I’ve thought about writing this a few times, but always stopped myself, wondering if it might come across as unfair or a bit divisive. However, events of the weekend have brought the matter to prominence so here goes.
The response from Aston Villa fans to our FA Cup win has been varied.
Many have acknowledged the appalling performance of the officials and agreed our win was due justice. Some have hilariously defended their keepers kamikaze attack on Murphy as being a mere yellow.
Others have been indifferent to the result, as I think it’s a fair comment that their best chance of silverware this year is the Europa League, so attention should be focussed on that, as well as their sitting in a great position to return to the Champions League.
The strangest response though, is one that exasperates me completely each time I see it across the various social media trenches. A fair few Aston Villa fans have compared the fact that their Champions League run last year was worth (in direct payouts from the central competition pots of cash) £85m compared to Palace pocketing a mere £2.1m for winning the FA Cup, so any perseverance with the cup is an unwanted distraction from the big business of football capitalism. I totally despair at this.
Now I’m very aware of the PSR restrictions that have tightened around the ambitions of Newcastle and Villa more than any other club. I go on about them all the time if I’m honest. But surely the point in striving for financial advancement is to be competitive, in other words, to be able to win things? If the attitude is to throw the suggestion of winning things on the fire in pursuit of cold hard cash, surely that defeats the object?
Some of this may be deflection from Villa’s defeat, but I believe it is actually emblematic of a trend in football that I really don’t care for, that I call the rise of the top down fan.
Now, for the purpose of this explanation, I should clarify that I would consider myself a bottom up fan. Most people reading this will be and I’d suspect the vast majority of folk over 30 will be too. I consider bottom up fans to have been introduced to a particular club as a child, which traditionally will be the club of a parent or older relative, or the local club where they grow up. Round here those two factors will usually combine to give you a choice of one, but there will be parts of the country where people have a decision to make, and may be well into their teenage years before they settle. A wider love of the game will develop through childhood but bottom up fans will see everything through the prism of their club. If the club has a calamitous collapse through the divisions they will suffer with it. If the club hits lucky and rises high they are along for the ride. This is set for life.
The phenomenon of the top down fan is a recent thing I think, which has been accelerated by the international appeal of the Premier League. Basically, people are drawn to the game via world renowned media, such as the EA Sports FC game, fantasy football or YouTube or TikTok clips, often filtered through daft influencers like IShowSpeed. This sort of thing focuses only on the very top of the game, and is evidenced by the ludicrous proportions of people who vehemently support one side of the Messi v Ronaldo argument, often to an extent that they are obsessed with the player more than any club. This extends to their view of the big European clubs. In the eyes of the top down fan: Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool and the Manchesters are it for English football, and traditionally big clubs like Newcastle and Villa are irrelevancies. The Champions League is ‘elite’ and the cups that are revered by the traditional English fan don’t merit any attention.
As the influence of vloggers, Youcheewbers and internet celebrities grows, this attitude seems to have spread. Like any argument, the more it is repeated, the more it becomes true in the minds of some. Some of the Aston Villa fans espousing the “cash is best” argument were clearly old enough to know better but have drunk the internet Kool Aid. They can maybe lend our “balance sheet champions” flag from a few years ago if that’s what’s most important to them, although the fact they’ve reportedly breached UEFA Financial Fair Play rules again, might suggest they’re not ideal candidates for this moniker.
I thought of this when Kieran Trippier called out “the stuff on social media which (Eddie Howe) really does not deserve” after Saturday’s game. A lot of the top down fans have been partial to the old Eddie abuse, often without due consideration of the revenue gulf to ‘the big six’ (between 2-400 million p/a) and the startling over performance of the past few years. They believe that an “elite” coach is needed, with the laughable candidates usually being from the Zidane/Xavi/Fabregas mould of great players who have had short or untested runs in management. However, the stardust from their playing careers appeals to the top downs as they are within their initial and limited frame of reference. Doesn’t matter that they wouldn’t have a clue how to manage a £150k top wage bill, they couldn’t half hit a pass/volley.
“Elite” is that word that keeps coming up. It’s a miserable factor of the world that everyone covets wealth. Fair play to those that have cracked the social media influencer game, as they will be rolling in it and likely have the best of everything in their lives. They spawn many an acolyte though, who do not have these means but mimic the attitude (get in on online row with one and they’ll almost certainly boast about how much they make; a guaranteed lie). The attitude makes them feel entitled to expect the best, and in their world the best are on the front cover of FIFA 25.
I don’t mean to speak for the entirety of the bottom ups but the great moments for me are not measured by how much they make. Villa fans citing the above argument may want to consider that we will be making a tidy chunk from our ongoing UCL exploits this year. The qualification for this competition twice in three seasons has been tremendous, but neither of them touch that day at Wembley last March, or the subsequent celebrations with friends, family and fellows in an explosion of civic pride and pure happiness. I feel pity for those that have to affect such emotion for online likes and follows and even more for those that deal in conflict and misery for the same ends.
As I’m writing this I have just caught the FA Cup fifth round draw. Man City yet again, while at least five of our Premier League brethren get lower league opponents. Eight all PL ties so far and three of them have featured NUFC. But the best chance we can get of putting them out is at SJP and I would expect the place to be on fire for revenge after the league cup disappointment. Let’s go for it, I’ll take this cup over any amount of money.
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