The journey to find my inner Spurs

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Fuck me this is grim! Let me see...what's the criteria for me to choose an American sports franchise to follow because I've been brainwashed into ordering a sports package and infected with the 'consumerist' bug since birth and can't think for myself any longer, so all my decisions are decided for me by whatever maybe trending or the largest marketing campaigns!

This is exactly what's wrong with the American model of football fans, it's totally artificial and based on superficial factors. After a few years of following this, especially if his 'team' goes through a hard time and actually get's relegated, he's be onto his cable service provider asking about other packages to fill that bottomless pit of a void in his life!

This is the present and future of the fans to be expected from the USA & Canada and it looks like this is the way things are headed! A commercial every 20secs and general mind fuckeries with no real emotive attachment to the club just superficial bullshit!
 
ANTONIO MONTANA said:
This is exactly what's wrong with the American model of football fans, it's totally artificial and based on superficial factors. After a few years of following this, especially if his 'team' goes through a hard time and actually get's relegated, he's be onto his cable service provider asking about other packages to fill that bottomless pit of a void in his life!
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I agree its not the most romantic or organic way to start supporting spurs, but support always begins somewhere.

In 20 years what difference does it make? When his son, or grandchild says "my dad/grandad supported spurs", does it matter that it started like this?

I understand your point, but to judge someone who has just found football, primarily down to the exposure it now receives is a bit harsh. How can you support something you had no knowledge of?

As for decisions based on marketing and advertising, pretty much everything you own, use or have as an avatar is a product of outside influences. It's life, its not new, it's always been this way.

let him support spurs however he wants. he chose spurs, it wasnt forced on. I salute his bravery.
 
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arlombardi said:
I salute his bravery.
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When you sell the integrity of any value's for short term gains, you shouldn't be surprised when things start going wrong, like having a shit atmosphere at the stadium, having sponsors dictate what colours your team project, what time and day your team plays, who your club chooses as official ticket resellers etc.

When all is said and done, the history and value's of a club are it's identity and culture, we laugh at clubs like Chelsea and are beginning to hate on Citeh for taking new money but I think this is far worse because people like you are applauding superficial value's and calling it brave when in fact you look what those two clubs and their owners have invested and the decisions they have made, which have directly benefited their fanbase, whereas our owners or Woolwich's, continue to manipulate us and treat us like a 'target audience', because their 'market research' tells them that we fall into the same 'demographic' as supporters like Ken Saxton.

A decision based on kind of a tv package version of an 'impulse purchase', it's like a mid life crisis, he's 45 yrs old and needs a new hobby to follow, he will have plenty of disposable cash and is exactly the type of 'supporter' the new age of football wants, a sheep, who's going to consume, merchandise, tv subscriptions and maybe even the occasional visit to watch us at the Lane, buying tickets from Stub Hub at over inflated prices etc etc.

He's more than welcome to support whoever he wants, who am I to say he can or can't, I'm merely pointing to the fact that most of these North American fans are superficial, (who by his own admission had a list of criteria to 'choose' who he will support including "2) I wanted a team that wouldn’t soon be relegated!)".

When you start accepting and applauding this, then you need to keep quite when the club keeps treating us like we are all like him.
 
@ ANTONIO MONTANA ANTONIO MONTANA why do you support Spurs? Enthral us with your tale of how you spent years researching our history and ensuring that the club stood for the right values before you made your informed choice.

"it's like a midlife crisis." Really? Are you friends with Ken, how does it compare to a midlife crisis? So the hobbies you had as a kid are the only ones you can stick to for the rest of your life?

If someone in their old age decided to start following/playing golf, are you not allowed to start supporting Tiger Woods?
 
ANTONIO MONTANA said:
Fuck me this is grim! Let me see...what's the criteria for me to choose an American sports franchise to follow because I've been brainwashed into ordering a sports package and infected with the 'consumerist' bug since birth and can't think for myself any longer, so all my decisions are decided for me by whatever maybe trending or the largest marketing campaigns!

This is exactly what's wrong with the American model of football fans, it's totally artificial and based on superficial factors. After a few years of following this, especially if his 'team' goes through a hard time and actually get's relegated, he's be onto his cable service provider asking about other packages to fill that bottomless pit of a void in his life!

This is the present and future of the fans to be expected from the USA & Canada and it looks like this is the way things are headed! A commercial every 20secs and general mind fuckeries with no real emotive attachment to the club just superficial bullshit!
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I really don't get this rant. It all boils down to this bizarre notion of what makes a true fan. So in your eyes I am a more a true fan then him because I was born and raised a few miles up the road from WHL? Yet I never had any really credible reasons for following the club than he did. Fact is that as a kid I hated football, because I was terrible at playing it, and didn't come from a family where there were any football fans. So I didn't become a fan until I was a teenager in the Nineties and it all came about simply because I was invited to a game to fill an empty seat. It was an initial indirect exposure that I didn't originally, intentionally seek out. In fact, if you think about it, people who follow the club because their fathers did are again not seeking it out of their own accord. They are indoctrinated. If anything this guy has more claim to initial fandom than I do because he obviously still decided to watch us of his own accord when he saw games on offer.

Plus, how else are fans abroad supposed to become fans unless they have exposure in this manner?

Also, I don't really understand how you know this guy will move on after we go through a bad patch. He says he is part of supporters group that includes ex-pat Lillywhites. So, if anything, he has a greater reason to stick around.
 
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beautiful article.

anyone who follows anything will have deemed reasons of both good and bad criterias.

what he has chosen is something that will effect his lifestyle, his purchases and opinions. its a decision that anyone should be proud of.
 
Smoked Salmon said:
Plus, how else are fans abroad supposed to become fans unless they have exposure in this manner?
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THIS.

How can you support something if you dont know it existed?

I dont agree with all aspects of the modern football beast, but bringing Spurs into the life of a man who 5 years ago had no idea we existed is something i whole heartedly agree with.

We all support spurs, there is no hierarchy. It's like me telling my sister, "dad is more my dad than hers because I have been alive longer"
 
arlombardi said:
@ ANTONIO MONTANA ANTONIO MONTANA why do you support Spurs?
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Pat Jennings, Steve Perryman, Alan Gilzean, Cyril Knowles, Martin Chivers, Martin Peters, Glenn Hoddle, Osvaldo Ardiles, Steve Archibald, Ledley King, Erik Thorsvedt, Ricardo Villa, Keith Berkenshaw, Darren Anderton, Mark Falco, Jason Dozzell, Vinny Samways, Ronny Rosenthal, Chas & Dave, Jeff Minton, Panini Stickers, Haringay Green Lanes and Bernie Grant and the Lillywhite shirt, that's why I support the mighty Tottenham!


[/quote]"it's like a midlife crisis." Really?[/quote]
If it wasn't this it would be something else, it's a generalised demographic group in the marketing landscape of US males in that age group. Depending whether they are urbanised or living in more rural places, they may take up shooting & hunting, or as he's urbanised, he takes on a hobby like following 'soccer' or as you say may take up golf.

As I mentioned before he can do what he likes but as we've already seen, the footballing environment for fans has become homogenised because of the embracement of these plastic fans. Therefore there is an increase in the sponsors who are eager to be involved in the sport, in order to market to this type of dumbing down of support base, I'm just pointing out the correlation between the experience of watching football and the culture & heritage surrounding it, is being destroyed in order to facilitate this type of superficial fan.

People like yourself choose to embrace this element on the one hand and still moan about changes such as Stub Hub Ticketing. To me it's obvious to see that the two go hand in hand.

When a company starts seeing these changes, it wants to obviously exploit it in order to maximise their profits, but it effects all of us fans, the rise in costs and the dilution of our sense of identity, in order to facilitate this growing 'demographic'. Like in Asia, Levy's talking about several million fan base, of course this is the potential of the Asian market and in order to get a piece of the action, there's going to be compromise, change and an increase in demand for tickets, for instance. So ENIC looks at strategies on how to maximise on sales when they only have 36k capacity, then these type's of fans feel a little intimidated by screaming and cheering, so the stewards are told to clamp down on this, more and more concessions are made in order to facilitate for these fans, until in the end the experience is so distilled that its unrecognisable.

This is one example and my comments are aimed at drawing attention to these facts and not as a personal dig on one fan.
 
@ ANTONIO MONTANA ANTONIO MONTANA your argument sounds an awful lot like several punk rockers I knew in the 90s talking about the "scene" and how these "Green Day posers" are ruining it. Deal with it. There will always be people that come and go as fans of a team/sport. Sometimes people find things in less cool ways than you did. So what? To label the writer of this article or generalize that all US supporters are "superifical" is ridiculous IMO. How do you know you love Spurs more than we do? Is it our fault that we were not "born into it"? I think we fundamentally agree on several of your points regarding the way the fans are being treated, but I feel your anger is being misdirected.
 
American chaps don't have the history of supporting football teams, so how they start may seem a bit odd to us over in the UK. If they stick with the team through thick and thin, they will have "earned their Spurs" and can call themselves Spurs supporters. If they bail out at the first sign of grief, then they can go back where they came from. Don't see why the guy is getting put downs at this stage. All Spurs supporters should be welcome with open arms by the rest of us.
 
Mrs Perryman said:
American chaps don't have the history of supporting football teams, so how they start may seem a bit odd to us over in the UK. If they stick with the team through thick and thin, they will have "earned their Spurs" and can call themselves Spurs supporters. If they bail out at the first sign of grief, then they can go back where they came from. Don't see why the guy is getting put downs at this stage. All Spurs supporters should be welcome with open arms by the rest of us.
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Fortunately (or maybe unfortunately), the first signs of grief as a Spurs supporter don't take very long. So, the plastics should be weeded out quickly :)
 
ANTONIO MONTANA said:
Pat Jennings, Steve Perryman, Alan Gilzean, Cyril Knowles, Martin Chivers, Martin Peters, Glenn Hoddle, Osvaldo Ardiles, Steve Archibald, Ledley King, Erik Thorsvedt, Ricardo Villa, Keith Berkenshaw, Darren Anderton, Mark Falco, Jason Dozzell, Vinny Samways, Ronny Rosenthal, Chas & Dave, Jeff Minton, Panini Stickers, Haringay Green Lanes and Bernie Grant and the Lillywhite shirt, that's why I support the mighty Tottenham!

If it wasn't this it would be something else, it's a generalised demographic group in the marketing landscape of US males in that age group. Depending whether they are urbanised or living in more rural places, they may take up shooting & hunting, or as he's urbanised, he takes on a hobby like following 'soccer' or as you say may take up golf.

As I mentioned before he can do what he likes but as we've already seen, the footballing environment for fans has become homogenised because of the embracement of these plastic fans. Therefore there is an increase in the sponsors who are eager to be involved in the sport, in order to market to this type of dumbing down of support base, I'm just pointing out the correlation between the experience of watching football and the culture & heritage surrounding it, is being destroyed in order to facilitate this type of superficial fan.

People like yourself choose to embrace this element on the one hand and still moan about changes such as Stub Hub Ticketing. To me it's obvious to see that the two go hand in hand.

When a company starts seeing these changes, it wants to obviously exploit it in order to maximise their profits, but it effects all of us fans, the rise in costs and the dilution of our sense of identity, in order to facilitate this growing 'demographic'. Like in Asia, Levy's talking about several million fan base, of course this is the potential of the Asian market and in order to get a piece of the action, there's going to be compromise, change and an increase in demand for tickets, for instance. So ENIC looks at strategies on how to maximise on sales when they only have 36k capacity, then these type's of fans feel a little intimidated by screaming and cheering, so the stewards are told to clamp down on this, more and more concessions are made in order to facilitate for these fans, until in the end the experience is so distilled that its unrecognisable.

This is one example and my comments are aimed at drawing attention to these facts and not as a personal dig on one fan.
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Slags off other fans but can't even spell Burkinshaw properly. I hope old General Burkinshaw makes you do a thousand push-ups and a few laps.

:troll:
 
I think you have to look at this as the next wave of fans from abroad, we have a huge number of fans who became fans on foreign TV, we have had a fair number of scandinavians who fell in love with Spurs and now there are generations of them coming to the game at WHL, I've seen regular fans coming in from Holland and Germany, somewhere down the line they became attached to spurs, it all has to start somewhere.

I don't see the US or any of the new markets being different to that.
 
Beautiful article...Love the fact that I started supporting Juventus at first,and then Spurs.Although I still like Juve and watch their games.
 
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