Football Programmes Centre

Wullie · Joined: 10 Jun 2009 Posts: 3423

It's often said of Manchester City , you can't buy class. Manuel Pellegrini comes out to wave goodbye after a successful few years by any standards and the place is almost empty. Maybe the fans are just spoilt nowadays. It didn't take long did it ?

goonerboy · Joined: 24 Aug 2009 Posts: 1050

I was at Etihad today and I have got to say I was very surprised that so many City fans left a few minutes before the end when game was 2-2 and City pressing for a winner. Then at the final whistle nearly all the city fans left even though there was the end of season lap by the players and Pellegrini's last match. There was nearly more Arsenal fans at the end than City ones. Where were all those "true City fans". Seems that after all the hardcore are a few thousand at best.

roughyedz · Joined: 16 Jul 2010 Posts: 608 Location: Oldham

Im sure all the above will be in the first programme of the new season ........

oldbolt · Joined: 06 Jun 2009 Posts: 434

I listened to some of the match on the local radio, the ex City player im not sure who it was,was concerned about there being a half empty stadium for the presentations if City didn't win.If they'd drawn 1-1 rather than lost 1-0 in Madrid the ground would no doubt have been packed to the rafters.At the final whistle there were a few boos when City only drew.
Going back 15-20 years when Bolton had a better team than Manchester City for a few seasons, there were a few City fans referring to their higher placed neighbours as Bolton "Whingers" on the radio phone ins and the letters page in the Pink believing the Bolton fans enjoyed a right good moan.
I think recent events are proving which set of fans are the greatest whingers in the area.

hydemaine · Joined: 17 May 2009 Posts: 651

I was there after the match yesterday.

But then again I always am. Win lose or draw I alway wait till the crowd disperses so I can get on the tram

I go to City by train from Liverpool were I live and then get the Metrolink to the ground from Piccadilly.

I was disappointed the majority left. It was such a flat feeling. It was a cracking match City should have won but for their two defensive errors.

To summarise I would say that the true fans expectations of this season have exceeded the ability of their aging squad.

But it does make me laugh about teams such as Sunderland Newcastle Middlesbrough etc that when they go down a league or in our case two and when they have a bad season they pontificate about our support? Who averaged and always will 30k in the 3rd tier. I can remember all three getting 17-20k Let alone walking out early because they were disappointed.

Wullie · Joined: 10 Jun 2009 Posts: 3423

There is a slight difference between walking out when you're bottom and fighting relegation every season , and winning trophies. Just seems so ungrateful . Most Arsenal fans will admit Wenger is well past it, but i bet he'll get a hell of a send off when then time comes.Dick Advocaat got a fantstic response for saving Sunderland from relegation . Peter Reid is a legend for finishing 7th . Clough was still a God and Forest when going down. Pellegrini won City the title and it's forgotten in two years . I'm quite embarrassed for the poor bloke.

Goonerak · Joined: 01 Oct 2011 Posts: 189

Wullie wrote:

Most Arsenal fans will admit Wenger is well past it, but i bet he'll get a hell of a send off when then time comes.

The way things are going, civil war will break out!

Rocky · Joined: 15 Jun 2009 Posts: 1541

hydemaine wrote:

But it does make me laugh about teams such as Sunderland Newcastle Middlesbrough etc that when they go down a league or in our case two and when they have a bad season they pontificate about our support?

Don't forget Hartlepool...they are from the North East and they have also pontificated in the past.

Dorking · Joined: 05 Feb 2010 Posts: 2531

Wullie wrote:

There is a slight difference between walking out when you're bottom and fighting relegation every season , and winning trophies. Just seems so ungrateful . Most Arsenal fans will admit Wenger is well past it, but i bet he'll get a hell of a send off when then time comes.Dick Advocaat got a fantstic response for saving Sunderland from relegation . Peter Reid is a legend for finishing 7th . Clough was still a God and Forest when going down. Pellegrini won City the title and it's forgotten in two years . I'm quite embarrassed for the poor bloke.

Well said. Expectations are everything. Arsenal should really have been succession planning about 3 years ago. In a perfect world, Wenger could become technical director (as Fergie should have done at Man Utd) and it would be seamless.

I think Arsenal are taking the easy option for as long as possible and leaving it alone, as 3rd or 4th place every season keeps the cash pouring in, and the Arsenal fans only moan once a year when they go out of the CL at the last 16 stage (again).

The gamble building up for Arsenal is eventually Wenger will go and with no natural successor they could find themselves being grateful for 5th place every season.

Sorry, veering off topic somewhat.

Karb · Joined: 21 Jan 2015 Posts: 462

hydemaine wrote:

I was there after the match yesterday.

But then again I always am. Win lose or draw I alway wait till the crowd disperses so I can get on the tram

I go to City by train from Liverpool were I live and then get the Metrolink to the ground from Piccadilly.

I was disappointed the majority left. It was such a flat feeling. It was a cracking match City should have won but for their two defensive errors.

To summarise I would say that the true fans expectations of this season have exceeded the ability of their aging squad.

But it does make me laugh about teams such as Sunderland Newcastle Middlesbrough etc that when they go down a league or in our case two and when they have a bad season they pontificate about our support? Who averaged and always will 30k in the 3rd tier. I can remember all three getting 17-20k Let alone walking out early because they were disappointed.

It's not a fair comparison though, to compare Sunderland's crowds in the late 80s with City's in the late 90s. Crowds everywhere were much lower in the late 80s.

As an example, I've just dug out the programme from SAFC's visit to Maine Road during your promotion season of 1988-89. Admittedly it was early in the season, but in the 6 games you'd played, you averaged less than 20,000 - which included good crowds against (relative) neighbours in Oldham and Blackburn. Barely 16,000 had turned up for the Brighton game.

Whereas, 10 years later, when Sunderland won promotion from the second tier, their lowest crowd of the season was 34,111, and the average 38,745.

That said, however, I will agree that City have always been a well supported club

Wullie · Joined: 10 Jun 2009 Posts: 3423

Football pre Hillsborough was dying on it's feet. Personally i loved those days, but crowd figures don't lie. I wonder if the new 10,000/20,000 obtained are as fanatical ? If Manchester City won the title in those days they would have built a great big statue of the boss outside the ground . Now it's title one year , 4th next. Goodbye, next. Expectations of the maga rich foreign owner's has rubbed off on to the fans.

hydemaine · Joined: 17 May 2009 Posts: 651

Wullie

you are quoting rhetoric from today's media outlet's which you have fed off.

Would you call fans of another club as having 'no class' back in the 1980's ?

No you wouldn't because the term hadn't been invented back then.

You might as well throw in having 'no history' etc.

The Manchester City fans have remained loyal through thin and thinner

We deserve a pass on this one for the reasons I've outlined previousy and I admit I was disappointed with the walk out but to start a thread off that we have no class is wrong.

Also just because we have had massive investment doesn't actually make us fans any richer . What should we do? Boycott the owner because he's dragging us down?

gatfb · Joined: 05 Nov 2011 Posts: 333

'It's often said of Manchester City , you can't buy class.'

The sort of cliched comment that says more about the person and their prejudice who made the comment than the team and supporters they're trying to denigrate.

Of the many things you could criticise Citeh fans for I do not see how class can come into it.

To be honest they gave a second rate manager who should've walked the title every season during his tenure the send off he deserved.

Five and In · Joined: 15 Sep 2015 Posts: 1447 Location: Dawlish, Devon

Everybody in the media etc is focusing on this "snub" to Pellegrini.
Has anybody considered how the players felt walking out for their lap of appreciation with so few there?
Whatever the outcome of the season, the likes of Hart and Aguero have not let anybody down.
They must have been surprised to say the least.

Dorking · Joined: 05 Feb 2010 Posts: 2531

It's just modern football, not specific to Man City. Whichever of the three teams in the frame stays up in the Prem this season, their fans will celebrate as much as Leicester fans when they won the title (well not quite, but nearly)

However its fair to say that not everyone who goes to any game is a 100 percent fanatic who lives and dies that club, and necessarily wants to stay and cheer, or perhaps has circumstances that allows them too.

Palace won an FA Cup semi the other week and probably a third of Palace fans left straight away at the final whistle. We've waited over 2 decades for that and lost 5 semi's in a row before it!

Or what about England fans at Wembley - in the last qualifying campaign, England won 10 out of 10 games - the perfect record. Yet after 85 minutes of the 8th game (- at Wembley, which secured qualification) the usual stream of fans leaving to catch the tube home. And by the time the lap of honour/appreciation took place after 94 minutes, there was probably only a fifth of fans left in the ground to clap them round!

It's not just a Man City thing, it affects pretty much all clubs. Your modern fan is happier beating the traffic, getting home, then watching anything significant on Sky.

Anyone genuinely thinking it is just a City thing probably has an agenda against City!

Five and In · Joined: 15 Sep 2015 Posts: 1447 Location: Dawlish, Devon

Anyone genuinely thinking it is just a City thing probably has an agenda against City!

Completely agree Dorking. It's not just City, but their absentees were highlighted on Sky, so they are taking the heat.

Wullie · Joined: 10 Jun 2009 Posts: 3423

If Sunderland win tomorrow watch what passion and football is all about. And all for finishing 4th bottom. If they ever won the league it would be remembered in 100 years not forgetting after two.

hydemaine · Joined: 17 May 2009 Posts: 651

Steve Bruce and Gus Poyet were both clapped off by Sunderland fans.

Tynie Topics · Joined: 26 Nov 2009 Posts: 3572

From a disinterested viewpoint with no axe to grind, if Man City fans left in large numbers then it does raise the question of what it is they expect these days.

League Cup Winners, Champions League semi-finalists for the first time ever, top 5 finish, and the last home game of the manager (and probably a player or two) who won them the league last season yet they don’t seem fit to stay behind and at least show some appreciation of their achievements?

Is this what football has become in the millionaires playground of the EPL?
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hydemaine · Joined: 17 May 2009 Posts: 651

Unfortunately YES but it's not just City it's everywhere and for someone to pick up on what happened they must have been sat at home watching it on Sky. It's not just City where the fans have a wrong sense of entitlement.

My point is that Wullie is singling City out as having 'no class' because he watched it on Sky on Sunday and used that phrase because he has heard it used by pundits and journalists.

That's also an indictment of the modern football fan believing the negativity poured out to make up newspaper columns or viewing figures because it's a story.