Rovers not allowed play in Tallaght this weekend

[passerrby]

dont know who is responsible but platinum one must be sniggering at putting one over on the league.
Just finished reading pat dolan does this man never tire or talking sh&t

[marinobohs]

[QUOTE=Dodge;1193963]

Its finally hitting home with Rovers fans that they are merely tenants in the ground, and they are at the whim of the landlords/QUOTE]

If only ! I suspect it will be no time beforec the hoops on this forum are pontificating again about how every other club should be run.

Still think the Madrid game is good for them and the League although if figure mentioned (30K) is all they are getting then Platinum are making a major killing.

[Sheridan]

I always knew the Cosmos were ahead of their time:

We also propose to pursue a revolutionary fixture policy, rotating league matches between a planned, compact, modern stadium in North Dublin (initial capacity 6,500) and an existing facility in South County Dublin. A small fleet of coaches (already purchased and resplendent in Cosmos livery) will ferry supporters between the two venues.

[Mr A]

Bring it back sonofstan, it was very good!

[sonofstan]

Bring it back sonofstan, it was very good!

Preaching to the converted, on reflection - and annoying myself to no end.

[eL Bettor]

What are the actual health and safety concerns or have they said?
I've read through this whole thread and nobody seems to know.
Is it simply that they dont want the game interrupting preparations for Mondays game?

[sligoman]

Is it simply that they dont want the game interrupting preparations for Mondays game?

Basically, yes.

I hope the pitch gets waterlogged on Monday and the match gets called off, would be perfect for SDCC & Platinum One.

[SkStu]

are updates on Rovers game going to be in here or in the Shels forum tonight?

[Réiteoir]

are updates on Rovers game going to be in here or in the Shels forum tonight?

In any case you'll only get 4% of any match report

[Drogman.]

They can have as many vague statements as they like, its nothing more than a powerplay by SDCC

Its finally hitting home with Rovers fans that they are merely tenants in the ground, and they are at the whim of the landlords

I guarentee you that they wouldn't have been shafted like this by Pats, Bohs or Shels if they were renting those grounds

That's true, but so what? Rovers will soon have the best stadium in the country. I wish Louth CoCo or Drogheda Bourough Co. were able to build us a stadium.

My first visit to Tallaght was near the end of May for our 1-1 game. Even though there is only 1 stand, I thought the buzz around the place was great and it looks really great with the club shop.

Whatever about the bitter Bohs fans, I for one am very jealous of not having a setup like they have.

I still hate playing against the kunts though

[Dodge]

That's true, but so what? Rovers will soon have the best stadium in the country. I wish Louth CoCo or Drogheda Bourough Co. were able to build us a stadium

I've said countless times that I wish more clubs had councils as generous as SDCC, and grounds as nice as tallaght

I also wish rovers fans were a little more humble about having a ground built for them

[Sheridan]

The FAI did Rovers a massive favour by not revoking their authorisation of the friendly, as they were fully entitled and arguably required to do. SDCC would have made life impossible for Rovers if they had.

[Dunny]

Madrid training in Tallaght atm apparently.

[Drogman.]

I've said countless times that I wish more clubs had councils as generous as SDCC, and grounds as nice as tallaght

I also wish rovers fans were a little more humble about having a ground built for them

I know, I was just really responding to all those, IE. Bohs fans, who are still going on about how Rovers don't own the stadium etc....

Ah yeah, but you have to remember that most of the "new" Rovers fans probably don't know squat about the club and it's background etc..

[osborne]

The FAI did Rovers a massive favour by not revoking their authorisation of the friendly, as they were fully entitled and arguably required to do. SDCC would have made life impossible for Rovers if they had.

I think you mean the FAI did Platinum One a massive favour.

[SkStu]

That's true, but so what? Rovers will soon have the best stadium in the country. I wish Louth CoCo or Drogheda Bourough Co. were able to build us a stadium.

My first visit to Tallaght was near the end of May for our 1-1 game. Even though there is only 1 stand, I thought the buzz around the place was great and it looks really great with the club shop.

Whatever about the bitter Bohs fans, I for one am very jealous of not having a setup like they have.

I still hate playing against the kunts though

what the hell do we have to be bitter about when it comes to Rovers???? At most we've lost a song from our repertoire and thats about it. The posts are just a jibe at our rivals dont be getting so offended on their behalf, theyre well capable of that themselves...

And really Drogman, they dont own their ground and that much is obvious now surely.

[dfx-]

In any case you'll only get 4% of any match report

Definitely below 65% anyway

Madrid training in Tallaght atm apparently.

By all accounts Hope they got out safely...

[Hairy Bowsie]

Reality sets in. 20 odd years waiting on a new ground, only to be turfed out at the first sight of anything even slightly more, high profile.

Hope it was worth the wait lads

[sonofstan]

Once upon a time, Real Madrid and Shamrock Rovers were the same kind of thing: football clubs - sure, Real were always many times 'bigger' in terms of gates, quality of players and success, but still: each was a club made up of predominantly local players playing in front of fans almost exclusively from their own city. And, just as football is a simple game and played much the same way everywhere, so its form of competitive organisation and its social function are -or were - similar across the large part of the world in which it was the favoured game of the urban working class. There were leagues, and there were cups, organised on a national level, and the former is always the more prestigious, but the latter provides a way to compensate for failure in the former.

More importantly, being a football fan, and the whole set of cultural practices that went with it, evolved in a remarkably short space of time (say 1890 -1930) in most of Europe and south America, a little later in Africa and barely at all in most of Asia or North America or Australia (outside Melbourne). It was played at the weekend, when workers were off work, it was played weekly, and being a fan required going to all or most home matches, knowing the players well, and knowing the history and traditions of the club you followed. You generally didn't have much choice as to who you supported: family, work, religion, political affiliations all played their part, but locality was by far the most important determinant of who you followed.

Like I say, this was as true in Milltown or in Phibsboro' as it was in Madrid, Prague, Buenos Aries or Athens - and in all those cases it mattered deeply that you were 'one' or the 'other'. Paradoxically, perhaps, this intense localism was also a kind of universal: a transplanted fan from one of those listed cities would find it fairly easy to slot into the culture of another just as soon as he decided what side he was on, and allowed himself to be consumed with hatred for the other. The organisation of the game, the whole point of going to matches would be immediately apparent. In an odd way, it mirrored the fact that 'working class' skills were generally pretty mobile - being a plumber in Munich wasn't that different to being one in Birmingham. However, though a universal, the specifics of football fan-dom remain stubbornly opaque to outsiders.

One thing that is central to the experience of football though, is competition - you want to win things, and only competitive matches matter. A dull 0-0 draw that wins you the league on goal difference will be a more treasured memory than a cultured, but meaningless victory in a friendly - or a league cup game.

winning mattered financially to a club because it brought in bigger crowds, because it brought prize money and because it attracted better players from outside the locality. Other sources of income - souvenirs, shirts, sponsership were, until well into the 80s relatively minor streams even for really big clubs.....

That was then: now, Real, and even more so, Man U and the other three of the big four in the prem. are 'brands'. Income from prize money and from gates is dwarfed by revenue from TV and merchandise, and business practice reflects this. A huge and growing portion of the income of such clubs comes from way outside their catchment areas, but since a lot of Londoners still wouldn't support a Manc team, and no catalan would ever support Real, they have to look well beyond their native shores. Crucially, the relationship of a Man U fan in Kuala Lumper to the team is completely to different that of man U fan from Withenshawe: whereas the latter could, once at any rate, talk about 'us' and mean the club including him, his mates, the players and the manager, and not be completely deluded, the fan in KL is a 'fan' the way one could be a Michael Jackson fan or a U2 fan: there is no 'us', there is just a product to be consumed. And, with that kind of relationship, the summer tour becomes the equivalent of a gig - an 'in person' appearance, with the local opposition as something about as important as the support band on a stadium show. For that kind of fan, the continuity, the intensity of a long campaign is replaced by the glamour of a short- lived, intense celebrity crack hit.

The universalism of football fandom where the same social practices were accompanied by intensely local peculiarities and histories has been replaced by a globalised model, where the same product, that belongs everywhere and nowhere, slowly extinguishes the indigenous one.

Of course, even big clubs still have to win things to stay big: but, in a model familiar from late capitalism, the game gets distorted more and more to favour the giganticism of success - huge Wall St./ City of London salaries did not just accidentally coincide with huge wodge for footballers. And, because these are now, comparatively big corporations, future success must be at least reasonably assured: so leagues become less competitive as the rewards for winning become disproportionate and the cost of challenging the big boys impossible - and, most crucially, European competitions are tilted hugely in favour of the big leagues and the big clubs: so, whereas once, Rovers and Real could reasonably hope to meet competitively, this possibility has been all but removed.

And so we end up, logically, inevitably, at a situation where SRFC find themselves playing a league game that really matters because, for the first time in long while they are possible challengers for the title away from their new home because an event in which they have a bit part, and for which they are being paid - what? - less than 10% of the gate, is more 'important': important to who?

[brianw82]

Great post, but nothing any of us didn't already know, to be honest.