[Albion] Is reaching the Premier League all you hoped it would be?

Renegade · Jan 5, 2018

As I said earlier,teams like us get no respect.This is part of an article on Daily Mail online today from Martin 'I need another Burger' Samuel.

'Brighton and Crystal Palace will trial the Video Assistant Referee system on Monday for one very good reason: their game doesn't matter.

Well, it does, but only to supporters of Brighton and Crystal Palace. To the wider world it is a meeting of two mediocre Premier League sides. They call it a derby but few outside the two localities understand that.

So, why is a ho-hum Premier League fixture among the pick of the FA Cup third-round ties? Because BT Sport caved to the carping busybodies complaining about Manchester United always being on television. United play Derby on Friday night in a much better game. Derby are in excellent form near the top of the Championship, United have shown vulnerability of late'

Publius Ovidius · Jan 5, 2018

Bozza said:
I've not actually answered the question there...

I'm pleased at how competitive we've been but I do wonder how long the novelty of Premier League football, should we remain here, will last....

1) I've noticed before this season that clubs of a moderate size who have been knocking around the middle of the PL for a few seasons seem to be suffering with drop-offs in attendance. West Brom is the one that particularly springs to mind. Are a number of their fans just bored of it all, perhaps?

2) Away games at the big grounds/clubs are exciting the first time, but I'm not sure how many of them I'll bother with again. A lot of home fans don't turn up, the atmosphere is non-existent (as it's a nothing game to the home side), the star players struggle to get out of second gear and we're just there as some sort of sparring partner.

my points to a T

I have not particularly enjoyed football for a few years now, ( probably my age) and only really the excitement of going up last year rescued that ( although we were on holiday for the pitch invasion and promotion winning game). I am not sure what I expected this season, but whoever I speak to seems astounded how well we are doing. I just sometimes think, " what is the point of being in the prem if we are only there to attempt to survive" the sum total of ambition is to stay in the prem and hopefully not get thumped by the to 6 clubs who as badger said, are light years ahead of the rest of the division, even though you do get the occasional mad result like Palace at Chelsea ( although they seem to be a decent team under Roy) and I think they will survive at a canter.

Yes, to be playing against some of the best teams in the world , watching the best players in the world is certainly great ( and Yes I do clap some of the players we have seen...Coutinho(sp) was one of the best players I have seen at the Amex) and I do get "up" for the games at the Amex, although when I see us sitting back or fecking about at the back against teams we would be putting away like Stoke Bournemouth etc I do get very frustrated.

Publius Ovidius · Jan 5, 2018

Renegade said:
As I said earlier,teams like us get no respect.This is part of an article on Daily Mail online today from Martin 'I need another Burger' Samuel.

'Brighton and Crystal Palace will trial the Video Assistant Referee system on Monday for one very good reason: their game doesn't matter.

Well, it does, but only to supporters of Brighton and Crystal Palace. To the wider world it is a meeting of two mediocre Premier League sides. They call it a derby but few outside the two localities understand that.

So, why is a ho-hum Premier League fixture among the pick of the FA Cup third-round ties? Because BT Sport caved to the carping busybodies complaining about Manchester United always being on television. United play Derby on Friday night in a much better game. Derby are in excellent form near the top of the Championship, United have shown vulnerability of late'

but the ticket sales say that this game doesn't matter to the fans of both clubs...palace cant shift a lot of their 2000 tickets and we may be 10k fans light on the league game.

DavidinSouthampton · Jan 5, 2018

Easy 10 said:
Cheers chap.

I think as a general observation, your point is valid. The money in the game IS ridiculous these days, I don't think anyone could argue any differently. But has that fundamentally affected my enjoyment of seeing my team, BHA, finally taking their place amongst the elite for the first time in nigh-on 2 generations ? And not just being there, but actually competing ? Not on your nelly. If Liverpool want to splurge £75m on a patchy centreback, that's their lookout. Doesn't impinge on my enjoyment of this season one iota. Its been epic.

In our first match of the season it was said that Man City had spent more on two full-backs over the summer than we had spent of the stadium and Training Centre combined. Silly Money.

But I am proud of how well we are acquitting ourselves with strong and reasonably priced recruitment, when we can actually get it over the line.

And proud of TB, CH and everyone else in the management of the Club. I think the "Together" stuff is a very real feature. Saints are not doing too well at the moment (!!!!!!!), and I heard a comment from someone after they were beaten by palace the other night that their team spirit is virtually non-existent. The Van Dijk affair and their decision to front it out in the summer, their Chairman seems to have admitted, has been a commercial success but a footballing nightmare. ..... In stark contrast to us.

Renegade · Jan 5, 2018

Publius Ovidius said:
but the ticket sales say that this game doesn't matter to the fans of both clubs...palace cant shift a lot of their 2000 tickets and we may be 10k fans light on the league game.

So you agree they should only show FA Cup games featuring the big sides?

Infact my argument in particular is this line 'To the wider world it is a meeting of two mediocre Premier League sides'.

The stadium will not be full as with most stadiums because the FA Cup is half dead.

DavidinSouthampton · Jan 5, 2018

Renegade said:
Being in the Prem reminds me how insignificant teams like us are.The media just see us as being there to make up the numbers.The disrespect is very evident and the obsession with a few top teams is obvious.F.....them all.We are 12th in the league with doing it the right way.We haven't bought success like the big boys.We are not owned by faceless co-operations or by an entire country.We are keeping it real with sensible buys and a real owner who loves the club.If that ever changed it would be a sad day for Brighton.

Agreed the media bias towards the top teams really gets me. When we lost at Old Trafford there was precious little said about the mighty Albion but they concentrated on what a brilliant player Ashley Young is, just because he had scored an extremely flukey goal when we had been the better team for the most part.

Hiney · Jan 5, 2018

Easy 10 said:
How did you feel when we stuffed West Brom 3-1 for our first win of the season? Or went to West Ham and completely mullered them on their own patch ? Or when we went to Old Trafford and turned in one of the best away performances we had any right to expect ? Sorry, but I don't really buy into this "the game has been ruined by money" mantra. After the journey we've been on, there is an inherent thrill and joy at seeing BHAFC competing at the very highest level, against the best teams in the country, in a magnificent stadium, in front of a packed house week-in, week out.

If you're honestly NOT enjoying that, then maybe you should take up...I dunno....metal detecting or something.

Absolutely this.

Publius Ovidius · Jan 5, 2018

Renegade said:
So you agree they should only show FA Cup games featuring the big sides?

Infact my argument in particular is this line 'To the wider world it is a meeting of two mediocre Premier League sides'.

The stadium will not be full as with most stadiums because the FA Cup is half dead.

absolutely, which is the point really. Cup competitions are an irrelevance now a days

As I see it, managers such as hughton and the like are single minded in their desire to set teams to stay in the Prem. Cup competitions , including the Europa Cup which teams put second string players in them, F A Cup and the league cup are not priorities and an irrelevance for the premier teams....the top 6 are only interested in CL and the rest desperate not to go down. for Fans it is different. I want to see us send out the best team we have in every game...but we know that is not going to happen.

Renegade · Jan 5, 2018

Publius Ovidius said:
absolutely, which is the point really. Cup competitions are an irrelevance now a days

As I see it, managers such as hughton and the like are single minded in their desire to set teams to stay in the Prem. Cup competitions , including the Europa Cup which teams put second string players in them, F A Cup and the league cup are not priorities and an irrelevance for the premier teams....the top 6 are only interested in CL and the rest desperate not to go down. for Fans it is different. I want to see us send out the best team we have in every game...but we know that is not going to happen.

I want to see our best team in the league but where the FA Crap is concerned we could send out the tea-ladies for all I care.Rest the big boys for the Prem.Give the cups to the non-regular players which is great for them.

Publius Ovidius · Jan 5, 2018

Renegade said:
I want to see our best team in the league but where the FA Crap is concerned we could send out the tea-ladies for all I care.Rest the big boys for the Prem.Give the cups to the non-regular players which is great for them.

just as a matter of interest, did you go to the final in 1983 and the replay?

Not Andy Naylor · Jan 5, 2018

The Premier League is a bloated, overgrown, greed-is-good club designed at enriching its members with no thought for the greater good of the game as a whole, and its concentration of wealth into a very few hands is despicable. The parachute payments are an especially invidious way of attempting to ensure that the rich stay rich and the poor stay poor, making the prospect of another Burnley, Swansea or us rising from the foot of League Two to the top flight ever more remote, and making the desperate struggle to hang on the be-all and end-all of existence for 15 of the 20 Premier League clubs.

Now that we're there, we have become part of this loathsome entity. And because I want us to compete at the highest level we can, I'm desperately hoping we stay there (and also because I want TB to recoup some of his enormous investment). But if the Sky investment ended tomorrow and it all began to be about which clubs were well-run and attracted big crowds and not about vast injections of foreign capital, I'd be a lot happier.

essbee1 · Jan 5, 2018

Not Andy Naylor said:
The Premier League is a bloated, overgrown, greed-is-good club designed at enriching its members with no thought for the greater good of the game as a whole, and its concentration of wealth into a very few hands is despicable. The parachute payments are an especially invidious way of attempting to ensure that the rich stay rich and the poor stay poor, making the prospect of another Burnley, Swansea or us rising from the foot of League Two to the top flight ever more remote, and making the desperate struggle to hang on the be-all and end-all of existence for 15 of the 20 Premier League clubs.

Now that we're there, we have become part of this loathsome entity. And because I want us to compete at the highest level we can, I'm desperately hoping we stay there (and also because I want TB to recoup some of his enormous investment). But if the Sky investment ended tomorrow and it all began to be about which clubs were well-run and attracted big crowds and not about vast injections of foreign capital, I'd be a lot happier.

Sums up my thoughts exactly. i also have to admit to a mild guilt when I talk to championship and lower club fans for becoming one of
the 'we're wealthy now so screw you' sort of thing.

Bigtomfu · Jan 5, 2018

Not Andy Naylor said:
the parachute payments are an especially invidious way of attempting to ensure that the rich stay rich and the poor stay poor, making the prospect of another Burnley, Swansea or us rising from the foot of League Two to the top flight ever more remote

Such a shame because this scenario possibly came about to protect the interests of the smaller clubs who feared never being able to get back there without such a boost.

It has completely de-generated into a farce as clubs such as say Middleborough, Villa, Bolton [Gartside being the original proponent of parachutes I believe] showed terrible mis-management of funds and tactics to do nothing other than believe they had a right to be at the trough and shouldn’t suffer the indignity of relegation in the first place.

Not Andy Naylor said:
But if the Sky investment ended tomorrow and it all began to be about which clubs were well-run and attracted big crowds and not about vast injections of foreign capital, I'd be a lot happier.

I’d personally love it if somehow the Champions league became more powerful than the Premier League and forced the issue so the top 4/5/6 clubs in the major European leagues buggered off and left us to it again.

Back on topic I’ve loved the journey, loved getting there, loved being part of it and having greater exposure for the fine job TB, CH and even PB have done for us over the last 3 seasons but otherwise the teams, the big club fan apathy and the general lustre of all that is proclaimed to be golden about the Premier League is actually exactly as I expected it.

For me I don’t believe TB will be simply happy with survival and wants to compete in an Everton type way and I’d like to think that if two or three seasons of consolidation are possible then the remit for success may change and a cup then European journey might be on the agenda.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Renegade · Jan 5, 2018

Publius Ovidius said:
just as a matter of interest, did you go to the final in 1983 and the replay?

You mean when the FA Crap meant something?No I didn't.Not sure about your point.

clippedgull · Jan 5, 2018

Personally I enjoyed it better the first time around in the old 1st division, plus we had the cup run and final to enjoy. Exciting times that will never be matched for me except in the very unlikely case that we win the FA cup or the Premier League!!

But I was younger and enjoyed football much more then than I do now.

For people that weren’t born at that time I totally get the excitement of being in the PL.

Publius Ovidius · Jan 5, 2018

Renegade said:
You mean when the FA Crap meant something?No I didn't.Not sure about your point.

No point really. Personally, that was my best moment of following albion for 45 years! Ok. People like you don't give a toss about the fa cup and that is fine, but a lot of people still do and feel dismayed and disappointed that clubs seem to have abandoned anything but a holy grail that when people are honest, they have precious little chance of ever winning.

It's all about opinions

Publius Ovidius · Jan 5, 2018

clippedgull said:
Personally I enjoyed it better the first time around in the old 1st division, plus we had the cup run and final to enjoy. Exciting times that will never be matched for me except in the very unlikely case that we win the FA cup or the Premier League!!

But I was younger and enjoyed football much more then than I do now.

For people that weren’t born at that time I totally get the excitement of being in the PL.

Exactly.

Charlies Shinpad · Jan 5, 2018

Far more Saturday games for a start which is a bonus
Seeing some great players playing against us week in week out
Never thought I would see us back in the top division again in my lifetime so that’s another one off the bucket list
To share these games with my two lads who have only been coming with me since 1997 and never seen us in the top flight is another bonus

But in a way I do miss the Championship with proper fans and not some of the sterile Souless stadiums we’ve played at so far

The Gem · Jan 5, 2018

indy3050 said:
The game has been ruined by money. So no, I’m not enjoying it which is a shame.

Not ruined by money ruined by SKY, any one who subscribes to Sky or BT has no right to moan about all the money in the game.

If only the entire country cancelled SKY for ONE season it would ALL change.

Tooting Gull · Jan 5, 2018

It is what I expected it would be. The good, the bad and the ugly.

On a personal note I have managed to 'live it' a little more than I expected given work commitments on Sats and Tue nights, helped by some of those changes to Fridays, Sundays and Mondays before Christmas. And home end at Arsenal, Spurs and Man Utd.

Related to that last point, getting tickets has been if not easy then just about possible as a non STH for the games I knew I could make.

As regards the team, they have performed better than I thought they would in what was always going to a season-long battle against relegation - but given the level of performance we are at least 6-8 points shy of where we should be based on the actual displays. Still think that may come back to bite us on the arse.

I have enjoyed seeing certain players rise to the challenge (Dunk, Duffy, Gross etc) and enjoy seeing our manager conducting himself with dignity, in contrast to many of his supposed betters, and that despite some dodgy refereeing. And the fact we have only got a tonking from Liverpool, and been in games.

The atmosphere at the Amex has been in the main superb, much better than in recent seasons, and good to see not so many early leavers as well.

I have enjoyed much of the media coverage, but not some of the idiot pundits on Sky/talkSPORT who really haven't got a Scooby about 70 per cent of the teams in the league.

And the Amex as a stadium has stood up well as a venue in this company.

So I am enjoying it but I have to say, if it wasn't for the all-important financial aspect, it wouldn't bother me watching Albion in the Championship again - really enjoyed that league too. Sadly the finances are everything, the difference is so vast, and the damage so great from getting relegated these days.

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