Back in the days, when DIC wanted to buy the club, I was all for it. I didn’t know then what they were perpetrating in their country, or the despotic manner in which the ruler of Dubai runs the country. I also didn’t understand how important democracy was, coming from a country where despotic authoritarianism and “elections” was the norm. If I knew then what I know now, I would have recoiled at that idea.
I would have walked away if the European Super League had gone ahead, as I think the idea of teams playing not on sporting merit (or at least the facade of such), but instead being guaranteed a spot in the league, was probably the final death of the idea of football as a sport. Instead of being run to win meaningful trophies, it would exist merely as a pure money-churning exercise. It’s not so much the likes of PSG or Barcelona or Juventus that I look forward to, but often the underdogs and the fairy-tale stories. That’s what makes the Champions League more magical to me, and the jeopardy, the potential that a team would not be able to make it back in again. That a team like us could be at the pinnacle, fall from grace, and then claw our way back in.
In a way, because of these ideals, I think I would walk away if we ever got bought over by a tyrannical human rights-abusing dictatorship. I despise the use of forced labour (as part of a genocide, no less), so I don’t buy our kit. If it turns out tomorrow that FSG’s investors actively engaged in modern slavery for example, I’d walk away too.
I would never be able to switch off my love for LFC any more than I’d be able to for any person that I love. It’s just in me, like it is for all of us! I wouldn’t be able to not have an interest in how they were performing or what they were up to. If the club ever gets sold to a regime like the ones that own Cheaty or PSG or Newcastle I’ll be devastated. I wouldn’t be able to ‘support’ them in every meaning of the word any more, and I’d think of them differently from then on. I wouldn’t be able to discard my love or my memories, but I would be able to discard my allegiance and I wouldn’t be able to help doing that. The whole thing with these people being able to buy English football clubs is fucking horrible. Absolutely fucking horrible. It’s a massive kick in the bollocks to those who have suffered at their hands and, Khashoggi’s widow being just one example out of 1000s, I support them completely.
To be honest a lot of countries in that region can be seen by western ideals as being “stone age” etc.
I find us in the modern western world as a bit snooty commenting on other countries like that.
Of course the rich in those countries live a completely different life to those that they seem to be keeping poor. But that argument can be applied to most countries if the truth be told. Of course the parallels are a long way apart between a poor person in the UK compare to a poor person in Saudi / Afghanistan etc
Although I supported LFC since I was a teen, when I did not have access to watch football matches on TV in the past (between 90s to early 2000s, unlike these days), I did not really follow LFC progress.
I used to spend lots of hours per day to watch baseball (160+ games per season, ~3hours per game, almost a game per day!) and ice hockey. After the players strikes/owners lockouts, I dropped both of the sports. (F1 is teetering on that on my list of things to drop.)
With the above track record, I am sure I will be fine when the day comes that I stop watching football all together.
Not a fan of these hypotheticals, we have decent owners a great manger and team let’s just chill on that. We frequently beat and finish above teams who spend more than us, no reason that should change.
with the failure of the FA to punish Man City for their shady bookkeeping, that opened the door for all sorts of back-door dealings. you can be 1000% sure that the Kingdom will be opening accounts in tax havens to be funneling money into the club and players through dubious means.
Personally, I think I’d find myself drifting away from club-level football all together. That said, I wouldn’t hold it against anyone if they continued supporting the club. I don’t expect anyone to suddenly leave behind a lifetime of memories just like that. Although, it would be disheartening to see Liverpool supporters go the way of Man City supporters and make excuses for horrible regimes just because they brought trophies.
I would personally have huge problems. I got unlimited access to games when I was 17 and since then I have all but moved my schedule around Liverpool’s schedule. I have probably missed, I dunno, 20-30 games in a 23 year period. I’ve stayed up late, skived off work, swooped shifts, rearranged parties, skipped on gf’s, you name it. Even when in the bush, I always camp according to our schedule and which rest camp has enough signal to allow me to watch on my phone or a restaurant/bar with a TV (I’ve even made friends with rangers/guides to get an invite to use their TV on occasion, )) . I was in a bad way in 2019 and my subscription was canceled and snuck into a resort after hours pretending to be a guest and used their WiFi at the pool to watch the CL final. I’ve literally done everything I could to watch our games.
Long story short, walking away would be one of the most difficult things I could ever do but I would and hope that somewhere down line ownership changes again.
John Henry’s ‘greed’ is apparently more morally reprehensible than earning billions through property scandals, betting scams, being tangled up in anti-corruption investigations, scamming governments out of hundreds of millions from duty free, and making your fortune from selling nitrogen fertiliser.
I’m of the opinion that it is virtually impossible to earn the sort of money that it takes to buy and own a premier league club without there being some shady deals in the background and somebody being shat on in a major way. So where as I think our owners are probably about as decent as you can get I bet if there was enough digging going on into them and the political propaganda used against them as there are against states such as Saudi, Qutar and Abu Dhabi I don’t think anyone would come up smelling of roses
Of course, but running a repressive fundementalist feudal state where women are second class citizens and political opponents are murdered is a whole different level of nastiness don’t you think?
Ye course it is. But the sort of theme of this thread is where do you draw the line.
It’s a difficult one. Like somebody else commented above you can guarantee the Newcastle fans were slagging City / PSG off before the Saudis rolled into town.
There is also the argument of if Saudi take over didn’t happen then all these atrocities would still be happening over there. We wouldn’t be so bothered about it then. It’s just really a headline because the money of being poured into football.
Besides the human rights issue being the biggest no no of all with the take-over, there is also the element, even though it may be deep rooted within us… this take-over could seriously be the beginning of the end of football as we have known it to be over the past couple of decades…
Ironic really, but at some futuristic point, I wonder if it will be seen as the ‘straw that broke the camels back’
There has to be a saturation point of good calibre footballers, worthwhile competitions… and most importantly, GOOD football managers.
Are we almost there yet eh!
A state is lifeless. It’s the person that gives a state its distinctive characteristics. With Putin, Sheikhs, Sisi etc. you get the repressive states like Russia, Arab Kingdoms, Egypt etc.
)) . I was in a bad way in 2019 and my subscription was canceled and snuck into a resort after hours pretending to be a guest and used their WiFi at the pool to watch the CL final. I’ve literally done everything I could to watch our games.