Anyone else lost it?

wanderlust wrote:Some good points made although I think that LPP's comment "fans are paying CUSTOMERS who have a RIGHT to expect value for their money" is spurious inasmuch that the definition of VFM is questionable.
Can't equate VFM to our performances because if we lose, the other team wins and fans choose to pay to watch both teams. 

If I go and watch a film and it doesn't pan out the way I hoped it would, does that mean I'm not getting VFM? 
If I bet on a horse that doesn't win, does that mean I'm getting ripped off?
The only right I really have is the right not to do it again.

Sluffy wrote:I've 'lost it' a couple of times over the years but it still draws me back after a while.

For me the club as never been my 'religion'.  I've always though people really were 'fanatics' when they go on about how they've spent most of their time and a massive wodge of their incomes following basically an entertainment company around - similar in a way as young girls follow pop boy bands about.

I've always picked and chosen what matches I've gone to rather than felt the urge to see each and every game Bolton play irrespective if I thought I would enjoy the experience or not - what is the point in going and paying your money and spending your time on doing something you are not enjoying, simply so you can say later to someone or other who probably doesn't give a fig - that you've not missed a match in the last x number of years?

Saying that though I've probably seen close to a thousand Bolton games give or take over the last 50 years.

As a kid I loved being with my dad, the atmosphere and noise at the game and talking about the match on Monday morning at school with my mates.  As a youth it was about meeting up with your mates and sharing something together - back in those days there wasn't all the media and computer games stuff around as alternative options to do, it was either go to the match or go with your mam and dad shopping in town.

As a young man it was a way of keeping in touch with your mates who had by now had got jobs, moved homes (or even out of the area) and was usually a starting point for a good day / night out, rather than just going for the game.

Around that time it also started to become an adventure in that you used to plan for away games, was there going to be any aggro, could you afford it or did you have to hitch-hike down and back?  Where were you going to meet up (remember this was a time before mobiles, sat navs and the internet) etc.

Back then most games were pay on the door so tickets were never really a problem unless it was a big match.

I first 'lost it' the year we got back to the first division under Ian Greaves.  Don't know why though?  I saw the vast bulk of our games from or rise from the third and one of my best games was the away match at Blackburn that clinced our promotion back - so why did I lose interest once we had returned to the top?

Anyway it came back again and it coincided in me moving down south so I used to travel to many games down 'here' whilst returning home on the weekends we were playing at home - best of both worlds really.

I got used to going to games on my own - usually when my mates didn't fancy travelling to 'southern' games, which were far easier for me to get to than them - but I also loved the craic meeting up with them at home games - so much so that the football was incidental in having a good time - simply a place to meet up at and go on from.

Some of my most enjoyable times have been when the club as been playing crap - as it was the company of freinds and the laughing at how bad we were that made it special - not the footy itself.

Football is dead for me - the money is stupid and people without any redeaming personal qualities are millionaires many times over - simply because they can kick a bag of wind better than most of the rest of us.

Clubs have always exploited the paying public - they are in it for a profit after all - so it makes me laugh at the poor souls who moan bitterly of how they have paid thousands over the years into the club and the club doesn't want to know their opinion of how things should be.  Why the fuck should it?  Do you think Tesco wants to hear what I think about how they run their business simply because I've shopped with them over the years since they opened their branch on Blackburn Road (near the Iron Church) some 40 odd years ago?

I really don't 'get' why some people live and breath football - it is at the end of the day simply a game.  So we lose a match - it's not the end of the world really is it?

I've loved football over the years both watching and playing it.  I follow my home town club and had many fantastic times doing so.  I want us to do well but not at all costs - hence my thread on ethics the other day.

If we win it makes me happier, if we lose it makes me sadder but neither makes or breaks my weekend because if it.

I don't watch any other football these days (World Cup apart) as all the Sky money as distorted the game out of all recognition to me - the rich get richer and the rest are just their to make up the numbers.  When the likes of John Terry and Joey Barton can become millionaires and minor celebs, then surely somebody must see that our values in life are going wrong somewhere - football is simply not that important in the scheme of things.  

Money makes money though - so morals have long since gone out the window - the game seems to be rotten to the core for me.

Freedman is on record as saying some of our players are not giving their best - what does that little snapshot tell us about life as a footballer these days?

Second division players - paid more in a week than most of us earn in a year - just to kick a ball about - and they can't even give 100% of themselves just to do that???

Something is very wrong - and we've got what we deserve for letting this happen.

I'm much too old to change my ways - I'll still want Bolton to do well and win - but I've never fooled myself that I've been valued by the club for supporting them over the years and equally neither am I shocked our amazed that the club doesn't want nor value my opinion on how it should run its business.

It's just a game - but most people these days seem to have forgotten that.

That's my opinion on Bolton and football anyway.

rammywhite wrote:To be honest I'm a bit surprised at how many of the most frequent contributors to this site no longer go to matches or go infrequently. For others their following of the club is on a take it or leave it basis.
Like others here I'm no spring chicken- but I still feel strongly about the club.
I didn't go yesterday- I had to go to an event in North Wales which finished just before 1pm.
I then bust a gut to get to the Reebok to watch the game( breaking the speed limit on the odd occasion).
I didn't get there because of a long delay on the M62 near Warrington- but I bust a gut trying.
For me going is still important. Perhaps its catharsis ,letting off some steam, tribalism, enjoying the pain of watching the trash that's served up. I think I like the idea of choosing games -but |I've got a season ticket so that I don't have to apply for tickets or queue to get them. I like my seat and I like the people round about me.There's a couple of idiots who shout fair-mouthed abuse at everyone, some decent local people who, like me ,enjoy a good moan at the club.
I get there abut 2.30 to get parked up in front of DFS so that I don't have to pay for the car park.
It's the season ticket bit- I'll have one next year so that I know that I have the choice to go or not. And if I've got one I intend to use it -because next season is going to be better than this one. Without one I might not turn up at all. So it's because |I've spent the money that \I intend to use it - it guarantees that when the good times return, my seat is already mine

rammywhite wrote:To be honest I'm a bit surprised at how many of the most frequent contributors to this site no longer go to matches or go infrequently. 

luckyPeterpiper wrote:

wanderlust wrote:Some good points made although I think that LPP's comment "fans are paying CUSTOMERS who have a RIGHT to expect value for their money" is spurious inasmuch that the definition of VFM is questionable.
Can't equate VFM to our performances because if we lose, the other team wins and fans choose to pay to watch both teams. 

If I go and watch a film and it doesn't pan out the way I hoped it would, does that mean I'm not getting VFM? 
If I bet on a horse that doesn't win, does that mean I'm getting ripped off?
The only right I really have is the right not to do it again.

wander I'm not talking about the result of the match. Obviously we will lose from time to time because even the best teams in the world do that. 

I mean have I (a) been shown a performance in which I believe the players have given their best even on their bad days (ie max effort) and (b) have I been entertained, in other words did I enjoy myself. VFM isn't a way of saying we must win or I'm not coming again. It means we must be doing our best to provide an enjoyable experience for those people who pay large amounts of money to come and watch. 

I would say that at the moment the footballs is dull and lethargic (although today was better in parts and we probably should have won) and has been going downhill ever since the last year of big sam's reign, it's not at all solely DF who has brought us to this low ebb. 

As I said in my previous post I am not personally at the point of voting with my feet as yet but I understand those that are and I feel sorry for the 'go to all games no matter what' group because they are being taken for a ride. Football is the only business I know where the paying customers are effectively treated as traitors by their fellow customers for deciding they aren't getting value and want to hold onto their money rather than just give it to the club for effectively nothing in return. It's NOT a fan's duty to do that at all, it's a club's duty to do its best to make the fans feel their cash is worth handing to the club. The club does not do us any favours by existing and taking our money, we aren't privileged to hand our cash to them and ungrateful louts when we don't. In the final analysis BWFC's employees ALL work for us not the other way around just as any retail business, be it a shop, a cinema or a ten pin bowling alley employees all effectively work for the CUSTOMERS because its they who provide the money to pay the wages. In football the fans are the reason why Sky and others throw millions at the game, they don't do it to be generous or kind but because they expect to get a profit from it either via subscriptions or increasing sales of their goods and services. Without us there's be no point in sky paying a billion quid for TV rights and no point in advertisers buying a space on the hoardings etc etc. 

So yes, we have a RIGHT to value for OUR money but I don't mean we have to win every game, just that I feel I had an afternoon that was worth forking out my cash for and not wasted it on a bunch over paid twerps who didn't even try under a manager who has no clue how to play anything remotely entertaining and even less idea about how to get the best out of the aforementioned twerps. 

I give BWFC a LOT more leeway than I would any other form of entertainment because I love the club but I don't have unlimited patience nor do I love it blindly. I want the club to be doing its best every time they play to earn my money. They could be in the conference and I'd still go if I felt they were doing that. Right now I'm a long way from sure that they are or that there's any sign they're going to again in the near future.

wanderlust wrote:That's why Nuts isn't representative of the average BWFC fan who has the option to go every week.

Sluffy wrote:Some of my most enjoyable times have been when the club as been playing crap - as it was the company of freinds and the laughing at how bad we were that made it special - not the footy itself.

Sluffy wrote:To be pedantic RT, I suggest the League Cup Final (v Liverpool) or the two FA Cup semi's ( Villa and Stoke) all at Wembley are that much closer to your dream.



Speaking of which is anyone masochisic enough to watch this?

luckyPeterpiper wrote:wander the other team doesn't concern me. I'm not helping to pay their wages etc, at least not directly apart from the FA Cup (third of the gate goes to each club and a third to the FA or at least that used to happen) so if they perform badly or don't look committed that's something I leave to their fans to berate. 

I care only what BWFC players do to try and earn the privilege of taking my money. 

Make no mistake, I don't expect to be seeing barca style play every week, I don't expect to be oohing and ahing over the brilliance of the display. I know some games will be dire, scrappy affairs but as long as I feel the team is doing its best to entertain me then I can accept that sometimes it won't be a dazzling affair. Weather, the pitch, the referee and officials can all conspire to turn what could be a flowing and entertaining match into something drab and obviously we can't always control that. Sometimes the opposition will play ugly and sometimes we'll need to be defensive and not pretty ourselves. 

I just want to be able to feel that the entertainment on offer is the best BWFC can provide, that they value my custom enough to give their best every time in order to earn my repeat business. Under Megson I felt they weren't and had no intention of doing so. Under Freedman I haven't reached that point myself yet but I fully sympathise with those who have.

Sluffy wrote:

wanderlust wrote:That's why Nuts isn't representative of the average BWFC fan who has the option to go every week.

Not sure I agree with that view Lusty.

We certainly have a load of Season Ticket holders who are regular posters on here and if you look at the gates we get compaired to the population of the Wanderers catchment area, then I would think we are as reasonably representative as any random group of people with a shared interest in the club.

People go to the game - or not - for their own reasons.  For instance at times I've not bothered going to home games when I lived in Bolton, yet I've travelled round trips of over 300 miles in a day to watch them play at home when I've been living down south.

At the end of the day what does it really matter?

If people want to attend every game season after season, or not bother going since Adam was a lad, then that's down to them - their time and money their choice.

We all still care about the club in someway or other though, otherwise non of us would be spending our time on here, would we?

COYWM.