Nice summary and very good post.

Pretty much sums it up perfectly for me.

Next season I’ll be watching far more Non VAR games live than VAR. I’ll be watching non-league Boston United in their splendid new stadium.

I’ll probably go to more Palace Away games than Home ones too as I enjoy the away travel and making a day/weekend of it, plus the atmosphere is usually better and we often give it a bit of a go.

Agreed and thank goodness Fulham took ages to get the loan players gelling together and that West Brom didn’t get going until recently otherwise we would be in big trouble. Fulham may be going down but most of the matches I’ve seen them in have been enjoyable stuff. I believe it’s mainly us that are so boring to watch for our faithful fans. I would be happier playing like Norwich with players on low wages putting a shift in and going between divisions rather than watching us play. Promotion from the championship is more enjoyable than flirting with relegation / mid table every season. It really does get depressing to watch. I just hope those players on high salaries leave as they are out of contract and that we get a younger more exciting squad in. That would also mean Hodgson has to go and may mean relegation next season. But, hopefully followed by a promotion?

Agree with the OP.
Most bored I've ever been in fact most games now get switched off long before the end

VAR in its current form is awful, as is the ease and frequency with which free kicks are 'won'. Neither creates a competitive, well fought, high tempo sport that stirs the soul, which is what football should be.

At the same time, the biggest issue is the exact one the Real Madrid President, Mr F. Perez esq, cited as his justification for starting a European Super League - football itself can/has/will become stale and boring. He was right to say that, though he failed to notice his own role in creating that reality.

For over 100 years professional football has consisted of hundreds of private companies doing exclusively what is best for them, seeking to utilize every advantage against each other. In American sports they load the dice in favour of the current worst teams to guard against long term monopolies. We have never had any such 'reset' or 'balancing' functions - the more successful a football club gets, the more advantage it has over those who are less successful.

That's not fatal until you begin to hyper-inflate the amount of money involved. The gap between us and Millwall, Charlton, QPR etc is currently a chasm - we can buy any of their players we want, any time - yet the gap between us and City, United, Chelsea etc is as great, if not greater, and it only widens every year.

This is all reflected on the pitch. Even with the most expensive squad (possibly best) we've ever had, the cost of which cannot be imagined by our lower local rivals, we still can't compete. Not properly, in the way football fans outside the top flight might see their team compete - on the pitch, taking the game to each other to some extent at least.

Over 15 years we have seen the ongoing rise in the premier league of totally one-sided games. It has become not only accepted, but also evidently the wisest strategy for the relative 'have nots' to not even try to engage the big boys toe-to-toe. Pundits questioning the 'ambition' or 'style' of the bottom eight clubs can f*** off - if you want to be entertained by decent football matches then extend your anti-super league wrath to UEFA, the Premier League and the broadcasters, all of whom are responsible for such a disjointed, flawed competition. Don't expect clubs like Palace to step into the ring with one hand behind their back and their chins sticking out.

It got to the stage in Spain where smaller clubs were actually resting their best players against Real Madrid and Barcelona, as they had no chance of winning anyway. It made sense for the likes of Getafe to focus on playing Eibar the week after instead. It is very rare for a league game involving one big club to be competitive, or engaging, in any of the big European leagues. Football, as the sport has been known for over a century, is harder and harder to find.

No wonder Perez is worried that the football is disinteresting. It's boring for the fans of big clubs to watch, just as it's boring for us. Nobody enjoys it as far as I can see.

Indeed, but at the time, of course, perfectly within the rules. Note that the commentator (Kenneth Wolstenholme) didn't hesitate to call the goal - not even a suggestion that a foul might have been committed. Also that no Man U player "appealed" and that they all applauded Lofthouse and his teammates off the pitch at the end.

Palace since 19 August 1972. Palace 1 (Tony Taylor) Liverpool 1 (Emlyn Hughes)

I go to most home games every season, so about twenty give or take in nine months. But how it’s felt to me in recent years is, if I go out elsewhere, I don’t go to the same s*** restaurant twenty times in the same period or if I go to the cinema, I don’t go to watch the same s*** film twenty times. Yet palace I go back game after game after game, same s*** different game, with a half decent one once every blue moon

The joys of being a Palace fan

Edited by monkey (28 Apr 2021 6.52pm)