Some football supporters - and human beings in general - are man children that struggle to process their emotions correctly.
Its not exactly a revolutionary point you're making here

And we get it - your field involves close work with athletes, so you're not coming at this purely as a spectator. You would naturally have more sympathy than the average punter. Can't expect everyone to have that same level of sympathy

Gazza M wrote:

Some football supporters - and human beings in general - are man children that struggle to process their emotions correctly.
Its not exactly a revolutionary point you're making here

I  ertajnky thought so aswell but the  resistance against the point would suggest otherwise. 

@[deleted] I guess I feel like you've gotta accept that football and all the money that pours into it are mainly there because its a venue for fans to feel silly things about something silly.

Even if your fans are all well behaved and "getting behind the team" they're still paying for tickets to cheer wildly for eleven men in jester's outfits trying to stick an inflated bit of leather past eleven other men into a random rectangle hung with netting and you can't, in the end, remove the childishness and absurdity from that—and all the grace and beauty of the sport relies on that childishness, consisting as it does of a simulated conflict with little underlying meaning beyond the attention it diverts from the drudgery of everyday life, and the large sums of money moving around.

Burnwinter wrote:

@[deleted] I guess I feel like you've gotta accept that football and all the money that pours into it are mainly there because its a venue for fans to feel silly things about something silly.

Even if your fans are all well behaved and "getting behind the team" they're still paying for tickets to cheer wildly for eleven men in jester's outfits trying to stick an inflated bit of leather past eleven other men into a random rectangle hung with netting and you can't, in the end, remove the childishness and absurdity from that—and all the grace and beauty of the sport relies on that childishness, consisting as it does of a simulated conflict with little underlying meaning beyond the attention it diverts from the drudgery of everyday life, and the large sums of money moving around.

The fans can do what they like, and I can point out the stupidity of it. Truth be told they enjoy rosting some of our players. They had fun watching almunia shit himself when they all shouted at him everytime he came out of his goal.

The vib around a club is huge, it impossible to fully comprehend unless you've been in that enviroment. When things go bady the board will blame the manager and he'll blame some players and coaches. Imagine the pressure our set piece coach is under now. He'll have arteta down his neck, he'll be wanting more time with the players but arteta has to set that timetable and every other coach/ sports scientist wants time with those players aswell even the physios will be asking for time for injury prvention drills.  When you get a real positive vibe around the place everyone is living in the moment and living their best life. Arsenal fans seem to revel in the negative shit which is why AFTV and blogs endlessly create that content.  It's really unhelpful for getting a good vibe around the club. Look at klopp he ooozes charisma and the club is buzzing it's a huge help and the point of being a fan.

But again, the tone of your post implies the fans are responsible for initially sparking the positive vibe, when that's not the case. the fans reflect and amplify what they see and feel on the pitch, but it starts with what the club produce. Arteta has already said the club is responsible for giving supporters something to shout for. That's the kind of accountability you want to see, not the tail wagging the dog. fans didn't turn liverpool around- klopp led and they followed. Your arguement in reminiscent of the type of mentality wenger was espousing during his lowest times at the club. It is also devoid of the context that fans have been watching the club slip into mediocrity over the course of 10 years

Gazza M wrote:

But again, the tone of your post implies the fans are responsible for initially sparking the positive vibe, when that's not the case. the fans reflect and amplify what they see and feel on the pitch, but it starts with what the club produce. Arteta has already said the club is responsible for giving supporters something to shout for. That's the kind of accountability you want to see, not the tail wagging the dog. fans didn't turn liverpool around- klopp led and they followed. Your arguement in reminiscent of the type of mentality wenger was espousing during his lowest times at the club. It is also devoid of the context that fans have been watching the club slip into mediocrity over the course of 10 years

He doesn’t get it.

He sounds more like AFTV then he realises.

I knew that Klopp and super Liverpool would not be far behind, never mind those super fan scousers have booed and heckled managers  and Players they didn’t like. Where was that super support when they hired Hodgson? 

Where was that super fan mentality towards record signing Andy Carrol?

No, Liverpool after making mistake after mistake, woke up and secured by far and away the consensus best manager appointment in the world after Guardiola. In fact due to his attitude and style, the best appointment Liverpool could make.

Even then in his first season there was lots of murmurs that he style would not work in the premier league, and he couldn’t organise a defence to save his life (from Liverpool fans). Now when there were clear signs that he was steering the club in the right direction the fans followed.

If Arteta has the same trajectory, our fans would be overflowing with positivity.

The answer is the same, it is for the club to show the fans they are serious, and then the fans follow.

Singling out players is a waste of time, but blaming the fans for certain players form is also a complete waste of time.

Gazza M wrote:

But again, the tone of your post implies the fans are responsible for initially sparking the positive vibe, when that's not the case. the fans reflect and amplify what they see and feel on the pitch, but it starts with what the club produce. Arteta has already said the club is responsible for giving supporters something to shout for. That's the kind of accountability you want to see, not the tail wagging the dog. fans didn't turn liverpool around- klopp led and they followed. Your arguement in reminiscent of the type of mentality wenger was espousing during his lowest times at the club. It is also devoid of the context that fans have been watching the club slip into mediocrity over the course of 10 years

Look I said earlier the players, thr fans, tbe manager can all do a bit better. So I haven't put this at the fans feet. 

I also said theirs lot of negativity thats over the top which their is. And that makes things a bit harder which is does. I'm not suggesting thr fans need to set the tone. But when fans are bashing our best midfiekd we couldn't play without their being more negative than is called for. And some of that is fueled anger form sources like AFTV and shit blogs ect that has people primed to loose their shit easily.

ohboy!!! wrote:

Singling out players is a waste of time, but blaming the fans for certain players form is also a complete waste of time.

I said regularly abusing a player can make a 1 or 2/10 difference to their preformace. I just not sure how you can argue with that.

ohboy!!! wrote:

Gazza M wrote:

But again, the tone of your post implies the fans are responsible for initially sparking the positive vibe, when that's not the case. the fans reflect and amplify what they see and feel on the pitch, but it starts with what the club produce. Arteta has already said the club is responsible for giving supporters something to shout for. That's the kind of accountability you want to see, not the tail wagging the dog. fans didn't turn liverpool around- klopp led and they followed. Your arguement in reminiscent of the type of mentality wenger was espousing during his lowest times at the club. It is also devoid of the context that fans have been watching the club slip into mediocrity over the course of 10 years

He doesn’t get it.

He sounds more like AFTV then he realises.

I knew that Klopp and super Liverpool would not be far behind, never mind those super fan scousers have booed and heckled managers  and Players they didn’t like. Where was that super support when they hired Hodgson? 

Where was that super fan mentality towards record signing Andy Carrol?

No, Liverpool after making mistake after mistake, woke up and secured by far and away the consensus best manager appointment in the world after Guardiola. In fact due to his attitude and style, the best appointment Liverpool could make.

Even then in his first season there was lots of murmurs that he style would not work in the premier league, and he couldn’t organise a defence to save his life (from Liverpool fans). Now when there were clear signs that he was steering the club in the right direction the fans followed.

If Arteta has the same trajectory, our fans would be overflowing with positivity.

The answer is the same, it is for the club to show the fans they are serious, and then the fans follow.

Singling out players is a waste of time, but blaming the fans for certain players form is also a complete waste of time.

Hahaha you knew I say something? I said klopp has charisma and it makes a difference. Then you made stuff up about me saying things about the Liverpool fans which I've not said. 

Liverpool fans were positive about Klopp because he's a great manager with a great track record and provided them good football and an upward trajectory very quickly. They also had owners backing Klopp in the market, etc A few years before that when Gillet and Hicks were still in charge the put out a video where they claimed they were raping the fans, I mean talk about embarrassing.

That video was cringeworthy.

Not saying you don't have a point in there Speedy about how collective fan behaviour affects the club and individual players, I just can't get behind the moral imperatives about how football fans have to behave, and what they should say, beyond the big picture stuff like racism or hooliganism. Totally fine by me to call things stupid, it's just being a sports fan is itself, in its nature, a somewhat strange psychological phenomenon where we transfer in a lot of joy and stress from regular life, and you can't really take that out of the picture and still have the sport, it's fundamental.

Yeah I don't buy this rationale. Real Madrid and Barca have some of the most demanding and least patient fans turning on a dime. By this causal logic how could they ever win anything.

Of course fans and the atmosphere of fans contributes to the environment that footballers play in but that is part of top level sport and you know that's part of the deal of playing at a high level there is big pressure.

Whilst there may be a minority of fans that enjoy seeing failure that is not the majority and as highlighted in this thread fans are reacting to what they see on the pitch. Frustrations with players don't exist from the outset people watch to see how players get on.

Me and I'm sure many people's opinions are formed from numerous matched and seeing how they perform. Mustafi didn't become an unfavored player for no reason. It was consistent poor performance that led me to judge he isn't a good player. Those initial performances were not occurring in an atmosphere where he was targeted but in fairly neutral situation. The reality is he's not good enough as a player.

Arsenal fans are not anymore toxic then other clubs. The reality is playing at this level is demanding and puts lots of pressure on people. If a player is not able to navigate their way through that and perform then they might not be cut out to play at this level.

Can we have a separate thread for this debate about supporters, as I don't see much in the last 6 pages / 100 posts to do with the subject for this thread. Not saying that the debate is not without merit, just not for this thread.

To me it's not a question of whether Arsenal fans are worse than other fans, but whether their behaviour ends up damaging the team and the image of the club.

I think we have to be careful in general when we talk about passionate people who pour a lot of their money into the pockets of some rich fuck on the other side of the world who blatantly doesn't give a rat's ass about the club they devote so much of their lives to. If we want football to be about emotions then this is always going to be part of the deal. People will get frustrated by the contemptous attitude shown towards something they love, and they will take it out on the wrong things. It's also unfair to blame the home crowd solely, because social media and newspapers are just as responsible for the harsh climate. I do think however that every grownup person, both as individuals and as part of a group, are responsible for how they conduct themselves, and certain behaviour will inevitably reflect poorly on them and the group they belong to.

Players are human beings and some acknowledgement of that simple fact would go a long way. There was a good interview with Denilson in The Guardian a while back where he talked about the massive depressions he suffered in London, and being heckled by the fans didn't help. There was a German interview a few months ago where Mustafi talked about his kids being bullied and harrassed because their dad plays football. I think that perspective is needed. There's a human side to football, a little deeper than surface level but it's there, that is both more sympathetic and more interesting than the image building and brand awareness that fans generally prefer to engage with.

Lastly, the argument can't simply be that anyone who is affected negatively by constant abuse isn't cut out to be a professional football player. That just means the sport will become a breeding ground for narcissists and psychopaths, completely antithetical to the community and team spirit values it pretends to cheerish. The dialogue about mental health in Premier League has thankfully come a long way, but it has a long way still to go. We're doing it a disservice by conflating human reactions with a lack of character.

Good post, Klaus.

Klaus that's a fair post and I didn't mean to disparage that players are human beings as well. My comment around character was less about getting the types of abhorrent abuse like you mainly get online. It's was more that in any field when you put yourself forward to be at the elite there is scrutiny, pressure and analysis. If your saying I'm good enough to be the best etc that's a hyper competitive environment and people will look at you and say are you?

That's more what I meant without the fan specific element although that is why football affords the opportunities it does as well. So if you're character is I don't like people to scrutinise me because it determinately affected my performance then that's were I'd suggest elite football or anything like that might not be the best place for you because that is the reality of that level.

I don't think Arsenal are any different to another fan base. The thing with our club is we have been in decline and failing for the past 10+ years and that erodes the fans belief in the players and there is inevitably a bit less trust in the club. Of the 'top' teams we have certainly been at the lowest level for longest period so we have the most accumulated negativity unfortunately.

My Dad just told me a story of a game he went to at Highbury in the 1970s. The fans were giving Sammy Nelson stick. What did he do? Turned to face them and pulled his shorts down. Mooned the crowd

A few weeks back the Tuesday Club podcast were doing book reviews of various Arsenal player autobiographies and it was pretty striking - particularly in the Perry Groves book - how several of old school generation indulged in what would now be identified as self destructive behaviour patterns. I think only Alan Smith and Ray Parlour were capable of navigating through their careers with minimal issues, I suspect largely because they had a stable life off the pitch.

awooga83 wrote:

Yeah I don't buy this rationale. Real Madrid and Barca have some of the most demanding and least patient fans turning on a dime. By this causal logic how could they ever win anything.

Real could buy laca, auba, xhaka for discounted prices because players dream of going their and still ahve transfer budget left. They have a lot of leeway for error.
But when they've consistently turned on a player like bale like fat ronaldo. Those players have clearly not preformed at their own best level since. Cheers for highlighting that. Youve highlighted even the top top playsrs in the world are effected by thr abuse. 

Everyone is effected by endless negativity. Its really weird to think those who have a talent for football all share a mental trait that makes them immune to ongoing abuse.