conn having a dig again

[BluessinceHydeRoad]

I read Conn's The Beautiful Game? when City were still broke and I was bought Richer than God for my birthday almost as soon as it was published. Conn is a “golden age socialist” and a prophet of doom at one and the same time. At least he has the honesty to admit that City fans, including himself, never accepted that failure was what attracted fans to City that City were content to enjoy cock ups while the “other team” got on with winning the cups, but after that you have to ask what did attract him to City. There were many things that we didn't accept in those “days of innocence” when football was supposed to be played by local lads putting a shift in for the love of the shirt. I don't think we cared much for the open sewers and other signs of contempt shown by the owners (they did exist in those days) of our club and others. This was at the time when the owners of Preston N E were regally stuffing one of the greatest of English players. But it was better then...

In Richer than God Conn claims that he was unaware that football clubs had owners and shareholders until the “Forward with Franny” campaign. He must be joking! He may not be old enough to remember the massive investment the owners of Everton made in the club in the early 1960s to build the “Merseyside Millionaires” who won the title in 1963, but he cannot, surely, have missed the three Manchester United share issues between 1986 and 1989, or the Spurs flotation followed by that of United? The talk was always of owners and leading shareholders: everyone knew of the Alexander family at City, the Edwards at Old Trafford, and the owners of Liverpool, who became famous in the late 70s and 80s precisely because they let the manager manage! Now City have Arab owners (why does Conn find this so noteworthy?) who invest in the club, the area, youth while building a club which can pay for all this. Let's get back to the bad old days...

I found myself asking with increasing frustration, “what on earth does Conn actually want?” and then I found it! He admires the German set up. This is the wonderful socialist utopia where the fans own the clubs, where fans can sit and take pride in the crock of s**** they're watching and can't expect any better because their “revenue streams” aren't big enough, where Hamburg have a billionaire praying to be allowed to invest but can't because “the rules don't allow it”. This is the level playing field that Conn craves – where more clubs are in more serious difficulties than in the PL and the FL, bit it's masked because the Bundesliga simply kicks them out to protect Bayern Munich's pre-eminence – who, by the way, have won the league 27 times in the last 43 years. The most competitive league in the world? Bayern are now picking over the carcass of their nearest “rivals”. Gotze, Lewandowski... who is next?

Those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end... Thank God they did.

 

[Matty]

A socially awkward misfit, which is why he works for the Guardian..

Lol @ this.

I hate that his profession allows him to complain about England's youth set up and also a teams lack of English players.

About what football has become financially and how poorly players were treated in "the good old days".

The fact that he thinks the economics of today's game will somehow ruin Sunday for an 11 year old in attendance speaks volumes of how fucking awful he must of been as a kid.

He doesn't say that at all.

What he implies is that, in the future, when todays 11 year old is looking back on Sunday's Final, it will not be with the same enjoyment, and reverence with which he looks back on the 1976 final, because we've spent a lot of money to get there. It's a piss poor argument, it's stunningly inaccurate, and it assumes that everyone will one day agree with him that money has made football somethign we can no longer love.

 

[The Flash]

I read Conn's The Beautiful Game? when City were still broke and I was bought Richer than God for my birthday almost as soon as it was published. Conn is a “golden age socialist” and a prophet of doom at one and the same time. At least he has the honesty to admit that City fans, including himself, never accepted that failure was what attracted fans to City that City were content to enjoy cock ups while the “other team” got on with winning the cups, but after that you have to ask what did attract him to City. There were many things that we didn't accept in those “days of innocence” when football was supposed to be played by local lads putting a shift in for the love of the shirt. I don't think we cared much for the open sewers and other signs of contempt shown by the owners (they did exist in those days) of our club and others. This was at the time when the owners of Preston N E were regally stuffing one of the greatest of English players. But it was better then...

In Richer than God Conn claims that he was unaware that football clubs had owners and shareholders until the “Forward with Franny” campaign. He must be joking! He may not be old enough to remember the massive investment the owners of Everton made in the club in the early 1960s to build the “Merseyside Millionaires” who won the title in 1963, but he cannot, surely, have missed the three Manchester United share issues between 1986 and 1989, or the Spurs flotation followed by that of United? The talk was always of owners and leading shareholders: everyone knew of the Alexander family at City, the Edwards at Old Trafford, and the owners of Liverpool, who became famous in the late 70s and 80s precisely because they let the manager manage! Now City have Arab owners (why does Conn find this so noteworthy?) who invest in the club, the area, youth while building a club which can pay for all this. Let's get back to the bad old days...

I found myself asking with increasing frustration, “what on earth does Conn actually want?” and then I found it! He admires the German set up. This is the wonderful socialist utopia where the fans own the clubs, where fans can sit and take pride in the crock of s**** they're watching and can't expect any better because their “revenue streams” aren't big enough, where Hamburg have a billionaire praying to be allowed to invest but can't because “the rules don't allow it”. This is the level playing field that Conn craves – where more clubs are in more serious difficulties than in the PL and the FL, bit it's masked because the Bundesliga simply kicks them out to protect Bayern Munich's pre-eminence – who, by the way, have won the league 27 times in the last 43 years. The most competitive league in the world? Bayern are now picking over the carcass of their nearest “rivals”. Gotze, Lewandowski... who is next?

Those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end... Thank God they did.

Excellent post once again, BSHR.

 

[Edin’s header]

I read Conn's The Beautiful Game? when City were still broke and I was bought Richer than God for my birthday almost as soon as it was published. Conn is a “golden age socialist” and a prophet of doom at one and the same time. At least he has the honesty to admit that City fans, including himself, never accepted that failure was what attracted fans to City that City were content to enjoy cock ups while the “other team” got on with winning the cups, but after that you have to ask what did attract him to City. There were many things that we didn't accept in those “days of innocence” when football was supposed to be played by local lads putting a shift in for the love of the shirt. I don't think we cared much for the open sewers and other signs of contempt shown by the owners (they did exist in those days) of our club and others. This was at the time when the owners of Preston N E were regally stuffing one of the greatest of English players. But it was better then...

In Richer than God Conn claims that he was unaware that football clubs had owners and shareholders until the “Forward with Franny” campaign. He must be joking! He may not be old enough to remember the massive investment the owners of Everton made in the club in the early 1960s to build the “Merseyside Millionaires” who won the title in 1963, but he cannot, surely, have missed the three Manchester United share issues between 1986 and 1989, or the Spurs flotation followed by that of United? The talk was always of owners and leading shareholders: everyone knew of the Alexander family at City, the Edwards at Old Trafford, and the owners of Liverpool, who became famous in the late 70s and 80s precisely because they let the manager manage! Now City have Arab owners (why does Conn find this so noteworthy?) who invest in the club, the area, youth while building a club which can pay for all this. Let's get back to the bad old days...

I found myself asking with increasing frustration, “what on earth does Conn actually want?” and then I found it! He admires the German set up. This is the wonderful socialist utopia where the fans own the clubs, where fans can sit and take pride in the crock of s**** they're watching and can't expect any better because their “revenue streams” aren't big enough, where Hamburg have a billionaire praying to be allowed to invest but can't because “the rules don't allow it”. This is the level playing field that Conn craves – where more clubs are in more serious difficulties than in the PL and the FL, bit it's masked because the Bundesliga simply kicks them out to protect Bayern Munich's pre-eminence – who, by the way, have won the league 27 times in the last 43 years. The most competitive league in the world? Bayern are now picking over the carcass of their nearest “rivals”. Gotze, Lewandowski... who is next?

Those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end... Thank God they did.

Top Post

 

[dawlish dave]

I read Conn's The Beautiful Game? when City were still broke and I was bought Richer than God for my birthday almost as soon as it was published. Conn is a “golden age socialist” and a prophet of doom at one and the same time. At least he has the honesty to admit that City fans, including himself, never accepted that failure was what attracted fans to City that City were content to enjoy cock ups while the “other team” got on with winning the cups, but after that you have to ask what did attract him to City. There were many things that we didn't accept in those “days of innocence” when football was supposed to be played by local lads putting a shift in for the love of the shirt. I don't think we cared much for the open sewers and other signs of contempt shown by the owners (they did exist in those days) of our club and others. This was at the time when the owners of Preston N E were regally stuffing one of the greatest of English players. But it was better then...

In Richer than God Conn claims that he was unaware that football clubs had owners and shareholders until the “Forward with Franny” campaign. He must be joking! He may not be old enough to remember the massive investment the owners of Everton made in the club in the early 1960s to build the “Merseyside Millionaires” who won the title in 1963, but he cannot, surely, have missed the three Manchester United share issues between 1986 and 1989, or the Spurs flotation followed by that of United? The talk was always of owners and leading shareholders: everyone knew of the Alexander family at City, the Edwards at Old Trafford, and the owners of Liverpool, who became famous in the late 70s and 80s precisely because they let the manager manage! Now City have Arab owners (why does Conn find this so noteworthy?) who invest in the club, the area, youth while building a club which can pay for all this. Let's get back to the bad old days...

I found myself asking with increasing frustration, “what on earth does Conn actually want?” and then I found it! He admires the German set up. This is the wonderful socialist utopia where the fans own the clubs, where fans can sit and take pride in the crock of s**** they're watching and can't expect any better because their “revenue streams” aren't big enough, where Hamburg have a billionaire praying to be allowed to invest but can't because “the rules don't allow it”. This is the level playing field that Conn craves – where more clubs are in more serious difficulties than in the PL and the FL, bit it's masked because the Bundesliga simply kicks them out to protect Bayern Munich's pre-eminence – who, by the way, have won the league 27 times in the last 43 years. The most competitive league in the world? Bayern are now picking over the carcass of their nearest “rivals”. Gotze, Lewandowski... who is next?

Those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end... Thank God they did.

Send this to the Guardian its a great reply point by point.

 

[BillCarlisle]

In Richer than God Conn claims that he was unaware that football clubs had owners and shareholders until the “Forward with Franny” campaign. He must be joking! He may not be old enough to remember the massive investment the owners of Everton made in the club in the early 1960s to build the “Merseyside Millionaires” who won the title in 1963, but he cannot, surely, have missed the three Manchester United share issues between 1986 and 1989, or the Spurs flotation followed by that of United?

True. There wasn't any hysteria when the Rags paid a purported £28m for Camel Gob, and a similar amount for the flop Veron. Nor, going further back, when they paid £6m in total for (I think it was) Pallister, Ince & Wallace in 1989. That was a massive amount at the time.

Perhaps we should also not forget who we are playing on Sunday ?
In the early 1950's Sunderland were nicknamed 'The Bank of England Club' due to the larger than normal transfer fees they were paying at the time.

Perhaps nothing much has changed. It's all relative to the times.

 

[tolmie's hairdoo]

I read Conn's The Beautiful Game? when City were still broke and I was bought Richer than God for my birthday almost as soon as it was published. Conn is a “golden age socialist” and a prophet of doom at one and the same time. At least he has the honesty to admit that City fans, including himself, never accepted that failure was what attracted fans to City that City were content to enjoy cock ups while the “other team” got on with winning the cups, but after that you have to ask what did attract him to City. There were many things that we didn't accept in those “days of innocence” when football was supposed to be played by local lads putting a shift in for the love of the shirt. I don't think we cared much for the open sewers and other signs of contempt shown by the owners (they did exist in those days) of our club and others. This was at the time when the owners of Preston N E were regally stuffing one of the greatest of English players. But it was better then...

In Richer than God Conn claims that he was unaware that football clubs had owners and shareholders until the “Forward with Franny” campaign. He must be joking! He may not be old enough to remember the massive investment the owners of Everton made in the club in the early 1960s to build the “Merseyside Millionaires” who won the title in 1963, but he cannot, surely, have missed the three Manchester United share issues between 1986 and 1989, or the Spurs flotation followed by that of United? The talk was always of owners and leading shareholders: everyone knew of the Alexander family at City, the Edwards at Old Trafford, and the owners of Liverpool, who became famous in the late 70s and 80s precisely because they let the manager manage! Now City have Arab owners (why does Conn find this so noteworthy?) who invest in the club, the area, youth while building a club which can pay for all this. Let's get back to the bad old days...

I found myself asking with increasing frustration, “what on earth does Conn actually want?” and then I found it! He admires the German set up. This is the wonderful socialist utopia where the fans own the clubs, where fans can sit and take pride in the crock of s**** they're watching and can't expect any better because their “revenue streams” aren't big enough, where Hamburg have a billionaire praying to be allowed to invest but can't because “the rules don't allow it”. This is the level playing field that Conn craves – where more clubs are in more serious difficulties than in the PL and the FL, bit it's masked because the Bundesliga simply kicks them out to protect Bayern Munich's pre-eminence – who, by the way, have won the league 27 times in the last 43 years. The most competitive league in the world? Bayern are now picking over the carcass of their nearest “rivals”. Gotze, Lewandowski... who is next?

Those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end... Thank God they did.

Nice pay-off line at the end there!

It seems we are in agreement, his political leanings have backed him into a corner, it's a conflict of interest, but not really, because he doesn't appreciate, or doesn't want to acknowledge football is actually about bringing enjoyment.

 

[aguero93:20]

I read Conn's The Beautiful Game? when City were still broke and I was bought Richer than God for my birthday almost as soon as it was published. Conn is a “golden age socialist” and a prophet of doom at one and the same time. At least he has the honesty to admit that City fans, including himself, never accepted that failure was what attracted fans to City that City were content to enjoy cock ups while the “other team” got on with winning the cups, but after that you have to ask what did attract him to City. There were many things that we didn't accept in those “days of innocence” when football was supposed to be played by local lads putting a shift in for the love of the shirt. I don't think we cared much for the open sewers and other signs of contempt shown by the owners (they did exist in those days) of our club and others. This was at the time when the owners of Preston N E were regally stuffing one of the greatest of English players. But it was better then...

In Richer than God Conn claims that he was unaware that football clubs had owners and shareholders until the “Forward with Franny” campaign. He must be joking! He may not be old enough to remember the massive investment the owners of Everton made in the club in the early 1960s to build the “Merseyside Millionaires” who won the title in 1963, but he cannot, surely, have missed the three Manchester United share issues between 1986 and 1989, or the Spurs flotation followed by that of United? The talk was always of owners and leading shareholders: everyone knew of the Alexander family at City, the Edwards at Old Trafford, and the owners of Liverpool, who became famous in the late 70s and 80s precisely because they let the manager manage! Now City have Arab owners (why does Conn find this so noteworthy?) who invest in the club, the area, youth while building a club which can pay for all this. Let's get back to the bad old days...

I found myself asking with increasing frustration, “what on earth does Conn actually want?” and then I found it! He admires the German set up. This is the wonderful socialist utopia where the fans own the clubs, where fans can sit and take pride in the crock of s**** they're watching and can't expect any better because their “revenue streams” aren't big enough, where Hamburg have a billionaire praying to be allowed to invest but can't because “the rules don't allow it”. This is the level playing field that Conn craves – where more clubs are in more serious difficulties than in the PL and the FL, bit it's masked because the Bundesliga simply kicks them out to protect Bayern Munich's pre-eminence – who, by the way, have won the league 27 times in the last 43 years. The most competitive league in the world? Bayern are now picking over the carcass of their nearest “rivals”. Gotze, Lewandowski... who is next?

Those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end... Thank God they did.

Nice pay-off line at the end there!

It seems we are in agreement, his political leanings have backed him into a corner, it's a conflict of interest, but not really, because he doesn't appreciate, or doesn't want to acknowledge football is actually about bringing enjoyment.

His political leanings? If he's a socialist, then the privileges and lifestyle enjoyed by footballers in 1976 should horrify him just as much as the money around now, they were still paid far beyond the ordinary man while many lived in poverty. He's a **** with a personal agenda.

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

His friend's 21 year old brother is one of the people I'm going down to Wembley with. He won't hear the end of this!

Well give him some stick from me. The deluded belief that it's still possible to assemble a trophy winning side through "effort" and the "development of youth" never fails to press my buttons.

Why would I give Neil some stick? He didn't write the article.

Conn's clearly saying it isn't possible. I don't understand how people can read an article yet take either nothing in, see only what they want or read the complete opposite of what was intended. The point is that football is now an elite sport that only a monied few can succeed at. Luckily we're one of that elite now but that doesn't make it fair. We've been lucky but Conn would be writing the same stuff either way, just with a different slant. He also writes about plenty of other clubs and is one of the very few journalists who actually gets off his arse, does some proper research and produces articles that the football authorities and club owners would prefer to keep quiet.

But if you only see the cynical side of football then you tend to become cynical. A sort of reverse Stockholm Syndrome if you like. I see the Campus as a selfless and altruistic investment in a deprived area, while he sees it as largely a PR exercise with few significant longer-term benefits for the area. The truth is it's somewhere in between but probably slightly closer to David's view than to mine.

In the same way, he sees the current state of football as a bad thing, having pandered to the basest instincts of greed, self-interest and corruption whereas many simply glory in watching some of the finest players who've ever turned out for us and don't pay a second thought to the fact that they're somehow feeding those base instincts. The truth, again, is somewhere in between.

Of course there's no immediate prospect of going back to the 1970's and earlier, when Mercer & Allison took a Second Division struggler to the title within three seasons. It's also somewhat pointless to make the comparison without documenting how and why we moved from a to b. But the point he's ultimately making is that will we be saying the same sort of thing to our kids or grand-kids in 30 years time that my grandad used to say to us. "I could buy a ticket for the match, get the train there and back, have a couple of pints, burger and chips on the way home and still have change from a ton."

 

[tolmie's hairdoo]

I read Conn's The Beautiful Game? when City were still broke and I was bought Richer than God for my birthday almost as soon as it was published. Conn is a “golden age socialist” and a prophet of doom at one and the same time. At least he has the honesty to admit that City fans, including himself, never accepted that failure was what attracted fans to City that City were content to enjoy cock ups while the “other team” got on with winning the cups, but after that you have to ask what did attract him to City. There were many things that we didn't accept in those “days of innocence” when football was supposed to be played by local lads putting a shift in for the love of the shirt. I don't think we cared much for the open sewers and other signs of contempt shown by the owners (they did exist in those days) of our club and others. This was at the time when the owners of Preston N E were regally stuffing one of the greatest of English players. But it was better then...

In Richer than God Conn claims that he was unaware that football clubs had owners and shareholders until the “Forward with Franny” campaign. He must be joking! He may not be old enough to remember the massive investment the owners of Everton made in the club in the early 1960s to build the “Merseyside Millionaires” who won the title in 1963, but he cannot, surely, have missed the three Manchester United share issues between 1986 and 1989, or the Spurs flotation followed by that of United? The talk was always of owners and leading shareholders: everyone knew of the Alexander family at City, the Edwards at Old Trafford, and the owners of Liverpool, who became famous in the late 70s and 80s precisely because they let the manager manage! Now City have Arab owners (why does Conn find this so noteworthy?) who invest in the club, the area, youth while building a club which can pay for all this. Let's get back to the bad old days...

I found myself asking with increasing frustration, “what on earth does Conn actually want?” and then I found it! He admires the German set up. This is the wonderful socialist utopia where the fans own the clubs, where fans can sit and take pride in the crock of s**** they're watching and can't expect any better because their “revenue streams” aren't big enough, where Hamburg have a billionaire praying to be allowed to invest but can't because “the rules don't allow it”. This is the level playing field that Conn craves – where more clubs are in more serious difficulties than in the PL and the FL, bit it's masked because the Bundesliga simply kicks them out to protect Bayern Munich's pre-eminence – who, by the way, have won the league 27 times in the last 43 years. The most competitive league in the world? Bayern are now picking over the carcass of their nearest “rivals”. Gotze, Lewandowski... who is next?

Those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end... Thank God they did.

Nice pay-off line at the end there!

It seems we are in agreement, his political leanings have backed him into a corner, it's a conflict of interest, but not really, because he doesn't appreciate, or doesn't want to acknowledge football is actually about bringing enjoyment.

His political leanings? If he's a socialist, then the privileges and lifestyle enjoyed by footballers in 1976 should horrify him just as much as the money around now, they were still paid far beyond the ordinary man while many lived in poverty. He's a **** with a personal agenda.

I'd presume he has a slight Socialist leaning working for The Guardian!

His continued referencing of City is two-fold.

It's positive reinforcement for him and also keeps his employers happy.

Meaning, it keeps him in a well-paid job.

The irony, eh!