BS: Ban Football [Soccer]

Subject: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 01:23 PM

Football should be banned with immediate effect because....

a It causes strife argument, and disagreements

b It causes fights and people get hurt unnecessarily

c It has been the direct cause of more than one murder

d It gives young men unrealistic ideals about being able to earn millions of pounds for little work

e It is bad for the reputation of the UK abroad, as football hooligans vandalise foreign capitals, and peoples

f It leads to hero worship of graceless louts who have only two brain cells, one in each foot

g If it were banned there would be more time on TV and Radio for intelligent programmes and pursuits.

h It would save Tony Blair having to pretend to like something because it is perceived as 'Working Class'

i It would mean that we would no longer have to watch Gary Lineker trying to be a pundit

j Glasgow would really be 'That Dear Green Place', and not either a green and white, or a blue and white place

k People who live near football stadia would no longer have people urinating in their gardens after matches

l Parents would no longer get ripped off by football clubs changing their strips on a regular basis, thus costing said parents a fortune in replica strips for their offspring

m If people want to kick inflated bladders full of air around they would use politicians, which is a good idea

n We would then have more TV time for intelligent sports, like rugby cricket, and golf.

o The sales of supercars would decrease, and help reduce greenhouse gasses

p It would finally put an end to slavery [Buying and selling humans]

I'm sure some of you can think of other valid reasons why this yob culture should be abolished forthwith.

Giok

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 01:37 PM

But I like football and I can assure you my parents who are season ticket holders at Norwich are not yobs or want fights. Pip, my mum turns 70 this year!

I'd agree there can be a yobbish culture attached to the game but I've never worked out why this is.

As for the money, as a supporter of a smaller club, it's easy for me to say I don't like it. I think though even if I supported a wealthy club like Man U or Chelsea, I would question the value we put on someone's skill at kicking a bit of inflated leather around.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: pdq
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 01:44 PM

Ban living. It inevitably results in death.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: ard mhacha
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 01:50 PM

I have an old friend who along with his wife lives in a small flat in Hastings, he played in the World Cup in 1958, also starred for many years in English League Div 1.
He does not decry the fact that the young footballers to-day earn fabulous money, he says it`s better the players get their share, as in his days the fat-cat directors took all that was going.
As he pointed out to me, on numerous occasions, it`s a short career, most players are finished in their early thirties.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 01:56 PM

Yes, I get the short career bit ard and don't begrudge them some salary to compensate for that. It doesn't alter my view on the millions that get paid out. I wonder how many times one could set themselves up for life with a reasonable lifestyle on some of thier earnings.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: ard mhacha
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 02:06 PM

Jon, Have a look at other sports and view the astronomical earnings doshed out to their stars, Tennis, Golf, etc, even Snooker players earn more than most footballers, and as for sportpeople in the USA they would laugh at soccer players wages.
It`s todays world everyone`s nose is in the trough.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 02:08 PM

Agreed of course ard. My feelings on the incomes do extend beyond football.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 02:22 PM

q Catholics will be able to take out contracts for Orange phones

r Protestants will be able to wear green and white scarves

s The Reverand Ian Paisley will be even more irrelevant than he is now

Giok

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 02:44 PM

So ... we're just talking about banning Scottish (i.e. pub league) footy here? ;o)

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 04:01 PM

Banning it does seem a very attractive idea, but I have a horrible feeling that the negative aspects of it would attach themselves to a better sport, and drag that into the mud too.

Ban professional football. It would solve or lessen all the problems...

Bunnahabhain.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 04:19 PM

I wish was just Scottish, then I could take Gary Lineker off the list ¦¬]
Giok

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: Peace
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 04:23 PM

I read somewhere a few years back--maybe more than a few--that a basketball player in the USA signed a contract for six (maybey seven) years with a team. His contract amount? Well, y'ain't gonna believe it so I won't tell ya. But it was lots.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: Peace
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 04:23 PM

OK, I will tell ya!

$42,000,000

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: *Laura*
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 04:50 PM

football is rubbish.
so there.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 05:00 PM

But Football doesn't actually involve pulling small animals to pieces, which makes it a bit different from the banned "sport" clearly Giok has in mind in making his tongue-in-cheek suggestion.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 06:19 PM

Many a true word spoken in jest Kevin, I loathe football because of the habit it has of fooling so many people into believing it is real life, when it's only a soap opera.
Giok

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: pdq
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 06:26 PM

Football is real life.

Folk music is a soap opera.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 06:34 PM

Sometimes it seems that real life is a soap opera.
...................................

I remember this documentary about somewhere in New Guinea, I think, where local villages used to cobduct heir wars more or less in the style of a football match. They had a fighting field, and the warriors would come out at a set time and have a battle, while the non-combatants from each village stood on slopes on either side of the field overlooking it and watch and cheer on their people. But the fighting was for real, with people getting wounded and killed.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 09:51 PM

Don't ban football, ban those bloody movie screen side of pitch ads. I can't watch matches where the player moves one way and the ad moves the other!

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: mack/misophist
Date: 18 Feb 05 - 10:15 PM

I wouldn't recommend banning football. It could get you killed.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 19 Feb 05 - 05:16 AM

It will save lives.
G

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 19 Feb 05 - 05:28 AM

As I said above, just ban the professional game.
It doesn't stop anybody who actully likes football from playing for or watching a local team at the weekend, and then getting on with real life. It would become real when you meet the players in the pub afterwards, rather than in the press all the time.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Guest Pip
Date: 19 Feb 05 - 05:58 AM

Where else can an elderly lady (maybe not a lady as you know one) dress up in a green and yellow shirt liberally autographed by her welsh hero, sing loud bawdy songs, leap up and down, hurl abuse at the referee and rival fans, hug an unknown man in the next seat, and scoff a delicious vegetarian pie at the same time?!
Maybe at The Millenium Stadium dressed in red when Wales beat England recently! ;>) (Wished I had been there)

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: Crystal
Date: 19 Feb 05 - 06:14 AM

>j Glasgow would really be 'That Dear Green Place', and not either a green and white, or a blue and white place<

Surely you mean blue, black and red place!

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: Blissfully Ignorant
Date: 19 Feb 05 - 07:30 AM

I just find it abysmally boring...and i doubt banning it would have any effect whatsoever on sectarianism. The people (i use the word people grudgingly) who practise it would undoubtably find something else to fight about. Possibly Barney the Dinosaur versus Thomas the Tank Engine...that would be about the right mental age...

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 19 Feb 05 - 08:09 AM

Pip have you thought about joining a Morris Team?, you could indulge in most of the practices on your list, with the added benefit of beer. Then there's Mumming of course!!
Giok ;~)
'With a bunch of green and yellow ribbons, tied down by her knee.'

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 19 Feb 05 - 11:04 PM

Giok, Pip is tetotal.

She does have a son (me) who has played (never danced) for morriss dancing though.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 20 Feb 05 - 05:53 AM

Well Jon contrary to the evidence, I believe the drinking isn't compulsory. Anyway the pewter tankard attached to the person somewhere looks silly with green and yellow.

Giok ¦¬]

Green and yellow
Green and yellow
O Mother be quick
Cos I want to be sick
And lay me down to die.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 20 Feb 05 - 06:02 AM

I have a good friend who lives in Norwich and whenever I visit her, I can't help singing that song...... especially in the town on a match day!

But I must concurr... now that my local team (West Ham, hoiyck phtooey, I live about 1/2 mile from their ground) have 001dropped out of the Premier league, I can park in the same borough, nay, the same ROAD as my house, I can walk up to the market and back on a match day, traffic flows more freely and the litter has been cut by half.

Makes you wonder where the 'fans' have all gone to... and how many new 'fans' other Premier league teams have acquired....

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 20 Feb 05 - 06:16 AM

Nah Giok and Liz. If you are going to sing, at least sing our song.

On the ball city
Never mind the danger
Steady on, nows your chance
Hurray we've scored a goal.

I think I have posted it to MC before but I'll try to look up the rest of this wonderfully archaic football song.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 20 Feb 05 - 06:19 AM

Here you go, a copy paste from a post I made elsewhere.

Norwich (the team I support) have got one, possibly written around 1905 by then director Albert Smith (its origins are uncertain and earlier claims are made). It seems wonderfully archiac now and these days only 3 lines (starting On The Ball City) are regulary are heard on the terraces. Here it is:

On the days to call, which we have left behind,
Our boyhood's glorious game,
And our youthful vigour has declined With its mirth and its lonesome end;
You will think of the time, the happy time,
Its memories fond recall
When in the bloom of your youthful prime
We've kept upon the ball

Kick off, throw it in, have a little scrimmage,
Keep it low, a splendid rush, bravo, win or die;
On the ball, City, never mind the danger,
Steady on, now's your chance,
Hurrah! We've scored a goal.

Let all tonight then drink with me
To the football game we love,
And wish it may successful be
As other games of old,
And in one grand united toast
Join player, game and song
And fondly pledge your pride and toast
Success to the City club.

Kick off, throw it in, have a little scrimmage,
Keep it low, a splendid rush, bravo, win or die;
On the ball, City, never mind the danger,
Steady on, now's your chance,
Hurrah! We've scored a goal.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 20 Feb 05 - 06:24 AM

One slight change to my comments: These days, the whole chorus is sung. Perhaps it was the same before but my childhood memory of watching games doesn't include having a little scrimmage.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Mr Red
Date: 21 Feb 05 - 05:47 AM

DO NOT BAN SOCCER

we all need a mindless pursuit, and if there is a focus for the mindless we want to know where they may just turn up. They will pop-up at cricket, rugby, flat green bowls - anywhere there are crowds.

AND - in 100 years time the folklorist will be majoring on terrace song variations - NOW that is folk.

But a little less on the TV would go a long long way to improving society.

FWIW in the Victorian era Northampton racecourse was the scene of several riots - on race days. All caused by large crowds (it was the old black) and beer. It is not a race course now because of the problems and the banning of beer.

Plus ca change.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,The Beast of Farlington
Date: 21 Feb 05 - 06:11 AM

'a It causes strife argument, and disagreements'

By the same token, ban Mudcat!

But it also gives many more people, much more often, a lot of pleasure which is what you might find if you looked at the other side of the argument.

And, therefore, by the same token, keep football!

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Mr Red who hates soccer
Date: 21 Feb 05 - 06:29 AM

Keep it in it's place. AND make a law to licence football on TV in Pubs. the PEL is not nearly pervasive enough. Football is.

I would like to be able to walk past a football ground on a Saturday and not feel intimidated, let alone ashamed of this country. Only football can sort-out football. It hasn't done enough yet. Remember Hillsborough wasn't a riot - but is was a very large crowd and they weren't going to be told to defer to the danger - were they? Ibrox Park wasn't a riot either but it was a problem. They have special anti-surge barriers at rock concerts because it was seen as a solution to a problem. It shouldn't take death to alert the decision makers.

Large crowds are always a problem - and drink only fuels that. If you don't want the flack - don't give us the fuel. Sort out soccer crowds from within. On the terraces. In the fanzines - and let us see the results.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 21 Feb 05 - 06:47 AM

Certainly, Mr Red. There is no doubt in my mind that soccer carries far mor risks than a session in a pub! It's been one of my arugments over the laws...

One question I have is why though? I do get the rivalry bit but rugby (IMO a superior game to watch much as I can enjoy football - I enjoy most ball sports except the stop start American football) does not as far as I know carry the same yobbish element. It's a side even many football supporters would like to see the back of.

That's one thing I like about Norwich at the moment, my parents in their late 60s, one of whom had quite a nasty stroke a few years back and is disabled can go there with no fear of violence towards them - they woulldn't be going if they thought they would get beaten up.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: alanabit
Date: 21 Feb 05 - 07:58 AM

It is a tongue in cheek suggestion of course, with our original poster getting a lot off his chest. I am afraid though that the yob -which is the main cause of Giok's exasperation, is not so much a problem of football yobs but of just yobs. You can put any other adjective in front of the word "yob" and come up with a creature every bit as unpleasant as a football yob. We do not talk about "black yobs", "lesbian yobs", "gay yobs" or even "heterosexual yobs". Football is the most popular sport in the world, so it it attracts the most yobs.
An argument about the merits or demerits of the sport is pointless. As it happens I have played both. You can run into all the usual difficulties though when you try to argue that your own preferences are somehow superior.
As long as there is a market economy, the most conspicuous performers will be able to command the highest wages. I certainly resent them a lot less that the directors of failing companies, who sack the poorest employees and then put their own snouts deep into the trough.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 21 Feb 05 - 08:05 AM

Giok, Giok, Giok, for goodness sake, they must have banned football in Scotland years ago - that's why your professional club and national teams struggle to rise to the level of the average Sunday-league pub team in England? (LMAO!)
S:0)

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 21 Feb 05 - 12:09 PM

Johnny as an avowed hater of the so called 'beautiful game' denigrating my national team is like water off a duck's back. We did do quite well in the BBC2 Folk Awards 2005 though!!
Giok ¦¬]

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: Strollin' Johnny
Date: 21 Feb 05 - 12:15 PM

So you did matey! And I'm happy to know you recognise a leg-pull when you see one! I have to tell you I'm a confirmed Albaphile and an Honorary Scotsman (so my pal Morag, who's a genuine Scotswoman, tells me)! After Lincolnshire, Scotland's the best place on Earth.

All the best
:0)

Subject: RE: BS: Ban Football [Soccer]
From: ard mhacha
Date: 27 Feb 05 - 06:26 AM

To-nights Panarama BBC1, Celtic, Rangers and secterianism in Scotland, 10-15.