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Spurs fans need to get behind the team and back Poch.

southlondonyiddo

My eyes have seen some of the glory..
Nov 8, 2004
12,599
15,012
Now, I'm not picking up on this post and its content specifically. I'm just using it as a framework for my thoughts. I think that you're saying its good thing.

This whole concept of women/kids/casuals being a negative thing for the atmosphere and "our" game. What we're talking about is just that 70s/80s hooligan thing, aren't we? A period of genuinely negative and regressive culture in the game, that resulted in a series of disasters, and English teams being banned from European football. A culture that still hangs over our heads today.

Now how many people on this site started going to Spurs as kids? Taken with their families to the game back in the 50s and 60s? How was a football match then? Why, it was a friendly community thing, wasn't it? A time before replica shirts, and tribalism... when everyone went along to just enjoy a good football match, catch up etc. Good clean fun.

If you ask me we're getting back to that. kids want to go see their heroes, so their mum's are taking them. I've got all sorts sat around me at matches now, instead of grumpy old gits moaning at everything like they did in the old shelf. There's an old guy with his son in front of me, who's been going since the 60s. I've got an Indian chap to my left, and another bloke my age with his two lads. There's a scattering of Korean fans, couples, whole families... and they all sing or chat or whatever, and just watch and enjoy the game.

It's far better than seeing grown men, screaming obscenities, red in their spittle flecked faces; seats getting ripped up and fighting in the street... which is the 70s and 80s scene.

As Bill Nicholson said himself, when he saw the hooliganism in Rotterdam, "What have they done to my game?"

I'm going to digress, and pick out Bradford City as an example. Valley Parade sits on the side of a hill, and is in the middle of long terraced streets. In the 60s and 70s these became heavily populated with multicultural families, Bradford being one of the most culturally diverse cities in the country. Pakistani, Indian, African, Chinese etc kids all grew up on those streets, playing football and staring up at that stadium looming over them up the hill. And every other Saturday, hoards of white football hooligans would swarm up their streets and trash them, urinate up the walls of homes, and shout at anyone who dared venture outside their doors to "go home" and call them pakis/wogs/niggers and other vile stuff. So even though those kids wanted to play football, they couldn't go see it.

Thankfully those awful days of hooliganism has gone, and football is inclusive now. Those kids now take their families to the Valley.

As for us, and the frustrated old man moan in the OP, I hear plenty of noise from that South stand, its volume when the songs roll out is immense, no matter the game. No one is stopping those who want to sing, from singing. And no one should ever stop anyone from going to watch a game they enjoy. Football is universal, its why its the most popular sport in the world. Anyone can play it, and anyone can watch it.

Brilliant post, loved it

Strange that i hadn’t really thought of football pre hooliganism (a bit like football pre premier league!!) and the effect it’s had on me and the way it must have clouded my judgement all these years

But thinking of those flat cap days and the old pictures and footage there would have been 99% men and boys at the ground and that makes for a hugely different atmosphere
 

Gassin's finest

C'est diabolique
May 12, 2010
37,355
87,827
Brilliant post, loved it

Strange that i hadn’t really thought of football pre hooliganism (a bit like football pre premier league!!) and the effect it’s had on me and the way it must have clouded my judgement all these years

But thinking of those flat cap days and the old pictures and footage there would have been 99% men and boys at the ground and that makes for a hugely different atmosphere
Quite possibly, the whole working man thing and all that... the wife at home doing the laundry and getting tea ready.

Maybe its selective, but there's plenty of old footage of lasses young and old at the games as well. My Grandad would be taking my Dad and my aunts and uncles along to see S****horpe on Saturdays. And I think we've had people like Cosmic on here who was as big a regular as anyone back in those days.

Anyway... to misquote Dylan: "Times, they're always a'changing"
 

rez9000

Any point?
Feb 8, 2007
11,942
21,098
Quite possibly, the whole working man thing and all that... the wife at home doing the laundry and getting tea ready.

Maybe its selective, but there's plenty of old footage of lasses young and old at the games as well. My Grandad would be taking my Dad and my aunts and uncles along to see S****horpe on Saturdays. And I think we've had people like Cosmic on here who was as big a regular as anyone back in those days.

Anyway... to misquote Dylan: "Times, they're always a'changing"
The universality of football has always been there - it’s always appealed to more than just men and boys.

It’s not a sign of football changing (although it obviously has) that we see more families and women at matches - it’s a sign of society changing.

Gone are the days of the sole male breadwinner, gone are the days of the nuclear family. The sharply delineated gender roles have been swept away and that will show in all areas of society, football not least.

If you want evidence of how football has always appealed to all genders and that it was more a societal barrier that precluded female participation, all you need to do is look up the film, Those Glory Glory Days.

Written by Julie Welch, the first female football reporter for a national paper, she’s a massive Spurs fan and she wrote the film as a semi-autobiographical look back on her childhood watching the 1961 Double winning side. The film also has Danny Blanchflower in it.

The times have very much changed and will continue to do so. And that’s no bad thing.
 

Gassin's finest

C'est diabolique
May 12, 2010
37,355
87,827
The universality of football has always been there - it’s always appealed to more than just men and boys.

It’s not a sign of football changing (although it obviously has) that we see more families and women at matches - it’s a sign of society changing.

Gone are the days of the sole male breadwinner, gone are the days of the nuclear family. The sharply delineated gender roles have been swept away and that will show in all areas of society, football not least.

If you want evidence of how football has always appealed to all genders and that it was more a societal barrier that precluded female participation, all you need to do is look up the film, Those Glory Glory Days.

Written by Julie Welch, the first female football reporter for a national paper, she’s a massive Spurs fan and she wrote the film as a semi-autobiographical look back on her childhood watching the 1961 Double winning side. The film also has Danny Blanchflower in it.

The times have very much changed and will continue to do so. And that’s no bad thing.
I know the film, and her book "Tottenham Hotspur, a Biography", well. I'm pretty sure our Cos is name checked in that book as well.
 

DiscoD1882

SC Supporter
Mar 27, 2006
6,934
14,669
The atmosphere was good on Saturday. Yes it’s not the constant drone of a man with a loudhailer shouting monotonous shit out for the entire game. It put me to sleep last year against Dortmund. I go to watch the game. And enjoy the moments. Not constantly stand up if I hate arsenal. I will rouse myself if there is a song doing the rounds. I will watch the football at other moments. It’s not all about constant chanting from the fans. It’s about getting behind the team at the relevant times. Sometimes they are shit. And deserve to be hounded a little. Sometimes the atmosphere is electric. Sometimes it isn’t. That’s just how it is. It was the same at the old stadium. I don’t get the ritual bashing of people who don’t want to stand and sing all the time??
 

FITZ

Well-Known Member
May 17, 2004
2,017
1,518
One of the problems is we don't have many decent songs anymore, I can count those that are sung on one hand.

I remember a match where “Martin Jol’s” “blue & white army” went on for about 20 mins back in the days of the drummer.

If the enthusiasm to sing is there the songs will follow.
 

Gassin's finest

C'est diabolique
May 12, 2010
37,355
87,827
Tell you what, following on my last post... I don't care who you fucking are, if you're getting up en masse on the 42nd minute, while we're under the cosh, and block everybody else's view while you stop to watch.... You are a clueless fuckwit, and should be chucked out.
 

spursfan1991

Well-Known Member
Jul 3, 2008
1,747
4,058
I was at the Lane this weekend for the thirds time the season and again there was no noise from the Spurs fans. We are meant to lift the team, would the yellow wall of Dortmund ever shut up. The season has not been disastrous and we get sung at is this a Library. What I can tell is away from home our support seems to be fantastic but home it is awful.

Home support for majority of the clubs in the EPL is shocking because the working man has been priced out of the game. It is mostly the prawn sandwich brigade that go to home games these days to financially support the club.
 
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