Anyone falling out of love with the beautiful game?

[Wol.]

sitting, even standing next to the same people at the ground year on year is my beef, every contrived "match day experience" the same.

[Wainy316]

I have enjoyed this World Cup but less than other years. Not too interested in England's qualifying campaigns. The whole overhyped Premier League sky4 suppersunday rubbish doesn't appeal to me but I am as interested as ever in the Villa.

This covers it for me.

Oh how I'd love Skyscum to go bust. Teams would have to live within their means. Games would be on Saturday at 3pm, and if you couldn't go away you'd listen to the radio

If Sky Sports went bust, ESPN would just buy all the coverage.

[Dante_Lockhart]

I'm starting to change the way I feel about it.

It's just getting frustrating and disheartening with the insane amount of cash being thrown about, the inconsistent refereeing / FA investigations and bans, the diving and cheating, the press and reporting... I find myself getting more angry with the sport than actually enjoying it.

Bring on the NFL season.

[villan83]

There is so much to dislike about the game nowadays. It has gone from one extreme to the other in 20 years. Back in the 80s the game had no money but was a lot more honest. Yet you had crumbling stadiums, rubbish pitches and hooligan fans.

Now we have state of the art stadiums and nice flat synthetic pitches (apart from Wembley of course!) but we also players 'winning' free kicks (i.e diving) and obscene amounts of money.

The money in particular has taken all the competition out of the game now, winners are determined by how big your wallet is, The art of coaching and team building has been removed.

In the long term this will be bad for the game - People are already being turned off the England team. Once City start winning things every year and hoover up everyone elses players, paying them £500,000 a week, they will turn away from their club sides as well.

The one thing that keeps a football fan going is hope, if that hope is crushed by a billionaires wallet there is no point in going anymore!!

[Genie]

The out of form, granny shagging, smoking, street pissing aldulter getting a brand new contract making him the highest paid footballer in the world earning £250k p/w has taken another bite out of any love for the game I have remaining.

Add to this local "hero" night club fighting wife bashing Carrol gets a 5 year contract

[Dodgyknees]

I get a lot of enjoyment out of watching conference games and even games down in the Wessex league, its fun, full of players who give everything for shit money and knowing that some have to go clean windows after, yet this is their passion. It just screams football. Where-as when I watch Premiership games, see the officials making stupid decisions and never learning and seeing so much crap going on, I just go "meh"

I will always love Villa, I just don't care for football.

[chrissmith921]

its really started to wane with me when reading the write up of man city's stuffing of liverpool earlier this year, there was more reference to the issues at board room level than on the pitch...

thats where i start to think that its moving away from the game i fell in love with as a youngster

[Dodgyknees]

its really started to wane with me when reading the write up of man city's stuffing of liverpool earlier this year, there was more reference to the issues at board room level than on the pitch...

thats where i start to think that its moving away from the game i fell in love with as a youngster

And I remember the passionate debates we all used to have on the old OS, so for you to say that is shocking as you even had trials at Cardiff (??) so never expected you to be one to fall out of love!

[Zatman]

With a decent player like John O'Shea getting a new contract worth 80k a week i think i will give up now.

What a joke

[cheltenham_villa]

Still enjoy watching football but really starting to lose interest. Hate the fact that money dominates the sport and that finishing 4th is seen as a big deal. Long gone are the days when any club could win the title. Cant really be bothered with Villa anymore either, didnt renew this season and havent been to a single game yet. Admittedly ive watched as many as possible but the whole Milner thing pissed me off, MON walking out pissed me off and if i want to go to blues at the weekend ill have to spend the best part of £75 for the day to watch some boring football, in an uncomfortable seat surrounded by idiots.

rant over

[bannedfromHandV]

Funny how it's okay for movie stars to earn millions per film but professional footballers, who entertain arguably more people (Premier League players anyway), get villified for it.

But then, that is the British way isn't it? We put them on pedestals just to knock them back down when things aren't going so well.

You forget that they don't lead normal lives, not the top players anyway, it's not as if Wayne Rooney can just nip down the pub for a quick drink when he has a row with Colleen, or for Rio Ferdinand to just pop down the shops to get some fags...they're harrassed by journalists/paparazzi and can't pick their nose without a picture appearing in the red tops the next day, their wives can't sunbathe topless for fear of being snapped - though for some this is clearly their day-job anyway.

Their kids will get bullied potentially depending on how they perform and likewise family members - how many South America and African pro's have had family members kidnapped? What about Pablo Escobar??

Things are never black and white, they don't simply 'get paid millions to kick a ball around a field', that's the kind of opinion I would expect from my missus' Mum.

[Woodytom]

yes. Bored Witless with it all. Ever since Milner and MON walked out tbh. Floggin a dead horse!!!

[kurtsimonw]

Funny how it's okay for movie stars to earn millions per film but professional footballers, who entertain arguably more people (Premier League players anyway), get villified for it.

I do agree to an extent.

I definitely agree with the "they don't get paid millions to kick a ball around". You could argue some of the top players aren't paid enough. Let's say X player is on £5m a year and he's a big name player at a top club. How much do you think this player earns the club through shirt sales, winning them trophies, etc? I reckon more than £5m.