Well I am bored. I work in an office where people come in on a Monday morning and over their first cup of coffee discuss the weekend’s football and their team’s performance. This actually carries on most of the week if we’re honest. They talk tactics, players and formations, the type of stuff we all like to think we know best on. I get stick every single week and this year even got a very cruel Secret Santa present (see picture on the homepage).
I was speaking to one Arsenal fan in my office after their Champions League exit a few weeks back, he wasn’t surprised at the defeat against Barcelona and we talked about the brilliance of their front three, but then I casually asked his thoughts on Wenger. He said he was worried – their season was falling apart and silverware was likely to elude them and then the kicker came.
‘I’m worried how this will damage the clubs global brand’ he said. My stomach churned.
How sad it is, that share price and brand reputation matter to him as a fan. ‘Well if the Far East don’t buy into the club as much then it’s less money for players’ he reasoned. Whilst Arsenal and Villa may be worlds apart currently, it got me thinking about why I’m bored of talking about Villa and haven’t written anything for a while- it’s because senior restructuring bores me, commercial strategy bores me, board comings and goings bore me and talk of sale prices bore me.
I deal with this rubbish at work all week- my football team is supposed to be an escape from that on a Saturday. I’m not pretending that the football isn’t business led but just that it feels that this season on the forums and around the club all we have had to talk about is the off pitch matters.
Maybe this is unsurprising given the turmoil but I’m still bored. I want to talk goals, players and hopefully in the not too distant future, winning football matches.
The various storms in various tea cups of ‘accidentally’ posting pictures of cars on Twitter or smoking shisha pipes on holiday are a dull sideshow in a season lacking anything positive. I have to commend Damian for keeping us all talking and writing posts when there feels little positive to write about!
I for one just want this season to come to a close, make a good managerial appointment and get back to talking about…wait for it…football.