Envy, myopia and looking the other way: Why we don’t all applaud when a football club is successful

PREDICTABLY, not everyone was overjoyed when Manchester City leapfrogged season-long title chasers Arsenal to win their third successive Premier League crown. Some City fans were upset that their team was not getting the credit they deserved, while the club’s critics devalued the achievement owing to the financial advantages they have from being effectively owned by a nation.

City’s dilemma is they are owned by a state that is very different from cultural, social and political perspectives compared to the United Kingdom. Some of the differences are considered unacceptable by the west and therefore, any club in the hands of such a regime will inevitably attract criticism and be taken to task on their morals and values. In football, most fans of clubs that have questionable backing will overlook these issues and begrudge anyone casting doubt on the water. City are not alone by any means – the same arguments can be aimed at Paris Saint-Germain, Newcastle United and, in the past, Chelsea. In the near future more clubs, such as Manchester United and Liverpool could find themselves owned by the middle east.

Some of the more animated and vitriolic protests about City can also be attributed to basic inter-club rivalry and of course, plain and simple envy. When Liverpool won the Champions League for the sixth time in 2019, there were as many bricks thrown at the club as bouquets. Supporters of Liverpool’s closest rivals, notably Manchester United and Chelsea, begrudged the success of the Reds, using all sorts of excuses for why they had won the competition and, unable to be too negative about a good team, turned to criticising the fans and their behaviour. 

Liverpool are not universally disliked, but when you have big bodies of fans like United and Chelsea bitterly denying the club any success, it must seem like the world is against them. Certainly, the incessant abuse of a club guarantees that siege mentality builds-up and those on the end of constant criticism become the victim. In some respects, it strengthens their resolve.

Football fans spend too much time “hating” their rivals or enemies and not enough time extolling the real virtues of their own club. Just watch Arsenal fans during a game and how many times they refer to Tottenham, not least in demanding that everyone should “stand up if you hate Tottenham”. Interesting, given that Arsenal have been extremely more successful than Spurs over decades and therefore shouldn’t be too worried about them if they were confident of their own standing.

An assured club shouldn’t fret about a local rival as it would be far more “grand” to not worry about the fortunes of another club. Do Real Madrid and Barcelona worry about their neighbours, do Bayern Munich get all bent out of shape about TSV 1860?

But it is unlikely to ever be any different in football. Why? Because the game is, essentially, a very simple function – win, lose or draw. One goal changes everything. The objective is to kick or head a ball into a goal, there’s nothing very sophisticated about it – football is, after all, an illiterate game. Therefore, the result of a victory for one, a defeat for another, becomes the catalyst for taunting, goading, abusing and poking fun. All very basic emotions adopted by the masses. Losers envy winners and try to explain defeat with a dose of “what aboutism” or envy of the victors’ greater strength.

From the very top of the game to grassroots level, football is a sport where the green-eyed monster of jealousy comes to the fore time and time again. The game has always been one where competitive imbalance has governed who wins the prizes and who struggles – the current landscape is extreme, but you can go back 100-plus years to find examples of clubs having financial advantages and wealthy benefactors. Rarely, if ever, has football been a democracy, but it has had “eras” where clubs have risen to the surface – such as Preston North End in the 1890s, Huddersfield Town in the 1920s, Arsenal in the 1930s (where “lucky Arsenal” began), Manchester United in the 1950s, Liverpool in the 1970s and 1980s and United again under Sir Alex Ferguson. The most recent drivers, of course, are Chelsea and Manchester City, the most obvious examples of inflated investment in the English game. Newcastle United will be the next resented club.

Manchester City are the subject of envy, as much as Liverpool are, but for different reasons. Liverpool, along with Arsenal and Manchester United (the traditional leaders of English football) have demonstrated envy more often than any other club, regularly bleating about the injustice of clubs with heavy investment. It’s easy to see why, for after decades of being the game’s royalty their position at the summit was undermined by Chelsea, initially, and City. They choose to ignore the fact they have all enjoyed the spoils of being better financed and, effectively, bigger than their peers for many years.

Liverpool fans, equipped with their banners proclaiming their history and ethos, like nothing more than to tell the likes of Chelsea or City that they have “no history”. Actually, before Bill Shankly arrived at Anfield, Liverpool had seen better days. Likewise, Manchester United’s cupboard was bare before Matt Busby was appointed as manager and Arsenal were nothing before Herbert Chapman moved down from Yorkshire. Each club has its pivotal moment when they become transformed from average entities to serial trophy winners – in most cases, the spark for success has been created by an outstanding managerial appointment. 

For Chelsea and Manchester City, the seismic moment in their history came from the arrival of cash-rich owners. No matter what some fans think, both clubs certainly “have a history” but it’s just that it wasn’t very successful until their circumstances changed. If, to quote an old football cliché, you’re only as good as your last result, then Chelsea and City have been very successful over the past decade. But only opponents will talk openly about the source and nature of any owners’ money.

Envy in non-league football is intriguing. Any club that has a new ground invariably has its detractors complaining about new stadiums, no atmosphere and not enough this or that. Usually, such criticisms are because club X’s ground is ramshackle, falling down, but sells itself on “character” and “unique ambience”. Furthermore, club X’s fans and officials might try to dismiss their own club’s lack of progress by giving you 101 reasons why a similar venture could not possibly be successful at their club. The envious fan will also suggest rivals with bigger budgets are the beneficiaries of cash from a dubious source. Today, that might be money laundering, drugs, tax evasion or property development that attempts to game the system.

Of course, the non-league playing budget is a subject of great contention and rarely is the truth known. A club official with any integrity would not/should not reveal a team’s budget to an opponent. However, the budget becomes something that can massage the ego, either to boast of how much the club can afford, or to play it down and suggest they are getting value for money from a modest outlay. Either way, you cannot believe much of what is said about budgets.

The tension between clubs fuels envy more than any other aspect of the game. There’s nothing wrong with healthy rivalry, it’s an important part of football, but ultimately, it should not deny the winner the spoils – each contest is a two-horse race and there are over 2,000 of them each season in the Premier/Football league. There’s nought so myopic as the committed one-club fan and even the most intelligent football follower gets caught up in the pettiness of what amount to playground spats. Basically, it is all about aspiration – the little club wanting to be Manchester United. Everyone, in their own way, wants the same thing, but the problem with football is that when somebody actually reaches the finishing post, the sniping starts. As Morrissey sang: “We hate it when our friends become successful”.

Ultimately, anyone connected to a football club should be open-minded enough to challenge the structure they are supporting. The prospect of success should not cloud reasonable judgement about the wrong type of owner. If the game continues to sell itself as a series of community clubs that attach themselves to causes and movements, how can real and very serious issues be ignored just for the sake of a few silver pots?

Manchester United and Qatar: The world must listen

MANCHESTER United is arguably the biggest football club in Britain, possibly the world and it is up for sale. There should be a string of would-be buyers eager to revive the fortunes of the club and leverage its enormous financial potential. It has been relatively quiet, but one assumes that as the February 17 deadline for offers approaches, there will be a flurry of activity and a few games of cat and mouse to be played. 

Now, we hear that Qatar is interested in Manchester United, the World Cup host that continues to crave credibility, even though the state’s reputation around human rights has changed little. Nobody did too much about this other than promise “platforms would be used” to send a message, but ultimately, this amounted to next to nothing, because Qatar didn’t permit it. Concerns about Saudi Arabia’s takeover of Newcastle United has been allowed to evaporate, just as everyone has resumed their post-World Cup business as usual as if Qatar never happened. Now, whenever a club comes up for sale, they appear to look towards the middle east for their salvation. The simple truth is nobody has any money or appetite apart from gulf states and some US investors. 

Is Qatar really interested? Or have they emerged with a “possible” bid to stir-up investor interest and drive the price? It is clear this type of posturing and manipulation is creeping into sport, be it bogus interest in a player by an elite club, agents encouraging player unrest to get a move mid-contract or ownership plays. Is this merely one of those occasions?

Qatar, of course, already owns Paris Saint-Germain and has a stake in Portugal’s SC Braga. It would be a complex transaction should they really want to buy Manchester United. But Qatar has various vehicles it could use within the Qatar Investment Authority’s (QIA) arsenal such as Qatar National Bank, who could front the bid. QIA is the sovereign wealth fund of Qatar which funds Qatar Sports Investments (QSI), the owner of PSG. It has US$ 450 billion of assets under management.

Qatar’s influence on football is growing and they already have a seat on the UEFA executive committee in the form of PSG’s Nasser al-Khelaifi, who was heartily and emotionally thanked by UEFA President Mr. Ceferin for steering his club away from the European Super League project. At best, QSI could only take a minority stake in Manchester United, but as everyone in business knows, there are ways and means if you are allowed to finesse a deal.

Manchester United fans should be very concerned about this development, but will they just be so relieved to get rid of the Glazer family that they will welcome any new owner with open arms and ignore the backdrop? That appears to have happened elsewhere in football.

Plenty of the club’s fans were enthused by the prospect of INEOS owner Jim Ratcliffe taking the club over as they believe he would be more of a benefactor rather than investor. Nobody really knows that. Any white knight would possibly be fronting a consortium as the price being asked – the Glazers want £ 6 billion – makes it nigh on impossible for an individual to acquire the club. If that would be the case, then the chance of “sugar daddy” ownership is almost impossible. The price may not be as much as that, indeed Qatar are supposedly looking at £ 4.5 billion, but there will never be another Abramovich, the world has become far more complicated since 2003 when he bought Chelsea.

Should Qatar manage to succeed, then it would also be another twist in the multi-club ownership model. Javier Tebas of La Liga: “Multi-club ownership is already a complicated topic, but it becomes even more complex when a state owns multiple clubs. It would not be good for European football.”

As mentioned, the deadline for offers is still a week away, so the Qatar saga is only just beginning. Whether it is a genuine interest or if it is designed to “flush out” other investors remains to be seen. It is quite likely that things will become even more complicated than they already seems.