Overseas support

[BongoBlue]

Very true... t'was grim all right. I got into many an argument but of course I was well over here by the time Saipan happened. So I just took the opportunity to give it large about him any time I went home. ("He's nothing but a fuckin' traitor...etc. etc".) Well I felt it was my duty you know.

Strangely enough, I actually played against him many moons ago in a challenge (friendly - yeah...) match when he was only a young lad. Didn't realize it at the time. He was a cranky little fucker back then too. And when he joined United years later and I realized who he was, it only justified my decision to follow City all the more.

Too many people in Cork took the easy way out - red jersey for Cork and United - yeah it's only natural and all that shite. Bollocks; I wasn't having any of it. I only wear red if Cork are playing in an All-Ireland. No other time.

Once a Blue I guess...;)

Very admirable. It was bad enough in Dublin but at least you had the ABU's (Anyone But United). Saying anything against Keane in Cork was a definite no-no. Sorry about calling you Bingo....that's the bloody predictive text on my phone.

No worries; been called much worse...;)

 

[3rdgenerationblue]

one of the proudest and happiest moments for any City fan is to watch Buzzer and Skip carry out the premiership trophy out the other year.

No one would deny them that right and tears stream every time I see it. No one would deny that they are as blue as blue can be.

I might be wrong but I don't think they are from Burnage.

End the debate. If your a blue then you'll do for me.

 

[Didsbury Dave]

On this subject, I picked up a book in Selfridges today called "Pride in Travel" and it's a story of last season following City from Canada by a chap called Darryl Webster.

It's difficult to tell but, unlike the glut of City books around these days, I don't think it's self published. It's quite professionally finished. Going to read a couple of chapters now. Will report back...

 

[Corky]

Being paid to work for city is different to being a supporter. One gets paid and one pays.

I may have a soft spot for another club if they had provided me with a good living, it is only natural, but I wouldn't claim to be a dedicated supporter, many of which spend the majority of their disposable income on the club.

 

[Didsbury Dave]

A decent first few chapters to the book "pride in travel". It actually appears to be one bloke spending a season travelling around the different city supporters clubs of the world. So far it's quite nicely written and is starting to paint a picture of a club with a new but rapidly growing global fanbase.

Being really honest it's a bit hollow to hear a guy talk about adopting a club in 2008 and then throw himself to the ground in tears of joy when we beat United three years later. But the hyperbole is part of writing and I quite respect the guy for embarking on this expensive project and taking quite an interesting writing approach: the old classic 'make the writing of the book the story'.

I'm going to stick with the book. It's good.

 

[City1974]

On this subject, I picked up a book in Selfridges today called "Pride in Travel" and it's a story of last season following City from Canada by a chap called Darryl Webster.

It's difficult to tell but, unlike the glut of City books around these days, I don't think it's self published. It's quite professionally finished. Going to read a couple of chapters now. Will report back...

I think this person was on the radio show Blue Tuesday on Radio Manchester back in Feb of this year and the book was mentioned then.

 

[Universidad de Chile]

I don't think any of us not from Manchester believe we are anything like the supporters that turn up week in week out and did so when the team or club really needed it most.
I for one distinguish between a supporter and a fan or follower. All are valid and whichever you are I believe City have a place for you.
The club have huge ambition. I agree with the locals that the heart and soul of the club has to stay with the local community and I think it is admirable that the plans for the future seem to cement this.
I hope the core support doesn't resent new supporters as I think the plans the CFG have will go way beyond Manchester.

There is a fabulous post by a guy called Petrusha on page 1283 of the City & FFP thread that I think deserves a wider audience. It's long but worth it.
I think it is a great read for New Fans and old supporters.
I agree with everything in it and it tells where this club has been and where it is going.

I agree.. a great, great post!!!

"Some great posts in this thread. I haven't quoted them in full because I hate it when people do that, but I've kept some just so that people can see the discussion I'm responding to.

If we look back 50 years in City's history, the club was dying on its feet. We were set to finish in what was then our lowest league position of the century. We drew gates below 10,000 for certain league games. Gary James has even revealed that City board members approached United with a view to a ground share, to lead to a merger, because Manchester couldn't support two major clubs. Yet three short years later, we were claiming the title with a side playing great football in front of crowds that had swelled by 250%.

The catalyst had been to appoint a brilliant new managerial pair who inspired many of the locally born, home-produced players (the likes of Doyle, Oakes, Pardoe and Young) to achieve heights many thought beyond them. We supplemented these players with buys, sometimes for fees that represented pretty hefty outlays by the standards of the time, but this was achieved with self-generated funds. Mercer and Allison doubled home gates in their first season. A cup run that saw us play five games in rounds 5 and 6 before an aggregate of 250,000 fans produced the cash to spend a club record fee on Colin Bell, who remains one of the greatest to wear the shirt.

Between the title win in 1968 and the early 1980s, we were regarded as a really top club. We contended for trophies, and played in Europe, this - along with the Junior Blues initiative - allowing us to grow our support base to the extent that we were third between United and Liverpool in the attendance tables. We also spent the cash on ground improvements which, when completed, saw Maine Road regularly chosen ahead of Old Trafford for major club fixtures that had to be played at neutral venues (between 1973 and 1984, we hosted five such games in which United didn't feature, while they had three). While we spent big on occasions, we didn't use external funding to do so, and we continued to bring through kids who turned into good First Division players of the time and often into internationals: Corrigan, Booth, Donachie, Barnes, Owen, Power and so on.

This was the City I encountered when my old man first took me to Maine Road in 1975, and, to use a modern expression, it was very much a club that "did things the right way". And if you were to ask me whether I'd prefer to cement and maintain the status of a really big club using the methods I've outlined above, then of course I would. Unfortunately, it's not a choice any club now has if it wishes to challenge for the domestic title or the CL (and why should that privilege be reserved for a small cartel?). Complaining at us for not following the seventies model is as futile as moaning that most of the old-style corner shops have disappeared, or that people can no longer leave their doors unlocked when they go to bed. It harks back to a world that no longer exists.

In any case, the "right way" is what we were pretty much trying to follow up to 2007, when we were living within our means and focusing on our Academy. We nearly won a UEFA Cup spot one year, but might have gone one better eventually. And if the likes of Birmingham and Swansea could win a League Cup in recent years, maybe one year we could have enjoyed similar fortune to end the long trophy doubt. Maybe with a better manager than Stuart Pearce, we could even have done what Everton did one year, and made the CL preliminary stage before getting knocked out. But in essence we'd have been a perpetual also-ran looking from the outside as an oligopoly dominated the top end of the game, having constructed for itself such an inbuilt financial supremacy that no one else could crash through the glass ceiling without the kind vast financial investment FFP now renders impossible.

I'm pleased that ADUG came along and delighted that we were the club they chose. However, had they picked someone else such as Everton or Newcastle, I'd have been happy to see that club shake up the football world. We had the choice of knowing our place and accepting it or having a shot at challenging an elite that, as PB described above, has systematically over previous decades removed as many regulatory elements as it could that had the effect of levelling the playing field to give others a chance of success. Actually, I'm quite proud that we ended up being the ones to challenge this.

Back when I first started watching football, it was seen as one of English football's greatest strengths that clubs could emerge from the doldrums and, thanks to an inspired managerial appointment or a good crop of kids coming through or both, and challenge for the game's major prizes. Leeds, Liverpool, City, Derby and Forest all won or nearly won the title in the sixties and seventies within a fairly short period after they were struggling in the second tier. Villa won the League and then the European Cup a decade after they were grubbing round in the third tier. The fact that these possibilities no longer exist in the modern game seems to me a great shame, and I'm regularly surprised by fans and pundits seeming to embrace the new order with enthusiasm.

Unless there are major changes to FFP, City and PSG will be the last to sneak in before the door shut, while the likes of Everton and Villa will probably never win the domestic title again. Moreover, I don't think that City get the credit we deserve for what we've achieved over the last two or three years with the spectre of FFP looming over us.

Only at the end of the 2010/11 season did City reach the position Chelsea were in when Abramovich took over, which was having a team that could legitimately aspire to win domestic Cups and to qualify for the Champions League. And the 2011/12 financial year, which started on 1 June 2011, was the start also of the first FFP monitoring period. This means we've had to be pretty careful in terms of what we spent, which meant, as others have pointed out, that we've missed out on a number of world class talents that have come to the PL. In the circumstances, I view the two league titles in three years as a fine haul, and I don't think we're given enough credit for it.

If we win nothing this season, it may be slightly disappointing, but the bigger picture is that we've taken the FFP 'pinch'. As long as we finish in the top three to guarantee participation in next season's CL and the increased financial rewards that will bring, then I think we can look back and reflect with satisfaction even if we win nothing else. In my opinion, it would be pretty creditable to get to the point where we're free of FFP sanctions with two titles, two domestic cups and two qualifications from the CL group phase under our belt.

Meanwhile, we're now set fair to prosper, having pulled ahead of Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool in terms of revenues. Not everyone may like the way we've done that. Matt Scott's rather laboured 'Alice in Wonderland' extended metaphor is nothing but an innuendo that we're resorting to chicanery to get our way, for instance. (As an aside, doesn't Scott have a dreadful prose style when his stuff isn't tarted up by national newspaper subs?). However, as others have said, we were put in a position where we had to innovate, and we have. We now definitely need to rejuvenate the squad over the next couple of years, but the financial position should enable us to do that.

All told, with the Campus and our financial results, I think the football world is waking up to the fact that we really are a long-term project, though there's a lot more to come. However, we're still widely regarded as being an interloper not deserving of rubbing shoulders in the company of football's aristocracy. In other words, people see us as "having arrived but not belonging", as I put it in another long post some time ago.

This can really grate, but I see no alternative to giving it time. If, by 2020, we've won a couple more domestic titles, cracked the CL, are playing before 62K every week in an imposing stadium and development of the Collar Site is continuing apace, I suspect that we'll see a lot less of that type of commentary. This is all realistic considering the recent financial results and there's so much more to come on the financial side; we really have barely started.

I'm not trying to score points over Chelsea and good luck to them in terms of having transformed their club, but they do provide an instructive example of perceptions changing over time. After all, when Matthew Harding first invested in them 20 years ago, they had four major trophies in their history (and many wouldn't count the League Cup I've allowed them, given that there was no Wembley final or place in Europe and not all top division teams entered). Their average gates over the previous two decades had dipped below 20,000 on nine occasions. No one mentions these things now, though I do recall fans of some rival teams denigrating them as a 'plastic club' in the early Abramovich years.

In any case, I have to say that I enjoy the discomfort of some of our detractors. We've gone from, at the outset of the ADUG era, holier-than-thou admonitions that we'd never be capable of buying success to sourly grudging snipes, often from the very same people, that with the money we've spent, we should be doing better. Long may that continue.

The one thing I really hope for from City as the stadium expands, we see a concerted effort to offer a decent proportion of cheap ticket prices. I have no problem with us trying to "monetise" those supporters who are able and willing to tip up plenty of cash, and I'm proud of the community ethos that shines through in our new developments. However, I hope we stay mindful of the need to engage the traditional support base, which by and large is hardly affluent, in tough economic times. This is my single gripe with the club at the moment.

That aside, ADUG have delivered everything we could have expected and more since the takeover, and in general we have nothing to reproach ourselves for in terms of the way our success has been achieved. Moreover, now we're free of FFP, I think the next four or five years are set to be even more exciting than the last. So though we get plenty of brickbats, I'd brush them off if I were you. As they say, the winners get to write history and we're going to be the winners."

 

[Universidad de Chile]

which part of Chile are you based?

Santiago, born and raised

Fresh Prince of Chile?

Hi mate!

I´m also from Chile... From Santiago, and I´m also following "Pelle" since he was in San Lorenzo or so.

The weird thing is, that most of the people from Chile, and others that are fans of my club, Universidad de Chile, hate him, or are rather indifferent to him.

I think, due to the fact, that he sent us (Universidad de Chile) to the second level division for the first and only time in our history. And the rest don´t want really Pellegrini, cause they find him too conservative or coward (God-Fearing) in his teams seatings (selections).

Pellegrini is actually a one strange case in the football history of our country, of course.


PD: If you want to come to Germany, I can invite you too, to come here. And you don´t have to have a lot of money, just to want it. Write me an internal message, If you need something mate. Have a nice time "auf die Insel" (= on the island = in the Uk... a popular german expression)

 

[blue44]

A decent first few chapters to the book "pride in travel". It actually appears to be one bloke spending a season travelling around the different city supporters clubs of the world. So far it's quite nicely written and is starting to paint a picture of a club with a new but rapidly growing global fanbase.

Being really honest it's a bit hollow to hear a guy talk about adopting a club in 2008 and then throw himself to the ground in tears of joy when we beat United three years later. But the hyperbole is part of writing and I quite respect the guy for embarking on this expensive project and taking quite an interesting writing approach: the old classic 'make the writing of the book the story'.

I'm going to stick with the book. It's good.

Im reading it myself this week,on chapter 13 Gilbralta

the lad that's wrote it Darryl Webster as videos on his youtube page showing some of the supporter clubs he visited ,worth looking for anyone reading or going to buy his book,good luck to him ,up the blues !
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zglKW57ZcAo


all his videos are on this page showing his supporter club visits

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7htEr0ShtZcoGICyJzLh0Q/videos

 

[Ascetic]

Hi mate!

I´m also from Chile... From Santiago, and I´m also following "Pelle" since he was in San Lorenzo or so.

The weird thing is, that most of the people from Chile, and others that are fans of my club, Universidad de Chile, hate him, or are rather indifferent to him.

I think, due to the fact, that he sent us (Universidad de Chile) to the second level division for the first and only time in our history. And the rest don´t want really Pellegrini, cause they find him too conservative or coward (God-Fearing) in his teams seatings (selections).

Pellegrini is actually a one strange case in the football history of our country, of course.


PD: If you want to come to Germany, I can invite you too, to come here. And you don´t have to have a lot of money, just to want it. Write me an internal message, If you need something mate. Have a nice time "auf die Insel" (= on the island = in the Uk... a popular german expression)

That "la Chile" team had so many issues, it's hard to put it all on a first year coach, but then again, it'll always be easier to blame the coach... even easier if it's his first team.

I think perceptions have changed in Chile over time, unfortunately not too many of our countrymen watched the Villarreal or Malaga teams that were incredibly fun to watch, particularly against La Liga sides. Many people only watched Villarreal Champions fixtures, which of course, meant a more cautious side (defensive to them). It's all ridiculous in hindsight.

Thanks for the invitation, but I'm afraid I'll have to pass. This time I'll be there only for a couple of weeks and plan to visit the whisky distilleries. Perhaps next time. Danke.