Adver in the bin tonight.

[thepeoplesgame]

you moan about football changing.these scarves are a blast from the past.nobody is made to buy them!
fog horns,inflatables,ticker tape,all fads but they go in time.
spencer i think you're going a bit ott over it because of your concerns with the modern game.

Yeah, but all those fads werent making millions for people who seem to be hell bent on destroying the game. None of those other things you mentioned were official merchandise. Why dont the fans go back to making up fads of their own, like all the other things you mentioned? Il tell you why, because football is a souless place, thats why. Its just individuals now, just how they wanted it to be. Few proper unnofficial supporters clubs.

I was directly criticising the fans who buy it. I know they are not made to. Its their choice and I was criticising them.  

It is gonna be the straw that broke the camels back at the moment.

To date I've seen a handful of people wearing (yes, wearing, as opposed to swinging around their head) these bar scarves and I thought they looked like the nicest piece of club merchandise since I can't remember when (...I had a Swindon Town ruler when I was at school, that was pretty mint...).

I hear where you're coming from - the whole Soccer AM-isation of football fans into a maleable mass of easily persuaded consumers and all that - but I'm not sure retro scarves at Swindon matches are really the best example of it...

[Spencer_White]

you moan about football changing.these scarves are a blast from the past.nobody is made to buy them!
fog horns,inflatables,ticker tape,all fads but they go in time.
spencer i think you're going a bit ott over it because of your concerns with the modern game.

Yeah, but all those fads werent making millions for people who seem to be hell bent on destroying the game. None of those other things you mentioned were official merchandise.

I was directly criticising the fans who buy it. I know they are not made to. Its their choice and I was criticising them.  

It is gonna be the straw that broke the camels back at the moment.

so do you begrudge the club trying to flog a few scarves to boost the coffers?
i see where you are coming from.and agree with you sentiments. but dont agree on this at all.i expect those scarves to sell well and its not a problem at all imo.

Of course we all want to support our clubs financially. I buy the odd tea mug or T shirt or polo. I buy loads of shit actually.

What annoys me about the stripy scarf syndrome is that it works everywhere. No one says, yeah Newcastle do it, but it looks naff on us. Were not Newcastle, weve got our own identity. We dont need their stupid scarves.

But obviously we do. Because Swindon is a baron area in terms of fan culture just like most other areas of the country. And there will be thousands of them at the County ground soon. Just like every other ground in the country. Great. How different it all could have been.

And by the way. Burberry hats in their day were just as pathetic. Well maybe the people who wore Aqua hats after Football Factory. That was pretty pathetic.

[Bogus Dave]

I dont get it, are you saying we shouldn't sell the stripey scarves because it wouldn't be unique? Nearly every club does it, why shouldnt we. We'd just be losing out otherwise

[pauld]

I dont get it, are you saying we shouldn't sell the stripey scarves because it wouldn't be unique? Nearly every club does it, why shouldnt we. We'd just be losing out otherwise

No he's saying it's symptomatic of the increasing commoditisation of football driven by the big-money sides in the Prem and those who "consume" football from their armchairs.

[Batch]

I think Spencer is saying that doing things to blatantly cash in is wrong. It's part of the commercialism that is deliberately targeting the fan and that is ruining the game as more and more people are priced out.

Personally I think the club needs to do whatever it can to bring in the £££. But obviously I am having a very large case of double standards, because I hate the prmeiershit clubs that do the same (albeit on a much more massive scale).

[Bogus Dave]

Hypocrisy rules

We moaned at the old board for not running the club like a business. Now the new one are so we moan at them aswell.

If Clubs didn't sell Merchandise, they wouldn't make as much money. Its a no brainer really.

[Ardiles]

I dont get it, are you saying we shouldn't sell the stripey scarves because it wouldn't be unique? Nearly every club does it, why shouldnt we. We'd just be losing out otherwise

No he's saying it's symptomatic of the increasing commoditisation of football driven by the big-money sides in the Prem and those who "consume" football from their armchairs.

Really enjoyed your use of the word 'commoditisation' there, Paul.

[Spencer_White]

I dont get it, are you saying we shouldn't sell the stripey scarves because it wouldn't be unique? Nearly every club does it, why shouldnt we. We'd just be losing out otherwise

Lets wrestle
Lets fucking wrestle

You like wrestling, I cant say Im suprised you dont get it bud. Quite obviously thousands dont. Thats how we got here in the first place. I feel sorry for the young lads who dont even remmember before Euro 96. Just a different mentality altogether.

By the way, the old board didnt run us like a business. They ran us as an pawn for a housing development and reserved the right to dip their fingers in when they felt like it.

But anyway, this is how the monster was born. You look in disgust as other clubs do it. But when our fans do it its getting a bit extra cash for the team.

[Bogus Dave]

I look on in disgust when other clubs consider playing league games abroad, when they split away from a league that has 100 years history behind it just for greed, when they treat corporate sponsors with more respect and dignity than the real fans. Selling a few scarves doesn't really bother me

[thepeoplesgame]

The more I read this thread the more I think I might buy one. I've thought the club should sell good old-fashioned red and white scarves for yonks now, instead of all these shitty half-red-half-yellow(?) things they kept coming up with.

The problems you hint at are real, gentlemen, but the scarves are not the issue.

[Spencer_White]

I look on in disgust when other clubs consider playing league games abroad, when they split away from a league that has 100 years history behind it just for greed, when they treat corporate sponsors with more respect and dignity than the real fans. Selling a few scarves doesn't really bother me

What about the monotony of football support nowadays?

Does it bother you that teams seem to be gravitating to being more and more like Reading? Every club, up and down the land. Sit down, watch the game in a stadium that looks exactly like 20 other stadiums in a retail park on a motorway junction. Sitting with 10,000 other people who all wear the same top (edit the same scarf too), but dont seem to have anything else in common.

There is no romance in that. Dont you think its sad that everything good apart from the XI vs XI is being taken away?

[ghanimah]

I look on in disgust when other clubs consider playing league games abroad, when they split away from a league that has 100 years history behind it just for greed, when they treat corporate sponsors with more respect and dignity than the real fans. Selling a few scarves doesn't really bother me

What about the monotony of football support nowadays?

Does it bother you that teams seem to be gravitating to being more and more like Reading? Every club, up and down the land. Sit down, watch the game in a stadium that looks exactly like 20 other stadiums in a retail park on a motorway junction. Sitting with 10,000 other people who all wear the same top, but dont seem to have anything else in common.

There is no romance in that. Dont you think its sad that everything good apart from the XI vs XI is being taken away?

Couldn't agree more especially about the stadium-by-numbers. Sadly I think that's what we'll end up with.

[janaage]

I'm gonna get my mum to knit me a red and white scarf, that'll be much better!!

[Spencer_White]

I'm gonna get my mum to knit me a red and white scarf, that'll be much better!!

Anything! Anything! So it just aint the same as everybody elses.

I hate them scarfs. I hate them with a passion.  

[pauld]

Hypocrisy rules

We moaned at the old board for not running the club like a business. Now the new one are so we moan at them aswell.

Erm except we aren't are we? For a start, it's mainly Spense that has a problem with the scarves, and second he isn't complaining about the club trying to sell merchandise. And we didn't just moan at the old board for not running the club like a business, yes that was a big part of it, but there was hell of a lot more to it than that