Watford And Modern Football

I don't have two mates

 

When you support Watford, it's quite hard.

 

It's not hard but for many it's much less fun !

 

There's a lot to hate about modern football.

- So much hypocrisy (Arteta absolutely kicking off at VAR this weekend after saying that "everyone makes mistakes" a couple of weeks ago after the Liverpool debacle).

- VAR has imo set the game back - it's not just in our country either. One of the clubs I work for was utterly robbed by VAR against a big club at the start of the season. Usual apologies etc, but we lost 1-0 which could be vital come the end of the season.

- The huge amounts of money in the game (although that played a part in my decision to go for a career in football so can't complain too much about that!)

- Click/controversial opinion bait

- The huge gulf in finances available. Again this is rampant in the PL but also so much worse in other leagues - one of the clubs I work for has only ever sold 1 player in their entire history for a fee above €1m and their record transfer in is €400k. The league winner spent €70m in the summer and over €100m the season before. How on earth can you compete with that?! That's the English equivalent of a team in the National League being dropped into the PL.

- Demand for instant success. Fans demanding player/manager/owner disappear after a poor start.

Are all personal hates of mine!

 

Yes. The majority of fans have been crying out for stability for years, now we have it some of those same fans are screaming for change.

 

We're definitely not alone in that! Players and managers I get to an extent, but fans of most teams seem to think it's very easy to change owner these days when the reality is far far different.

 

I enjoyed it because as a 13 y.o. it was so "first time" .
Experiencing different football grounds etc. An awakening that could never
be replicated .
The analogy would be someone who followed a pop group before they became famous
and enjoyed those days more than when the band found fame and everyone jumped on the bandwagon.

 

I was 11 years old at that time . I never went on my own .

I am not posting about how good Mike Keen was . He wasn't . I am posting
about the new found enjoyment I felt as a 13 year old following a football team.
I look back fondly about going away to Northwich Victoria , Southport , Halifax etc

Other people's peak enjoyment might be Cup Finals, winning the league the trek into Europe.

Mine is the feeling that I felt going to far flung places I have already mentioned for the first time

 

VAR is an abomination
Referees have the toughest job but appear to leave a contentious decision to
Stockley Park . That goal Newcastle were awarded should never have stood .
However Arteta is using stuff like this as a smokescreen for his own errors .
Control what you can control. You can't control an officiating error but he could
control replacing a perfectly good goal keeper with a Stuntman.
Every week there is VAR controversy, so what is the point ?

 

If anyone doubted how many Arsenal fans we have in our fanbase, you only have to look at the strange Arteta like complaining about a specific completely correct VAR review process across numerous threads since Sunday.

Imagine that, supporting Watford and Arsenal. At least support a team that wins ffs.

 

There is nothing wrong with Var but the officials are poor. They have always made bad decisions, but now they are magnified because they are given more opportunity to make bad decisions. They often had poor judgement in real time which doesn’t suddenly change when you throw in more officials looking at the same stuff from multiple angles, it just multiplies the bad decisions because you are multiplying the bad decision makers, and their opportunities to make them.

 

Well, the point is that's what gets the clicks and keeps people on the hook, so it absolutely serves the interests of broadcasters like Sky and Talksport to keep doom mongering about it. And it serves muppets like Arteta to deflect blame onto officiating when their team underperforms.

 

Is this aimed at me ?
Because the thread is about modern football and I was using the Spaniard as
an example of a manager who bitterly complains about something to cover up his own errors of judgement.
We don't have VAR in the Championship so if the discussion turns to VAR then we are going to have to talk about those teams that do "enjoy" its benefits and the weekends VAR talking points were Arse and Wolves

 

Yep .

 

VAR is supposed to be used to get rid of clear and obvious errors. If it's a clear and obvious error then it won't take 5 mins to come to a decision. Having a toe offside and having to draw lines across the pitch is not a clear and obvious error. If you can't see it with the naked eye then whatever decision is made on the pitch should stand. It's not a difficult system but it's being made difficult because it's not being used for what it was meant for

 

Yes, and a great analogy. I was 14 for my first game and couldn't believe the atmosphere generated by 6,000 fans, all in the same arena. The maximum number of people I'd seen together in one place prior to that, in the flesh, was probably a school assembly....

 

Its a game of stats and percentages now, probably got AI aids in the coaches offices and thats probably why you see the same repeated patterns of play. Top level coaches in 10 years will probably be some kind of bio engineered AI thing. I look forward to Bozzo getting his just deserts after sacking the terminator.

 

Games these days need 2 referees. So why not do that. Rather than VAR just semi helping the referee in key decisions (goals, red cards, etc) why not have an equal say? this "not enough to overturn the on field decision" is a big cause of the problem.

 

On field ref and VAR could have an equal say. But if they deadlock it goes over to a public vote. Everyone in the stadium has a keypad and has to choose the outcome they think applies. For televised matches those watching on Sky have their votes counted double.

 

Those watching via Hive Live get to vote the week after.

 

I agree with the OP. In the main we are watching teams keeping possession with constant sideways football. The excitement of a ball into the mixer or a winger beating his man and crossing has gone. The game at Udders was everything that I and I think most fans despise. Zero excitement.

 

Via carrier pigeon.

 

Hive watchers are able to vote on whichever other match is being accidentally shown in error.

 

I know what you mean and my comment was somewhat tongue in cheek. The first season I went to quite a few away games was the 68-9 promotion season when I was 12 and it was very exciting.
And I still remember the time I studiously pored over an atlas scouring the coastline to locate Port Vale unaware it was in Stoke….

 

Burslem.

 

Which is, of course, one of the constituent parts of the city of Stoke-on-Trent....

 

Haha! no. One of them would have to have the final say. If you want, we could have a third referee for this situation. People moan and complain about VAR without suggesting an alternative. Pundits & fans that come out with all these cliche comments, without being brave enough to actually suggest how it could be improved, should be ignored IMO. One other thing, before someone says it, if you want to scrap VAR entirely, how would this help get more decisions right?

 

It's just rubbish, isn't it.

 

Clapper. Bet you actually want Watford to win and score lots of goals.

 

Exactly. So what we have now is a Premier League 'product' that is worse to watch.

It wasn't until the pundit cohort became dominated by ex pros that the mantra 'they've got to get these decisions right' became a thing. For a century before that we lived with human error and the idea that sport is about striving to do your best. Now the game seems to be striving for some unattainable and drearily bureaucratic idea of perfection.

Last night's game between Spurs and Chelsea was a circus of decisions. There was barely anything else about it that was notable except the decisions. So often the only talking points are refereeing decisions.

Almost wiped from the media's evaluation of the game is whether a pass was good, or a piece of skill was beautiful, or a goal was euphoric. Nope, we have managed – collectively – to reduce the greatest team sport in the world to a series of transactions. Was that knee in front of the opposition player's knee? Was that challenge dangerous. Was it? What about from this angle? What about if it's slowed down? And let's take absolutely ages about it.

Premier League football has got it more wrong than many other leagues but the game is a husk of its former self.

And to make matters worse, all the people who howled loudest that VAR would make things better have moved on to insisting that everything will be better if we can hear what the VAR officials say to the on-field ref.

I'd love Sky and MOTD to conduct an experiment. Pick a matchday and ban all discussion of 'decisions' for that weekend. Just ignore every 'controversial' call and accept the decision made without analysis or discussion. Let's see if they can actually talk about the game instead.

 

Oddly enough, VAR decisions seem far less intrusive during Champions League games. Far closer to the spirit that the decision is made quickly by the officials and everyone gets on with it.

This is, of course, the final season of a vaguely watchable Champions League format before the bloated mess of a 'Swiss' system comes in.