Given the history of football hooliganism in Europe, why aren’t security guards more thorough with patting down fans so that they don’t sneak something ridiculous like road flares into the game?
Generally speaking, no. They have sports teams which are more like club sports in US universities. No huge fan followings, no big business for TV broadcasts, merchandising, and advertisers.
It’s soccer clubs that command that type of loyalty. This is partly because pro soccer teams in England are actually clubs, which the general public can join (not as players, but as part owners and users of club provided facilities.)
The club owns the team, not one wealthy owner. The only institution resembling that in the States is the Green Bay Packers. So you don’t have the spectacle of a scumbag owner (Irsay!!!) sneaking a team out of town in the dead of night. The team is part of the community in a way that’s similar to a college team being part of a university’s community.
In English soccer, an amateur club team can enter the national tournament and take on the loftiest pro team. On our side of the pond, that only happens in college basketball.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_football_league_system
Someone should tell Abramovich and Sheikh Mansour that.
I thought that was the exception, not the rule. I was thinking, Man U isn’t owned by a single person. But apparently it is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glazer_ownership_of_Manchester_United
and English football ownership in general is becoming more Americanized:
http://www.economist.com/blogs/blighty/2011/04/takeover_arsenal
Private ownership is more the rule than the exception now, apparently:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/competitions/premier-league/6123558/So-who-really-owns-Englands-top-clubs-Were-waiting-to-find-out.html
More fan/public ownership than in any American sports league, but a lot less than I’d thought:
Pete Winkelman at MK Dons would more appropriate; Chelsea and Man City still play in their home cities. And who was it that took that lot from Woolwich to Islington?
No. In the US fan loyalty is primarily based on geography rather than politics, religion, social class, or anything like that. At the most, a particular team might be saddled with a political steriotype of the particular community they represent. So, for example, Dallas Cowboys fans might think of San Francisco 49 fans as liberal hippies and 49er fans may assume that Cowboys fans are all gun-toting Republicans. The reality is that if you live in Dallas you are probably a Cowboys fan even if you are a liberal Democrat, and Republicans who live in the bay area are likely to be 49er fans.
Expanding on my prior post, fan loyalty in North America also doesn’t follow religion like it does with some European soccer rivalries (such as with the Celts and Rangers in Scotland.) College teams which represent religiously affiliated institutions such as BYU or Notre Dame may be a partial exception, but even there the emphasis is on institutional loyalty rather than religious loyalty. Not only are all Catholics not Notre Dame fans, but not all Notre Dame fans are necessarily Catholic.
That component is only relevant in Scotland as far as I know. No teams in England or on the continent have similar sectarian rivalries to the Old Firm and other teams.
Hey I’ve see it four times, so don’t knock Quadrophenia. But seriously, my family is English on one side and I’ve spent quite a bit of time there and there is a difference in attitude about class between the two countries. I deeply insulted my cousin’s husband when I suggested to his son that he should look at going to college even though I never graduated myself. Having the right accent was a big issue in my British Uncles’ families.
You see it somewhat in America on the East Coast, but in the rest of the country you won’t see kids being made fun of for putting on airs or getting ahead of themselves, it’s the American Dream to do better than your parents.
When I was in England in the 70’s there were Skin Heads in abundance. The idea that a bunch of kids would all dress alike and wear the same brand of shoe was utterly foreign to me. I think other posters have described it as the cowboy ethos, but Americans just don’t have that sort of group mentality.
Everywhere has there only type of arseholeness. Just about every time an English team plays in Spain one of their players seems to end up being subjected to racial abuse, for example.
Oh it happens.
The only time I have ever been at a match that has had to be stopped for a time due to hooliganism was my first ever match in Sweden, Hammarby vs Malmö a few years back. The Hammarby fans threw missiles at the Assistant Ref.
Being British and a football fan, I’ve been to many games in England and have never had a game stopped/delayed due to hooliganism. It took about sixty minutes of Swedish football for me to see it.
In fact, fandom is probably the one thing that’ll bring two politically opposite individuals together – or push two people on the same side apart.
Last year the Bruins goalie Tim Thomas was basically pillared for skipping the traditional White House visit after the Bruins won the Cup. Making it a political thing created a big backlash and from what I gather, pissed off some of his teammates as well.
And Thomas works in probably the Bluest state in the Union.
Heck, sometimes groups of hooligans clash even though they support the same team.
American hooligans seem to be better organised, I think you call them street gangs?
There must be some, but I confess I haven’t paid attention to a Islander-Ranger match in a long tme.
After reading through. I’ll share my view, I have been actively involved in the casual uk scene and seen around Europe.
I believe in the USA there is no hooligans, otherwise know as ‘casuals’ in the UK, it’s purely the distance. Without doubt if Americans could travel in 1000’s to football matches there would be trouble and hooligans.
The idea for us is to go to another town/city on behalf
Of our team and try to ‘take it’. Beat their casuals and drink in their town doing what you want. Taking the piss.
Australia is similar to you in that sense. Although they do have a all casual scene… Which the USA does. Casuals (hooligan) and being casual is a culture. It’s fashion. Wearing such clothes like Stone island, Paul smith, aquascutum, Armani, Lacoste, Henri Lloyd, Fjallraven… But it’s changed throughout the years. Music is another part of it. Well worth looking into, it’s a true British Culture.
Anyway… In America it’s not happened because its very unlikely 1000’s of pissed opposing teams are drinking in ‘your’ city, your ‘territory’ and you ‘don’t like it’ … Then it becomes wide spread. But always the danger of heavy handed police & others with weapons. America is worse than UK. Why have guns? At least here it’s fair game with your fists.
You wait, when ultra fast travel with trains or whatever, America will have a bigger problem
Than most with football hooligans!!
R&R!
Done on my iPhone, I’m not illiterate don’t worry.
I somewhat agree. What’s that saying? In England they think 100 miles is a long distance and in the States they think 100 years is a long time.
There really isn’t a street gang culture in the U.S. anyway, outside of minority and recent immigrant groups. You just don’t see young conservatives of the dominant social group joining gangs (well, except for those weirdos who the Republicans recruit to do some dirty work). But in Europe, it seemed like it’s semi-acceptable for even middle class kids to run around in tracksuit wearing gangs everywhere from Ireland to Russia.