2019/01/13

Against All Liars


Incredibly strong stuff from Britain. A Newcastle fan wants coach Rafael Benítez to resign in protest of the situation at the club under Mike Ashley's ownership.
This reminds me the times when all BPFC fans judged by media were "guilty" but not the stingy Mr. Hristolov, the club owner for 11 years. Nowadays story goes same way as journalists are turning a blind eye to what happens with the Botev's stadium construction delay. Fans are going to react again and are ready to be maljudged again. This time because of a slowly work and démagogie driven by a local oil taycoon who is expected to put more passion, money and efforts. Plovdiv fans are feeling he simply hasn’t done enough to invest and only bla-bla is airing around the bleeding spot at 10, Iztochen Boulevard.
Seeing rich men use a football club to line their own interests while the fans suffer is unbelievably frustrating. It is hard to criticise these people for not being willing to splash out amounts of money ala Abramovich, Berlusconi, Bernard Tapie, Claude Bez etc. The sort of person who wants to own a football club these days is, at times, exactly the sort of person you do not want owning a football club. Attempts at regulating ownership have proven painfully inadequate. Football clubs, with their market, branding, relatively small entry stakes and - in many cases - prime urban land - could scarcely be better designed to attract the liars. The bitter irony is that, in the vast majority of cases, the owners of your football club don’t care about you. They are not in this for your happiness. They are in this for their own happiness, their own prestige, and usually their own profit. Occasionally, happily, your aims and theirs may coincide: superstar signings, a swanky new stadium, wins, points, titles, trophies. But don’t for a moment think they are doing any of this for the benefit of the society.

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