Modern England fans. Boo all the time.

18 Nov, 2010 Jonathan F England, Fan Culture, Internationals, Latest

At half time of England vs France, England were booed off the pitch. Now, the problem with booing the team off is that whether intended as a show of displeasure aimed at a collective or not, when you boo one you boo them all. So at half time, England fans booed Jordan Henderson, 20 years old and making his debut. They booed Ben Foster. And they booed 21-year-olds Kieran Gibbs and Andy Carroll, both new to the England setup. At half time of a friendly that is supposed to represent one of the greatest moments of their professional lives. What a way to boost confidence and inspire performance. And people wonder why players play for England with heads down.

The sense of entitlement with which England fans now treat their national team has grown to beyond ludicrous proportions. France are no mugs. Despite a poor World Cup in South Africa they still have some of the world’s best players at their disposal (Florent Malouda was once again magnificent). Yet we boo and sneer at our players for having the temerity to be outplayed by some very good players or for going into the dressing room 1-0 down at half time.

From where has this condescendingly conceited, unsupportive terrace attitude emerged? England may wear white shirts, but this is not Real Madrid where scowls and white handkerchiefs accompany anything not deemed near enough to perfection. For all their high demands, Real Madrid’s standards are at least borne out of a glorious history full of dazzling football and even more dazzling silverware.

By contrast, one World Cup aside the history of English football at national level is littered with spectacular failures. Embarrassing defeats and era-defining bungles are far more English – from the brutal exposition of England’s insular complacency by the Magical Magyars of the 1950s to the ruthless savaging by the Ozils and Mullers of 2010. Winning big is the exception, not the norm. Yet still the sense of entitlement and the idea of glory and success as some sort of English birthright persists.

What gives us this right to boo England at every juncture not quite to our taste? “We pay our money, we can act how we like” is the popular reply. Yes we pay our money. But as far as I can tell it is not the players that set ticket prices. Fans find it all too easy to boo players who, as far as the relationship’s dynamic is supposed to work, are there attempting to provide them with entertainment and joy.

Yet when it comes to the truly important matters and the people in the corporate boxes who truly deserve scorn, who truly deserve boos and whose efforts or integrity do genuinely deserve questioning, invariably not a peep is to be heard. In a week in which the great institution that is Sheffield Wednesday lies on a life support machine barely breathing, Sir Dave Richards waltzes casually around Wembley smiling, knighthood under his belt, without so much as a frown in his direction.

That the culture of the ‘average supporter’ in England is changing is becoming increasingly unquestionable. Rising ticket prices have ushered in a different kind of supporter and entertainment is now demanded rather than hoped for. Far be it for me to suggest no-one should boo their team under any circumstances. There are undoubtedly times when player efforts are so wilfully negligent that booing ends up being the only recourse.

But the notion of being so affronted by a slightly below-par performance such as England’s in the first 45 minutes against France that you rise from your seat, crease your face, contort your neck muscles and verbally scorn a team you turned up no less than an hour ago to supposedly offer your support is baffling. It also smacks of a complete disconnect from the reality of what it is to support a team.

They say football reflects the society of which it is part, and that does also help explain the current predicament. Depressingly, booing your team off is now all part of the ‘experience’ at modern top-flight football grounds in England. Arsenal, Chelsea and Spurs fans have all heckled their team off the field in recent weeks – and those are supposed to be the more successful clubs where defeat is an irregular stranger.

Perhaps the culture of our modern society does play a part. In England, reality TV shows like the X-Factor class as our most popular forms of entertainment. We tune in, we judge people, we cheer the ones we like and castigate the ones we don’t, we tune out. Blame culture is everywhere. It is only natural these traits enter our football by osmosis.

The line dividing what is reality TV and what is sport is becoming ever more blurry. Sport is a TV show and everyone wants to be Simon Cowell.

(photo by yvestown on Flickr)

England, Fan Culture

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About Jonathan F

The boss of this here... Creator and Editor of Just-Football.com, world football analyst, watcher, freelancer and all-round enthusiast. French football analyst for Football Radar. Write for FourFourTwo, have also written for ITV, When Saturday Comes and others.

17 Comments

kt
November 18, 2010 • 11:25 am

In other, less tolerant nations the players would be physically attacked. English fans are actually relatively patient and respectful (ask foreign players).

We boo because no other nation gives so much in return for so little. We boo because we see men who earn in a week what we earn in five years yet can’t pass, who are lionised as greats but are actually mediocrities. We boo because it’s all we can do to show our frustration, and because ‘the underlying technical deficiencies in youth coaching means we can never compete’ doesn’t work as a chant. We boo because we care.

It’s sad that not enough people recognise Dave Richards to boo him, and that’s why the bastards continue to get away with it. But that thought makes me boohoo rather than boo.
Bobby Orange
November 18, 2010 • 2:19 pm

I blame the X-Factor and Simon Cowell…he’s taken booing mainstream and changed society in the process.
Ffwtbol
November 18, 2010 • 5:20 pm

Excellent post. Worst thing is there’s no way of counter-booing. If 200 fans out of 3,000 boo a team off at HT, as Cardiff did at Reading recently it reflects badly on all of us. Applaud or boo. There has to be a third way?
Tom
November 18, 2010 • 10:56 pm

Slightly below par?! England were woeful in that first half!! You only need to read the numerous articles in the media today to realise the gulf in… competence? I wish I could find a better word but this is what it seemed like as an observer at Wembley last night. Gareth Barry was a disaster, give me the heart and workrate of Scott Parker any day of the week. Fabio refuses. Give me Richards, Onouha, Phil Neville at right back. Poor old Jagielka is not cut out for that position. These were jusyt 2 problems in a team display which lacked any fluency, cohesion or fight.
The phrase ‘attempting to provide them with entertainment and joy’ really gets to the heart of the issue – quite simply, there was no effort. Just an assemblance of players without any tactical game, in complete contrast to the French. So we end the game hoofing the long ball again.
10/10 to you from getting a reaction with your piece but im afraid I cant agree with the premise that England fans were not entitled to boo. A gap in technical levels is acceptable (understandable?), a total lack of any semblance of team spirit, fight and, worst of all, EFFORT, is quite simply not. Capello needs to start drilling the team like his French counterpart who, let us not forget, has been in charge for barely 3 months.
In summary: booing is not helpful, but something must change soon with this England set up for the fans to change their ways. I suggest Fabio starts by taking a look at some players he has decided are simply out of the picture.
Dustin
November 19, 2010 • 11:32 am

Anyone remember that Simpsons episode where Lisa was in the second best band in the world, playing their number 2 hit, Born to Runner Up! And when they started playing the entire stadium started booing them. Lisa then wakes up from this dream and says “Why did they come to our concert just to boo us?”

Kinda how I feel with this situation…if I was just going to Boo the whole time I wouldn’t bother showing up.
josh groban
November 19, 2010 • 8:12 pm

have you seen england play for the past 3 decades?
the only reason we have lost total relevance is the EPL is the money league right now and we still get 4 IFAB votes because we invented the current rules (no other sport does that, not judo, nor hockey…)
try to watch EPL that isnt the top 6 teams and wallow in english football that is Stoke-Sunderland, Blackburn vs Bolton and so on.

its painful to watch.

booing means people still care.
its when indifference hits that it will already be too late.

as for pressure, italians were booed less than a year after 2006.
greek fans attacks coaches and teams routine switch managers a couple of times per year. throw in the mafia in italy, bulgaria, ukraine and other countries on top off all those small countries where the national team is all they have and spare me the ‘oh, its so much harder to play in england’.
Plenty of national teams have gotten booed before, this is nothign new.
Philip
November 19, 2010 • 8:23 pm

I completly agree with tom here. The booing doesn’t stem from us losing, it stems from the apparent lack of effort, direction and purpose our team seems to play with. It is like we are unsure of the manner in which we are meant to play with. Its farcical. I have been living in Paris for a few months now and I was brought up in Brussels and I can tell you that the French were absolutly astounding at how poor we were and not just poor, they kept going on about how the least you expect from any England team is energy and aggressivness. England only committed four fouls all game. Now im not saying we should be fouling people on purpose but it just shows the lack of engagement. I want to feel pride in my national team even if they don’t win. I was proud of the team of 96, I was proud of the team of 98 and ive been proud on a few occasions since. I genuinely think no one has a clue what is going on. We looked like a team attempting to play like an Italian team and sitting back controlling the game sticking to our positions doing what we’ve been instructed to do. There is no imagination, no initiative, no fantasy, no speed no nothing. Players just don’t seem to be able to just have fun and play football like they know how to and I hate to come to this conclusion but a lot of it comes down to Capello ( I know you’ll say we had problems before Capello, but the fact is we’re not going about trying to resolve them in the right manner). He’s a strict disciplinarian and a shrewd tactician, but in order to implement these qualities he needs a club like structure where he can get the players and drill them into knowing exactly how he wants them to play but thats not how the international scene works… I could go on like this for a long time
Jonathan F
November 19, 2010 • 10:26 pm

Some intelligent points here guys and thanks for reading and commenting.

However I can’t help but feel Dustin sums it all up perfectly: if you know you’re not going to enjoy it and you know the team aren’t in a great moment and playing well and you don’t agree with the manager and you’re upset with it all, it begs the question – why bother going?

Loving the Simpsons reference too by the way Dustin, ties in here brilliantly!
Tom Wright
November 21, 2010 • 10:49 pm

Just wrote another long one but forgot to include name and email so lost it – even more annoyed now!
Im surprised by the last comment about going knowing your not going to enjoy it. Surely views are subject to change based upon team selections, performances on the pitch, progress over time… the list goes on. So to suggest I went to Wembley with a negative view is plain wrong. It originally promised to be a great game and I was very much looking forward to the test against a relatively big name on the nternational stage. But sadly with great expectation there can be great frustration. Not for the first time. Fans are fully entitled to boo.
- Jonathan F
  November 23, 2010 • 1:00 am
  
  I think that’s a fair point Tom, and actually on reflection it’s probably unfair of me to suggest that if you’re not happy with the direction of the team you shouldn’t attend – such a line of thinking is arguably just as bad as booing!
  
  I do however stick by my genuine belief that the atmosphere at Wembley is becoming bad enough that it is starting to have a direct and detrimental impact on the team and the morale of the players.
  
  Even when England play well the boo culture in the terraces is prevalent, whether it be fans booing players for career choices (Lescott), off-field shenanigans (Terry) or just general dislike (A Cole). It just seems almost entrenched in the culture of the match-going fan at Wembley that they go there not to support, but to expect something from the players.
  
  Such an atmosphere is not conducive to England playing well, and I sometimes wonder if the players enjoy playing at Wembley for England at all! By the looks on some of their faces at times, it is doubtful.
Live Football Streams
November 25, 2010 • 4:05 am

Booing just makes your team worse lets face it.