will you fans be when it goes pearshape which it will.

[Samdy Gray]

Very similar to Reading fans in a way, you see them walking to the grounds all their new scarfs, new shirts, new Reading this and that, you never see an old shirt, old scarf or come to that old supporter ... bandwagon get on it.

The thing is dell, there were at least 15 or so MK fans who looked to be their fifties and sixties wearing full squadwear in The Merlin yesterday.

[dell boy]

The thing is dell, there were at least 15 or so MK fans who looked to be their fifties and sixties wearing full squadwear in The Merlin yesterday.

Yes I saw many as well, but they never had a side before did they from Milton Keynes and have just jumped on the bandwagon.
My comparison with Reading was totally shit, I know what I meant just didnt come out right.

[Kinky Tom]

Yes I saw many as well, but they never had a side before did they from Milton Keynes and have just jumped on the bandwagon.
My comparison with Reading was totally shit, I know what I meant just didnt come out right.

They had the Cobbs just 20 minutes down the road, if they wanted to follow football they could have been doing so all their lives!

[Ardiles]

Swindon fans (and residents) can often be an apathetic bunch, as we all know.  But on the MkFranchise issue we have - as a body - been very vocal.  I am proud of that.  And the reason that best explains this is, I think, that we have come very close during the last decade to losing our own club.

Dell - I think you're being a little harsh on Reading fans, to tell the truth.  I know they are often derided as being plastic as well, but to group them with the Franchise is not fair in my view.  Reading is an old club that has fallen on successful times and, much as we might think they look a little plastic now, I think we would all like a little of the success that they have had.  When better times do arrive for us (as I believe they will), we too will acquire a new set of supporters.  You will see more Swindon tops being worn around town, just as you see a lot more Reading shirts in Berkshire than you used to.  I would be quite pleased to emulate a little of what Reading has done...but NEVER would I want to emulate the Franchise.

Flamable - excellent essay.  Agreed with every word.

[Batch]

I think all successful clubs get bandwagon jumpers, Reading are no exception. Though living in the Reading/Basingstoke area as they achieved success was interesting. You used to see a fair few Saints shirts about the place. They soon dried up to be replaced by Reading. Knew a couple of older Reading casual fans that claimed despite lots of empty seats it was hard to get tickets in the Championship promotion year due to an increase in season ticket sales for the latter part of the season to ensure getting one for the prem year.

We'd be the same if we were ever that fortunate again. I'd think "where were you when we were shit" as the chant goes, but I'd be happy more money was coming into the club. But we all know for most clubs success and (hopefully) failure is temporary and cyclic and at some stage the new support will fade away.  

MK is a different kettle of fish to all that (for me anyway). But I've said my bit on that so won't go on.

EDIT: Beaten to essentially the same point by Ardiles. It took Reading a good 10 years and a substantial redevelopment to get where they are. And that was probably easier then than now. It shows how much work needs to be done to get success and how we have to be patient even if it is torturous on the pitch right now.

[Ardiles]

Great minds, Batch...

[dell boy]

Ardilles you are right about my comments I'm sure.
Funny thing I spoke to a couple of neighbours at lunchtime (new Reading fans) and apparently it is all going pearshape after a draw on Saturday and Wolves and Birmingham winning.
Oh if only we could be so down in the dumps.

[Reg Smeeton]

I was hoping the nice person from Bletchley might have wanted to talk about railways, what with Bletchley being a noted trainspotters paradise in the past.

Bletchley is a railway town...in much the same way as New Swindon was railway town..just sort of stayed a backwater...nevertheless interesting for all that.