Why do Irish people support English teams?

Road-Hog wrote: »

Heysel finished me with Liverpool and English clubs in general....there are still those out there that blame the stadium, the Italians and about everything else apart from themselves

Average age of fan who attendee Liverpool home games is 41 .

That would make them 7 year old at the time of Heysel ,

Hardly there fault is it or should we start to hold people responsible for other people actions ?

howiya wrote: »

The real reason those LOI fans get offended is based in economics rather than anything to do with the standard.

They imagine what the league could be if people stopped spending money on foreign teams and instead spend it on their local LOI team boosting what they could spend on facilities and club development or more likely higher wages for players.

Football is a product and we are all consumers who choose to spend our disposable income on different variations of that product. Clubs are businesses and need to promote themselves better if they want an increased slice of that spend. That's the cold reality of it.

Lots of fans including myself do not have an local team
,
I think finical gain if all locals went supported there local teams would not be a big as you think , In Dublin you have 6 teams In the top two division's

Place like Bray have 32 thousand people in all living there ,Athlone 21 thousand that people in total ,


There isn't the numbers of people to make these clubs big

redmgar wrote: »

At the end of the day does it matter?
Its just a load of men kicking a ball around a field.

It matters if you like judging others to feel superior

Barbrady wrote: »

I say this as a LOI supporter:

LOI fans: Stop criticizing Premier League fans as barstoolers, plastic fans etc etc. You cant attract new fans by criticizing them.

Premier League fans: Go to a game, the players are not as high a standard obviously but the games are still entertaining and you can still support your english club as well. Its a night out and if you have kids its a night out for them too.

Neither of them are going to happen!
LOI is in a catch 22 situation. People won't go because the crowds and facilities are terrible and the crowds and facilities are terrible because the crowds won't go.
It would be great if we had a strong league with 15-20k people going to games and representatives in the CL

A question to fans who have a LOI and premier league club:
Which team would you rather see win their league? Honest answers.

Everyone has their own personal reasons I'm sure but heres my own personal experience on why i support a foreign team.

I first got into football at the launch of the premier league. Lots of money, lots of glamour and building publicity. These guys had flare and fame and it was understandable why any young impressionable lad would be interested. There was premier league stickers, full length tv programs doing the build up on saturday mornings and match of the day. Overall it was a very attractive product that was talked about on the playground. Most of my friends followed man utd so i assume i naturally tried to fit in and also followed man united. There was never any talk of league of ireland.

The irish soccer team also had unfounded success in the early 90's and everyone got behind them. These were national idols who played in the premier league. Keane and Irwin being just two of mine.

I was also interested in most sports. Gaelic football in particular. I was reguarly brought to club and Dublin GAA games which naturally kept my interest but i was interested and attracted by all sports.

Then as i got older i realized i did not nessecarily have any affinity to manchester united. I wasnt from manchester and didnt feel the same connection as i did to dublin gaa. My support then faded towards man utd and although i still enjoyed the product, i would have no longer considered myself a supporter by the age of 12. If anything i now always supported the underdog as united were ao dominant!

Soon after that time i remember the bohs and roddy collins hype starting to build and i got behind that train. I remember asking my father to bring me to those games and i really enjoyed it. Some great memories especially when bohs were going do so well.

I do however remember when i started getting old enough to go the games on my own or with a friend. The bohs hardcore fan base was loud and energetic so i wanted to get closer but over time i also started thinking maybe this isint for me. I found the abuse and hatred shared between some opposing fans was odd and didnt represent me. "Northside till i die", "i fcking hate rovers" and others seemed out of place in the sport i was used to. Some of it seemed really heated, over the top and verging on thuggery. I wasnt even from the northside! I was used to the GAA where we shared heated banter but where my family would mix in the bars and clubs after. There was no real hatred and we were all one people. Something which i was more comfortable with and being from a fairly nationalist sporting household, i could identify with more.

Maybe if i had been brought to a pats game i would have stayed more interested but pats werent exactly nearby my home either! I had never heard of anyone supporting pats so it would have even been a bit odd and out of the blue if i requested my dad to take me there.

Then when i was also very young i also supported celtic. Probably the same reason as why i supported united. Plenty of glamour and publicity and most of my friends supported them. I had been brought to a game or two in my teens when i was impressionable but it really made an impact. This was a club built by irish immigrants and where they still fly a tri-colour over the stadium. I thought this was fairly remarkable and where i had family members who had immigrated to all over the world this really struck a cord. I remember the people were incredible over there. All of irish decent and so friendly and welcoming. I had never experienced this at a soccer game. Even most of the songs sung represented a connection to me.

Most of my friends still follow united. I dont but i still really enjoy the product and am kept engaged through the amount of air time it gets on both tv and conversation amongst my friends.

I still feel a connection to celtic which is stronger to what i feel to any irish club. Its a pity but maybe if i had different role models influencing me or if there was a club located closer to me, then i might have stayed engaged to domestic football.

Annd9 wrote: »

That's all well and good if you see football as pure entertainment , just like going to the cinema . Reality is far different though , sport in general brings on emotions totally different to any other form of "entertainment" .

Loi fans get offended when people wonder why our national team is not doing well , when people get up in arms over some youngfella deciding to play for his OWN country , when you are asked who you really support ? , when foreign football fans get bemused at all the English club jerseys on our streets .

I could go for hours but in my opinion it's a loosing battle , supporting Loi is hard work a lot of the time and most Irish people are simply not motivated or passionate enough to stick in there .

Look at crowds for run of the mill league games in the Gaa or Pro 14 , not great by any standard and some of these players are the best in the world at their sports so obviously standard doesn't come into it .

This is all fine btw , we love a bandwagon . It's when the "Best fans in the world " tripe comes out(specifically the national team ) that i and a lot of Loi fans get pretty pi**ed off .

Its not a case of fans not being passionate or motivated , fans pay a fortune to go watch there teams in England and Europe a few times a year because they are passionate

LOI just have to get over the fact that a lot of people aren't interested and prefer to support other teams,

Are you trying to say LOI have more affinity to the national team ? How ? The vast majority of players who play on our national team play in England ,


What point are you trying to make ?

I didn't support an English club coz a family member did - the complete opposite. My much older brother supports Liverpool....I hated them all because of him...because it was Liverpool this, Liverpool that...bla bla bla....all day every day....so I wanted them to lose....so I went looking for the club that was nearest to causing them to lose, which at the time was Everton.....and I supported them....and it stuck. I didn't even know at first that they were Liverpool's local rivals, I was just happy when they won the league coz it meant Liverpool didn't!

The nearest club to me growing up was the now defunct Kilkenny City - but as someone who grew up with a father as a former Laois county player and then county team selector, I had the GAA mentality ingrained in me and I would never in a million years have supported any team called Kilkenny - even though I liked soccer. I played for my local soccer team, but there was nobody at a decent level to be a supporter of.

I don't watch football and even i know the answer to this one.

Because Irish teams are ****e.

European teams and games are shown less often etc plus language barrier.


Its like asking why do Irish people watch the BBC instead of RTE? You KNOW why. The Brits make great TV.

And if you are thinking 'Oh they think England is better than Ireland etc' Yes YES because you would have to be delusional think that Irish football was in any way on the same level as English football.

So if you LOVE good quality football you will want to watch good quality football the best quality etc. When you add in the language factor etc and the fact that we have the BBC you have your answer.


The REAL question is why watch football when you COULD be watching hurling?

Football is boring it's slow. Its not watchable. It was created by the English! And they are fantastic at it.

Hurling is wild fast and untamed! Like us! Its SAVAGE!

Ardillaun wrote: »

The language reasons are gone for supporting Man U over the likes of Barcelona. You can watch the best teams with commentary in English and the players are interchangeable as well. If you simply wanted the best, as opposed to LOI, you should have cheered for Messi and Ronaldo for years now.

Very true. Although i can't assess football quality I know nothing about it.

I would imagine language is the main reason for the preference over non English speaking teams.

ILoveYourVibes wrote: »

I don't watch football and even i know the answer to this one.

Because Irish teams are ****e.

Yet you get tens of thousands out to watch the Republic Of Ireland national team. Why not follow elite European nations if that's the logic?

You brought up hurling. What if your own county is ****e? Just follow Kilkenny or Waterford because they're better?

Alicano wrote: »

Luton Town fan here My folks lived there in the 60's.. Brother and Sister born there. Uncles attended school in Luton for a while. Think my Gran worked in Vauxhall for a bit too So yep. Luton Town all the way. Sorry if slightly off topic.

Completely on topic and completely on point!

galwayllm wrote: »

Why do Irish people watch Eastenders or Corrie?

You're point OP can't be used for many many formats?


It's a mute point....



Cmon the Pool & Galway Utd.....

Yeah, but seeing as we can read it, it doesn't need to be heard!

Or we could support who we like and allow others to have their own interests also

Even before we joined the eu ,irish people watch english soccer on tv,
brexit has not happened ,right now the UK is an eu member .The
uk is located in europe as much as france or germany is.
so saying we all should switch over to watch french or german soccer makes no sense.
I,M not just going to switch over to watching french youtube video,s just to align with some pro european agenda .

8-10 wrote: »

Or we could support who we like and allow others to have their own interests also

This, I don’t see why someone’s like or dislike of something needs to be analyzed to death or even understood by anyone else...you like pizza, holidaying in Spain, labradors, playing golf, the Grateful Dead (the band), Liverpool FC, table tennis, Alfred Hitchcock movies...enjoy it ALL...in life, do and enjoy what makes you happy and fûck the ‘but why ???’ merchants, they suck the life and good out of everything, if you let em.