Over in Spain, poor old Celta Vigo have found themselves on the wrong end of a bollocking and an actual CASH MONEY FINE from La Liga chiefs. Their crime? Not getting enough fans in. No, seriously – there’s an actual La Liga which stipulates that clubs need to fill a minimum of 70% of their ground, with extra attention being paid to the bits that the TV cameras can see.
It might sound churlish and heavy-handed but perhaps they’re on to something over in Spain.
Maybe it’s time that sanctions were taken against British clubs for a series of seemingly trivial offences. MAYBE THEN THEY’D KNUCKLE DOWN AND STOP BEING SUCH DICKHEADS.
I’ve scratched out a list of possible footballing crimes that the FA could criminalise overnight, thereby transforming ‘the beautiful game’ for the better and bringing in some much-needed revenue for grass roots blah blah etc etc and all that bollocks…
GOAL CELEBRATION MUSIC
Obvious, but a long-running and heinous crime. Like the continued existence of ‘This Week with Andrew Neil’, everyone hates it but no one seems to be prepared to do anything to make it go away. Now is the time. Goodbye forever, ‘I Got You (I Feel Good)’ by James Brown, puked out of a tinny tannoy system for the final time as your team squeaks a late consolation goal at the wrong end of a 3-1 home defeat.
PLASTIC CLAPPY ATROCITIES
As deployed by Leicester City and more recently, Huddersfield Town. ‘If atmosphere cannot be created by the sounds and smells of the human body alone, it is not atmosphere – it is an illegal backstreet circus.’ Franz Beckenbauer said that. Probably.
GLOVE ABUSE
Sure, the British winter can be nippier than a ferret with a rubber band tied around its knackers and I get why some players need to to cover their extremities from the vicious freezing temperatures, but when a player is sporting the gloves during a midweek match in late September, the game, as they say, has ‘gone’. Financial censure is the only solution, and NO, it’s not just the foreign players you racist pig.
HIRING HARRY REDKNAPP
Just send him on his way and pay the fine. Seriously, it’ll cost you less in the long run…
FANS LEAVING EARLY
We’re all in this together and if your team’s players are having a nightmare, you’re obliged to stick around and endure it all. It’s not the same as a shit Adam Sandler film, where you’ll happily walk out after 35 minutes of awfulness. Football fans keep going on about passion and emotional attachment – you’re not just consumers, so stick around to the bitter end or the FA will be slapping a fine down on your asses.
This does not apply to the hardcore early leavers at my own team, Sunderland, who now turn up, march through the revolving turnstile and keep marching straight out again. They’ve suffered enough.
THE UNDISCLOSED FEE
More detachment between club and fan. We’re financing this shit one way or another, be it through admission costs or TV subscriptions and merchandising sales. We need to know exactly how much of our hard-earned cash you’re spunking on that Serbian left back. So we can throw it back in your faces when he’s given away two penalties in 20 minutes in a play-off semi-final.
OVERT SOCIAL MEDIA SHITE
If you sign a new player, just tweet his name and a photo of him wearing the shirt or holding the scarf. Stop doing eight-minute-long cryptic YouTube videos – this isn’t Cannes, you pricks.
WEST HAM UNITED
Sorry but they just get right on my tits. Fine them. Fine them hard.
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