Will you be watching?

[Stan]

8 minutes ago, Michael said:

How else is a country of only 300k people going to fill an 89,000 or even a 69,000 capacity stadium? We have to be realistic here. 

How can they have such a big football culture when they can't fill their stadiums with their own people? Bit of a contradiction there, no?

[Michael]

32 minutes ago, Stan said:

Pretty sure there was quite a fair bit of reporting about the threat of racism, hooliganism and culture in Russia.

 

Perhaps not as sustained as what we've seen for Qatar and this tournament, but the political climate in Russia perhaps also wasn't as bad as what we see currently with Ukraine. The Salisbury poisoning thing was closer to that tournament than the Ukraine conflict/war. To say there was hardly any criticism is incorrect, I believe.  

Yes, well that came out, because the Russian hooligan groups publicly threatened England fans coming to Russia. Given the terrible fights between England and Russian fans in previous tournaments, the media was correct to cover the official threat expressed overtly by the Russian hooligan gangs. 

But my point was mainly referring to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Crimea and Donbass at the time. There was very little media critique of that during the 2018 World Cup, at least in the UK and the US. Russia was engaging in endless fighting and killings in Ukraine(Donbass), while the World Cup was ongoing in Russia. Nothing much was said about this during the World Cup by our media, this is my main issue. 

[Michael]

2 minutes ago, Stan said:

How can they have such a big football culture when they can't fill their stadiums with their own people? Bit of a contradiction there, no?

They had smaller stadiums before, which obviously wouldn't have been appropriate for the World Cup. Are you suggesting that all small countries with small populations, say under 500,000 can't have a big football culture? It's all relative to their population size, isn't it?

[Stan]

Just now, Michael said:

They had smaller stadiums before, which obviously wouldn't have been appropriate for the World Cup. Are you suggesting that all small countries with small populations, say under 500,000 can't have a big football culture? It's all relative to their population size, isn't it?

No but I don't get how you can claim a country can have 'footballing culture' when they have to bring in ringers to fill a stadium. 

I'm not saying countries with small populations can't have footballing culture. I'm saying they can't claim to have a big one when they can't fill the stadiums they make with their own citizens. 

[Michael]

7 minutes ago, Stan said:

How can they have such a big football culture when they can't fill their stadiums with their own people? Bit of a contradiction there, no?

It's not a contradiction, because if you have a total population of 300,000, how on earth are you going to fill an 89,000 capacity stadium? I

[Michael]

1 minute ago, Stan said:

No but I don't get how you can claim a country can have 'footballing culture' when they have to bring in ringers to fill a stadium. 

I'm not saying countries with small populations can't have footballing culture. I'm saying they can't claim to have a big one when they can't fill the stadiums they make with their own citizens. 

How is a country with a total population of 300,000 people going to fill an 89,000 capacity or 69,000 capacity stadium? It's completely unrealistic. We don't have 20 million or 15 million people looking to attend England home games, even when England play a big match. That's the proportionality we are talking about here.

[Rucksackfranzose]

9 minutes ago, Michael said:

How is a country with a total population of 300,000 people going to fill an 89,000 capacity or 69,000 capacity stadium? It's completely unrealistic. We don't have 20 million or 15 million people looking to attend England home games, even when England play a big match. That's the proportionality we are talking about here.

Ahem, Qatar had 2.68 m inhabitants in 2020. their first tier consists of 12 clubs, that's 1 first tier club for 223.3period k inhabitants. Their average attendance was between 300 and 500 people. In comparison: German village Auersmacher have 2,578 inhabitants their 5th tier club SV have the same average. How can you say Qatar had a football culture?

[nudge+]

24 minutes ago, Stan said:

Don't a lot of countries promise new stadia and refurbished stadia in order to hold World Cups/Euros though?

This isn't me saying Qatar does have a football culture. It pales into insignificance to countries that have held the tournament in the past, but new/refurbished stadiums is normal for countries that bid. 

Sure, refurbished/new stadiums is normal for bidding countries, and if I'm honest, I always found it a bit controversial, as on many occasions, the construction displaces thousands of people and has a massive impact on environment, while the stadiums have no use once the tournament is over. The point I am trying to make is that the only reason Qatar got the chance to host the World Cup was because they bribed FIFA with crazy amounts of money, and then they had to completely change the footballing calendar because the country's climate wasn't even suitable for having the tournament there in the first place. So no suitable climate, no stadiums, no fans, no culture. 

[nudge+]

45 minutes ago, Michael said:

They do have a great football infrastructure now though with those stadiums, don't they? Of course, they are just built for the World Cup. But the fact that it is now there for the World Cup, is a positive thing. I mean, you can't expect a country of only 300,000 locals to have an 89,000 capacity stadium under normal circumstances, it just wouldn't make any sense. Even South Africa, who have a significantly larger population than Qatar, couldn't find use for many of their specially built stadiums, after the 2010 World Cup. 

As for footballing culture, football is played regularly all over the country. It's their national sport I believe. Most local games might not fill stadiums, but when it's a big cup game, they do get quite full. But again, what can we expect from a country of 300,000 people? Percentage wise, equate that to England or Germany, in terms of those interested and not interested in football. It would probably work out around the same, in terms of those interested. The fact that there is usually a significant turnout for their national team, despite their small population, is a positive thing. Hiring those Lebanese Ultras is a bit much, but I guess the Qatar authorities wanted their stadiums as full as possible, when the national team played. How else is a country of only 300k people going to fill an 89,000 or even a 69,000 capacity stadium? We have to be realistic here. 

But that's exactly the point... it doesn't make sense for a country with 300.000 citizens (as apparently expatriates and migrant workers do not count, for some reason) to have an 89.000 capacity stadium, and the same way it doesn't make any sense for the said country to host a World Cup. As for attendances - average attendance in domestic league is around 500, and even that is largely made up of migrant workers and paid fans. In fact, the presence of paid fans has been cited as one of the reasons why they do not like attending local games by the Qataris themselves... So what kind of football culture are we talking about here? Watching Premier League on the couch in an air-conditioned palace while sipping tea doesn't count. 

[nudge+]

Also, I don't get how people can seriously talk about separating football and politics. Ideally, yes, that would be the case, but professional sports have always been political, and football is probably the most politicised sport ever! It's a reflection of society. Origins of hundreds of football clubs are political, entire fanbase identities, fan friendships and rivalries are heavily rooted in political leanings and ideologies, FIFA is political, the game is regularly used as a platform for political messages.

[Michael]

1 hour ago, Rucksackfranzose said:

Ahem, Qatar had 2.68 m inhabitants in 2020. their first tier consists of 12 clubs, that's 1 first tier club for 223.3period k inhabitants. Their average attendance was between 300 and 500 people. In comparison: German village Auersmacher have 2,578 inhabitants their 5th tier club SV have the same average. How can you say Qatar had a football culture?

We are talking about the population of Qataris here, aren't we? The 2 million migrants, where football is not popular in their countries of origin, are hardly going to really watch the Qatar national team, let alone Qatar club sides. You are wrong about the average attendances as well. The average attendances for Qatar league matches ranges between 2,000 to 10,000 people, depending on the size of the match. Which makes sense given their population size. The capacity of some national team stadiums in countries where football is popular, and where there is a similar population as Qatar, is 10,000.

[Stan]

2 minutes ago, Michael said:

We are talking about the population of Qataris here, aren't we? The 2 million migrants, where football is not popular in their countries of origin, are hardly going to really watch the Qatar national team, let alone Qatar club sides. You are wrong about the average attendances as well. The average attendances for Qatar league matches ranges between 2,000 to 10,000 people, depending on the size of the match. Which makes sense given their population size. The capacity of some national team stadiums in countries where football is popular, and where there is a similar population as Qatar, is 10,000.

Where are you getting your stats from?

 

Football is fairly popular in some of those countries?

 

 

[Michael]

57 minutes ago, nudge said:

But that's exactly the point... it doesn't make sense for a country with 300.000 citizens (as apparently expatriates and migrant workers do not count, for some reason) to have an 89.000 capacity stadium, and the same way it doesn't make any sense for the said country to host a World Cup. As for attendances - average attendance in domestic league is around 500, and even that is largely made up of migrant workers and paid fans. In fact, the presence of paid fans has been cited as one of the reasons why they do not like attending local games by the Qataris themselves... So what kind of football culture are we talking about here? Watching Premier League on the couch in an air-conditioned palace while sipping tea doesn't count. 

You can count migrant workers if you want, but around 2 million of those migrant workers come from countries where football is not popular at all. Anyway, we are mainly talking about Qataris here aren't we, as they are the ones who are the most likely to follow their national team and their own clubs, we are talking about their football culture, right? So your basic argument then, is that smaller countries shouldn't host a World Cup? What about a much larger country like South Africa, that also specifically built stadiums for their World Cup, but now don't use most of them? Should they not have hosted the World Cup? By the way, you are wrong about the average attendances for club games, the average attendance figures are around 2,000 to 10,000 according to sources. Bigger games/clubs within their country, obviously attract bigger crowds. But as we've already confirmed, the locals have a small population as it is.

[Michael]

On 01/12/2022 at 12:01, Stan said:

Where are you getting your stats from?

 

Football is fairly popular in some of those countries?

 

 

India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Philipines, Sri Lanka? ... really? How popular is it in those countries? Add the expats from those countries and it's over 2 million.

[Rucksackfranzose]

35 minutes ago, Michael said:

We are talking about the population of Qataris here, aren't we? The 2 million migrants, where football is not popular in their countries of origin, are hardly going to really watch the Qatar national team, let alone Qatar club sides. You are wrong about the average attendances as well. The average attendances for Qatar league matches ranges between 2,000 to 10,000 people, depending on the size of the match. Which makes sense given their population size. The capacity of some national team stadiums in countries where football is popular, and where there is a similar population as Qatar, is 10,000.

No, we talk about inhabitants, nationality doesn't matter as nobody controls it at the attendance. By the way a part of the foreigners in the country are rich people from countries with football culture. Qataris paying their workers, or should I say almost slaves not enough to attend can't be used as an excuse here. On a side note nobody has researched how many of the attendance are indeed Qatari, so the average would be perhaps even lower, if the foreigners were excluded from the numbers.

[nudge+]

2 minutes ago, Michael said:

You can count migrant workers if you want, but around 2 million of those migrant workers come from countries where football is not popular at all. Anyway, we are mainly talking about Qataris here aren't we, as they are the ones who are the most likely to follow their national team and their own clubs, we are talking about their football culture, right? So your basic argument then, is that smaller countries shouldn't host a World Cup? What about a much larger country like South Africa, that also specifically built stadiums for their World Cup, but now don't use most of them? Should they not have hosted the World Cup? By the way, you are wrong about the average attendances for club games, the average attendance figures are around 2,000 to 10,000 according to sources. Bigger games/clubs within their country, obviously attract bigger crowds. But as we've already confirmed, the locals have a small population as it is.

Well you have to count them in, considering that it's mostly those migrant workers who get paid to attend the matches... It's not only relevant for football either, the same issue has been plaguing volleyball in Qatar as well. And no, I am not really wrong about attendances, either. Your "sources" is literally a single article from the official Qatar Stars League website from 2014, which has been taken down and only the archived link is provided by Wikipedia. In fact, only available figures for average attendance in QSL is from 2016/2017 season, and at that time, it was a whopping 672. After that, there's absolutely no indication of official attendances. Gee, I wonder why.

And no, my basic argument is not that "smaller countries shouldn't host a World Cup". My basic argument is that countries that have no football culture, existing football infrastructure, active domestic fans, suitable conditions and only just bribe their way throughout the bidding process shouldn't host a World Cup. And yes, South Africa shouldn't have hosted the World Cup either, because they bribed their way to it, too. 

[Rucksackfranzose]

Could we put that talk football were non-political to bed, please? A reminder for those, who are advocating it: Why are Russian clubs temporarily excluded from UEFA competitions? Because Russia invaded the Ukraine, which is political! Why are Israel UEFA members? Because, most Asian Islamic countries refused to play against them, which again is political! Why were South Africa banned from International football til 1990? Because of Apartheid, o look another political reason! In other words football never were nor is non-political, that's only a myth.

[Dr. Gonzo]

2 hours ago, Michael said:

India, Pakistan, Nepal, Philipines, Sri Lanka? ... really? How popular is it in those countries? Add the expats from those countries and it's over 2 million.

Isn’t football fairly popular in India and Pakistan in terms of viewership of foreign leagues?

[Dr. Gonzo]

1 hour ago, Rucksackfranzose said:

Could we put that talk football were non-political to bed, please? A reminder for those, who are advocating it: Why are Russian clubs temporarily excluded from UEFA competitions? Because Russia invaded the Ukraine, which is political! Why are Israel UEFA members? Because, most Asian Islamic countries refused to play against them, which again is political! Why were South Africa banned from International football til 1990? Because of Apartheid, o look another political reason! In other words football never were nor is non-political, that's only a myth.

And aren’t national teams generally just rooted in the concept of nationalism?

And nationalism is a political concept.

[nudge+]

Just now, Dr. Gonzo said:

Isn’t football fairly popular in India and Pakistan in terms of viewership of foreign leagues?

It's also the most popular sport in Nepal, and fairly popular in the Philippines.

I looked at some stats earlier today, India's TV viewership of both domestic and international football is said to be at around 60 million. The average attendances in the Indian Super League are around 15.000, with the best supported club having an average attendance of almost 35.000, and the worst supported club of almost 5000. That's actually decent and more than I expected. 

I think the only country on that list that truly has little interest in football is Sri Lanka. 

[nudge+]

4 minutes ago, Dr. Gonzo said:

And aren’t national teams generally just rooted in the concept of nationalism?

And nationalism is a political concept.

Yeah, I'd say that the very concept of international sports competitions with teams representing each country is inherently political in nature.

[Tommy]

17,44 Mio people watched the game in Germany last night. Highest number of the tournament so far, but still far away from the usual numbers of previous tournaments. 

[Michael]

22 hours ago, nudge said:

Well you have to count them in, considering that it's mostly those migrant workers who get paid to attend the matches... It's not only relevant for football either, the same issue has been plaguing volleyball in Qatar as well. And no, I am not really wrong about attendances, either. Your "sources" is literally a single article from the official Qatar Stars League website from 2014, which has been taken down and only the archived link is provided by Wikipedia. In fact, only available figures for average attendance in QSL is from 2016/2017 season, and at that time, it was a whopping 672. After that, there's absolutely no indication of official attendances. Gee, I wonder why.

And no, my basic argument is not that "smaller countries shouldn't host a World Cup". My basic argument is that countries that have no football culture, existing football infrastructure, active domestic fans, suitable conditions and only just bribe their way throughout the bidding process shouldn't host a World Cup. And yes, South Africa shouldn't have hosted the World Cup either, because they bribed their way to it, too. 

Well, we can dispute the attendance figures, but it would just be speculation from both of us. However, what I will tell you, is that for the big club games, the stadiums do get pretty full and there are mainly locals amongst the fans, you can tell by the way they dress. I am sure for some of the smaller clubs in the league, that they will struggle to get fans. Heck, I am also aware that a few of the smaller Qatari clubs were only founded in recent years. It's hard to see how they would garner a significant fan base. 

But from my time in the Middle East, I did visit Qatar. The enthusiasm for the game of football from the locals, whether that be the UAE or Qatar was immense. Whenever we would go to the beach, we would see the local lads playing football everywhere, to the point where it got annoying at times, because there'd be teams everywhere playing football. It was often challenging to find a space of our own on many occasions, just to relax at the beaches. There were also football pitches everywhere, and there would always be locals playing on them. So, the passion for the game is definitely there, among a significant part of the populace in that region. Qatar are also the reigning Asian Cup Champions, that has to count for something. I mean, I know that the Asian Cup doesn't mean too much for many of us in the West, but it is the equivalent of our European Championships to them. 

I was going to press you on the 2018 World Cup that was held in Russia and how that of all World Cups, was clearly the most controversial. But I will save you the headache of answering, as I scrolled back and read some of your previous messages from weeks back. I understand that you were/are against the South Africa, the Brazil, the Qatar and the Russia World Cups(for obvious reasons). That's fair enough, as by feeling that way, you are clearly being consistent. The problem is that corruption permeates everywhere, it's just a sad fact of life in our capitalist society. We could even say that the next World Cup, that will be jointly hosted by the USA, is clearly another controversial World Cup. What with the USA's destructive foreign policy of the last 20 to 30 years. They caused the death of 1 million people in Iraq and have helped to turn Afghanistan back into the most backward countries in the world again. That's only to mention a couple of their terrible meddlings in other countries affairs, in recent years.

I understand your disillusionment, but if I were to also fixate too much on some of the terrible things that go on, I probably wouldn't have watched the Russia World Cup. But I did watch it, not because I was a fan of Putin's tyrannical regime, but because I am still a fan of football and because I was happy that the joy of hosting the World Cup would have brought a lot of the Russian people. Just as I am happy for the people of Qatar today and the people of South Africa and Brazil, when they hosted the World Cups. Unfortunately, I think there will always be corruption within FIFA. This has been going on since the 70's, and sadly, I believe that it will continue in the future.

 

[nudge+]

11 minutes ago, Michael said:

Well, we can dispute the attendance figures, but it would just be speculation from both of us. However, what I will tell you, is that for the big club games, the stadiums do get pretty full and there are mainly locals amongst the fans, you can tell by the way they dress. I am sure for some of the smaller clubs in the league, that they will struggle to get fans. Heck, I am also aware that a few of the smaller Qatari clubs were only founded in recent years. It's hard to see how they would garner a significant fan base. 

But from my time in the Middle East, I did visit Qatar. The enthusiasm for the game of football from the locals, whether that be the UAE or Qatar was immense. Whenever we would go to the beach, we would see the local lads playing football everywhere, to the point where it got annoying at times, because there'd be teams everywhere playing football. It was often challenging to find a space of our own on many occasions, just to relax at the beaches. There were also football pitches everywhere, and there would always be locals playing on them. So, the passion for the game is definitely there, among a significant part of the populace in that region. Qatar are also the reigning Asian Cup Champions, that has to count for something. I mean, I know that the Asian Cup doesn't mean too much for many of us in the West, but it is the equivalent of our European Championships to them. 

I was going to press you on the 2018 World Cup that was held in Russia and how that of all World Cups, was clearly the most controversial. But I will save you the headache of answering, as I scrolled back and read some of your previous messages from weeks back. I understand that you were/are against the South Africa, the Brazil, the Qatar and the Russia World Cups(for obvious reasons). That's fair enough, as by feeling that way, you are clearly being consistent. The problem is that corruption permeates everywhere, it's just a sad fact of life in our capitalist society. We could even say that the next World Cup, that will be jointly hosted by the USA, is clearly another controversial World Cup. What with the USA's destructive foreign policy of the last 20 to 30 years. They caused the death of 1 million people in Iraq and have helped to turn Afghanistan back into the most backward countries in the world again. That's only to mention a couple of their terrible meddlings in other countries affairs, in recent years.

I understand your disillusionment, but if I were to also fixate too much on some of the terrible things that go on, I probably wouldn't have watched the Russia World Cup. But I did watch it, not because I was a fan of Putin's tyrannical regime, but because I am still a fan of football and because I was happy that the joy of hosting the World Cup would have brought a lot of the Russian people. Just as I am happy for the people of Qatar today and the people of South Africa and Brazil, when they hosted the World Cups. Unfortunately, I think there will always be corruption within FIFA. This has been going on since the 70's, and sadly, I believe that it will continue in the future.

 

You believe Qatar has a strong football culture, while I don't believe that's the case at all; and I don't think either one of us is going to be convinced. Other than that, honestly, I am not even sure what we are debating here anymore. You are watching, I am not, we both made our reasons clear, nobody has to justify themselves and nobody is going to care about it either way, so what's the point? I think we have fundamentally different views regarding the sport. As I said a quadrillion of times already, I'm not even "boycotting Qatar" as such, I am simply not watching the tournament the same way I didn't really watch several previous ones or Champions league or top European leagues etc., and the same way I won't watch the next one either, mainly because I am fed up with what professional football has become and lost almost all interest in it and don't want to be supporting those fucked up developments in any way. The additional controversies of Qatar as a host only made it worse, and for me, this tournament is pretty much the epitome of everything what's wrong with modern football. Also, as I said a quadrillion of times already too, I don't mind if others watch it or not (although I obviously am glad to hear when others have the same stance as I do), but the defeatist attitudes and the discrepancy between some people's alleged beliefs and their behaviours just do my head in at times (aka "oh FIFA and the FA is so corrupt but let's accept and ignore it and keep generating revenue for it because there is nothing we can do about it anyway", or "modern football is so baaad man, but wait a second let me just buy another TV subscription and order another overpriced shirt because I only have twenty five older ones I ordered in the past 3 years, oh but did I mention how money was ruining the sport and how they are milking the fans???", or "Super League plans are evil, the owners of my club are dodgy fucks, they are all greedy corrupt bastards, but hey nevermind, it is what it is, I will keep on supporting them and spending my money for it anyway while I complain about it" etc etc etc). Anyway, rant over, back to work.

[Michael]

On 01/12/2022 at 14:55, nudge said:

It's also the most popular sport in Nepal, and fairly popular in the Philippines.

I looked at some stats earlier today, India's TV viewership of both domestic and international football is said to be at around 60 million. The average attendances in the Indian Super League are around 15.000, with the best supported club having an average attendance of almost 35.000, and the worst supported club of almost 5000. That's actually decent and more than I expected. 

I think the only country on that list that truly has little interest in football is Sri Lanka. 

I believe that cricket is the most popular sport in Nepal, while in the Philippines, basketball is the most favoured sport, followed by several other sports ahead of football. International football is pretty popular in most countries. The English Premier League and some of the other top European leagues garner a lot of viewership in most countries. So, I think that combining international football with domestic football, when it comes to football TV viewership, will have most likely skewed that number in India. For all intents and purposes, I don't believe that football is particularly popular in Sri Lanka, Pakistan or Bangladesh either. As for the attendances in the Indian Super League, I think that we'd expect those attendance figures, even if football isn't generally popular in the country, given that India has a population of around 1.4 billion people. 

12 hours ago, nudge said:

You believe Qatar has a strong football culture, while I don't believe that's the case at all; and I don't think either one of us is going to be convinced. Other than that, honestly, I am not even sure what we are debating here anymore. You are watching, I am not, we both made our reasons clear, nobody has to justify themselves and nobody is going to care about it either way, so what's the point? I think we have fundamentally different views regarding the sport. As I said a quadrillion of times already, I'm not even "boycotting Qatar" as such, I am simply not watching the tournament the same way I didn't really watch several previous ones or Champions league or top European leagues etc., and the same way I won't watch the next one either, mainly because I am fed up with what professional football has become and lost almost all interest in it and don't want to be supporting those fucked up developments in any way. The additional controversies of Qatar as a host only made it worse, and for me, this tournament is pretty much the epitome of everything what's wrong with modern football. Also, as I said a quadrillion of times already too, I don't mind if others watch it or not (although I obviously am glad to hear when others have the same stance as I do), but the defeatist attitudes and the discrepancy between some people's alleged beliefs and their behaviours just do my head in at times (aka "oh FIFA and the FA is so corrupt but let's accept and ignore it and keep generating revenue for it because there is nothing we can do about it anyway", or "modern football is so baaad man, but wait a second let me just buy another TV subscription and order another overpriced shirt because I only have twenty five older ones I ordered in the past 3 years, oh but did I mention how money was ruining the sport and how they are milking the fans???", or "Super League plans are evil, the owners of my club are dodgy fucks, they are all greedy corrupt bastards, but hey nevermind, it is what it is, I will keep on supporting them and spending my money for it anyway while I complain about it" etc etc etc). Anyway, rant over, back to work.

I never said that I believe that Qatar has a "strong" football culture. They do not have one of the strongest football cultures in the world or anything. The claim was that Qatar do "not" have a football culture. My opinion is, that they do have a football culture that has a presence. Football is played regularly by people in Qatar, whether on the pitches or on the beaches. Football is even played in the summer, when it can get very hot there. It's also regularly watched on TV by many people in the country. Football is also the national sport of Qatar and by far the most popular, even though many other sports are played in the country. It's the national sport, unlike in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and the Philippines. Moreover, an interesting factual statistic, is that in a match between Qatar and the UAE at the end of 2021, 63,500 people attended to watch that match. The majority of those fans will have been Qatari supporters, as they were the home side. Not a bad turn out for a country with such a small population such as Qatar.

I fully understand and respect your consistent stance, even though I don't necessarily apply it myself. I guess my love for football, makes me prioritise watching it, when perhaps I shouldn't on principle, given the corruption in the sport. But if a European Super league does ever come about, you will never find me watching it, as I have strongly been against the idea for years. As for hypocrites, well, you will find them everywhere. There will always be those who complain, but who at the same time buy most of their club's merchandise, and who consistently, pay for football TV subscriptions and season tickets.