Are LOI Fans West Brits?

Patrick2010

Its a pointless debate , this LOI v EPL fans. Each to their own. I'm a supporter of Shamrock Rovers for 50 years now, got hooked at an early age and never lost the bug. Work with Utd, Everton and pool fans and we discuss each others teams fortunes. I'll watch european and EPL games but find the live experience much better, the atmosphere and watching movement off the ball where the TV focuses on the ball. Rovers will have 1000 fans in Belgium tomorrow when they could stay at home and just watch on TV.

Jimmy Two Times

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119614881#Comment_119614881

Can't agree with this at all.

You can't generalise to that extent.

I've been a supporter of an English team for many years, well before the EPL was even a concept. Lucky to have a season ticket and travel across most weeks. I've developed a network of friends from the UK, not only from the city my team is based in,but from many parts of the country, lads who travel each week, home and away without fail. It's not about supporting a brand at all, it's about supporting your club, having a day out with your mates and enjoying the games, win or lose My two young lads have also got on board and travel often. One is a Bohs season ticket holder and the other likes a Bit o Red.

We've also developed contact with regular travellers from Dublin who support what could be deemed lesser clubs like Wolves, Bournemouth and Norwich. Definitely nothing to do with supporting a brand.

gormdubhgorm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119616890#Comment_119616890

I have no problem with people going to LOI and EPL from Ireland. I have more a problem with Irish EPL followers who sneer at LOI support.

But the truth is Irish Derby and Wolves supporters are outliers. Most support the EPL glamour global teams. It is the lure of a brand for most. It not only happens in Ireland but world wide.

Unfortunately I cannot find the video but a study was done on worldwide EPL based on internet searches. It showed what is obvious worldwide fan base supported the big teams. Interestingly at the time most Man City searches were Manchester based. Man United was across the UK etc.

Fair enough you enjoy it I don’t knock you for it. But it is not a natural organic support, branding of global football concerns has a major impact.

It is more like following Rock Stars around the world for an event, rather than the sport of soccer in its purest community form. Which the LOI is. I was at an English VNL (fifth tier) game and it had the same sense of local community LOI or the GAA has in Ireland.

The EPL lacks that as clubs become more like corporate giants. Just my opinion and experience of it. EPL seems plastic, corporate, manufactured, unrelatable concern. Distant, as they hoover up players from around the world for peanuts or nothing in some cases.

To the detriment of domestic leagues like LOI, Scandinavia etc. And more increasingly the Brasileirao league in Brazil etc. The latter will happen more because of Brexit.

dxhound2005

https://www.irishwolves.org/

I wonder would these Wolves fans like to see themselves sneered at as Outliers. There are also Irish fan clubs for Derby and lots of other non "glamour" teams, and I know people who travel from Ireland to fixtures for those clubs.

I have never been sneered at by anyone for being a LOI supporter.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119616546#Comment_119616546

I'd say you hit your head a few times too many on the soccer pitch to think it's ok to come out with a Grade A a-hole comment like that at the end of your post. You just couldn't resist the snide dig.

You might suffer from the same weakness as many other soccer lovers: It seems you can't fathom that some people don't like or have no interest in soccer. And while I'm sure you've met such people before, perhaps you never asked them why, or they didn't want to offend you by telling you. But yes, of the people who dare to not like soccer, many of them would point to the drink-soaked loutishness, laddishness, and boorish conduct of soccer fans the world over braying the likes of KEEN-Oh, KEEN-Oh like a bunch of donkeys as one reason.

I remember well sometimes young lads would come up to me in school, in a nice attempt to make friends, by asking the question 'what team do you support?' When I invariably (and politely) responded with "none, I'm not into soccer" it was a conversation stopper. Most of them hadn't a clue how to proceed. I think that's a sad attitude.

Zebra3

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119617811#Comment_119617811

Oh boo hoo.

Hopefully your kids love the sad, sheltered life you have planned for them.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119617843#Comment_119617843

Stay classy. You're a great ambassador for your sport.

Zebra3

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119617879#Comment_119617879

Somebody once said something to me years ago in school and here I am whinging about it on the internet to people I don’t know. 😭

Maybe move on with your life, let things go.

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119617811#Comment_119617811

Your problem isn't that you don't like soccer, it is that you think you are above people who like soccer. grow up.

Jimmy Two Times

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119617141#Comment_119617141

Natural organic support...........very interesting concept and to be honest it's something I ask myself a lot. Obviously not from the UK, support the Dubs because that's where I'm from and similarly to the concept of bumping into LOI players,Jack Byrne, Ali Coote or Paddy Kirk walking down the street my club has had a decent representation on the Dublin senior football team for the last number of years and I'd know some of the players personally so supporting the Dubs is an easy concept to grasp.

Why an English team over Bohs or Shels ?

Hard one to call.It's something that I've carried for over fifty years, through all the ups and downs, highs and lows and in recent years having made friends with the lads over there and see that it's similar to my support for the Dubs it gets you, reels you in, so that it becomes a way of life. Is it a bit sad ? Maybe some would see it like that. But get me to the airport on a Saturday morning,to the boozer at 10.30 and up to the ground at 3 bells and it's so infectious.

Jimmy Two Times

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119617320#Comment_119617320

Ha, one of the lads in the Wolves pics is the lad we meet in the airport regularly. Think he goes every week.

gormdubhgorm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119621599#Comment_119621599

I wouldn’t say it’s sad just a different kind of support. You reminded me of a chat I had with a plasterer when he was doing up my the walls of my Gaff.

Big soccer supporter Home Farm , Bohs, Leeds. Goes to the games. Knew Ronnie Whelan that sorta age bracket. Spoke about his enjoyable trips to Leeds, and how he didn’t think much of Dave O’Leary.

Anyway, he used to go to all the Dubs football matches until the early 90s but gave up (when fellas got tickets ahead of him that never went to games) It used to be terrible getting tickets then in fairness. Much better now thankfully.

But I suppose it comes back to how event chasers and the corporate stuff can push fans away. It’s an awful thing, I think basically killing the thing that sport is supposed to be about. Which is why I have a bit of a set on how the EPL big guns operate. Money making tours then complain about fixture congestion etc.

I would consider myself a GAA supporter first and foremost. But I think it is very unfair that this thread seems to be created to bash LOI. They have that intangible local community thing. You can’t buy that.

The vast majority are sound. And most LOI fans seem to love when new fans give LOI games a go. They want the gospel spread, regardless of what club.

Jimmy Two Times

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119621778#Comment_119621778

Yep, get all that. My club is not one of the " big six " and was promoted back to the EPL after a long absence in recent seasons. One of the main points of discussion among the local lads and ourselves revolved around whether we actually did want to get promoted and have to deal with all the stuff you are rightly pointing out as being a huge issue in the game. We knew we'd struggle to compete and would likely end up taking several hidings, all of which proved to be true.

Suppose I can identify with the local community bit as my UK friends operate on exactly the same basis. Meet in the same pub before every home game,travel to away games together and meet in the same pub for the away games year after year,off the beaten track and away from the singing and dancing younger breed of fan.

As I said previously, don't have any issue with LOI fans. Personally I just couldn't commit to supporting another team on a full time basis. Missus would divorce me like a bullet.

Surely Irish fans of Premier League teams are the west Brits.

Greyfox

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119632630#Comment_119632630

Nope, nobody is a West Brit. People are allowed to like things that originate from a different country.

Fr Tod Umptious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119615205#Comment_119615205

No it's called supporting your team, it's not my fault that my team is not based in Ireland

But it is your fault.

Because you picked what you refer to as "my team".

You are not like people who are local to teams be it in Manchester, Barcelona, Phibsborough etc where you become a fan of a team because of where you live in a city or because of what generation after generation of your family support.

You picked a team based on a brand, that brand might have been Liverpool in the 80s, United in the 90s, Man City now, but it's still a brand.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119633213#Comment_119633213

I didn't mean it literally - west Brit is a stupid term imo - but if the OP is implying that League of Ireland supporters are west Brits, what does that make Premier League fans to them?

Greyfox

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119633376#Comment_119633376

Yes my team which is based in the UK, I think your post is childish. Its not my fault that I didn't know the LOI existed when I fell in love with football.

I never said they were my local team, I said they were my team and many members of my family also feel a connection to this team. Some of the best memories of my life involve this UK team

I picked a team that I enjoyed watching, what's the point of watching football if your not going to enjoy it? The LOI is a very good league but its nowhere near as enjoyable to watch on TV. I've been to live LOI matches that were good but prefer to watch on TV.

if I'm supposed to watch a LOI team should I also be watching the amateur matches every week in my local park? You don't always get to choose what football club you fall in love with

BaywatchHQ

I don't follow soccer anymore, it is a boring sport and the Premier League is so predictable.

I would never watch Irish soccer either as I have no connection to any club. Why would I drive an hour to watch Derry city when I have zero link with that club? I would feel as much as an outsider at the Brandywell as I did at English grounds. I certainly wouldn't follow any Northern teams either as they have unionist fan bases.

If you go to the airport on a Saturday you will see the group's of loud mouthed men going to watch teams in England and Scotland. It reminds me how I don't belong in that sort of hobby.

dxhound2005

At the start of the season did you predict that Leicester would be bottom of the league after 7 games? What other predictions did you make?