The Future of Football: Ticketing Apps and Livestreaming

As the Coronavirus pandemic continues to rumble on, many industries are predicting what their futures may look like – whether that’s offices who want to establish a more flexible way of working (as employees divide time between the office and home), schools testing out new contact systems, through to pubs and bars that have established table service arrangements – we’re living in a time of experimentation.

Football is no different – this weekend (19^th September), some experiments are going ahead in the EFL with a maximum of 1000 people attending select games. Non-League has been back for a few weeks now but even at these levels, maximum capacities and experimentation is happening.

As the last groundhop I did before lockdown, I returned to Ashton Town this week to have a look at the innovations they put in place for their first home game back – how will they affect games at these levels going forward? Well, that and a Wigan Athletic legend making his debut for the club encouraged me to go too!

Emmerson Boyce, the 40-year-old former Wigan Athletic captain, who lifted the FA Cup in 2013, signed for Ashton Town 3 weeks ago  – saying it was a ‘thank-you’ to chairman Mark Hayes for his years of charity work. Ashton have big ambitions for promotion this season (also appointing former Chesterfield striker, Glynn Hurst, as manager) and this signing made waves on the non-league scene. The capacity for this match was set at 150 – while this is certainly far more than the average crowd 10^th-tier Ashton get, they would have got far more in if no restrictions were in place. And it was all marshalled by a new Manchester-based ticketing app, Shocal.

The lockdown has undoubtedly provided the perfect opportunity for these types of apps to grow their user base (I’m absolutely pig sick of seeing that Just Eat advert with Snoop Dogg – and no, I’m not linking to it) – and Shocal have moved quickly in an attempt to establish themselves as ‘the home of local deliveries’ for a range of different business in Greater Manchester. They aren’t the only home delivery app that has created a ticketing arm – I’ve seen other non-league sides promoting different ones – but I believe Shocal is one of very few that offer partners more than just an avenue to sell tickets. In fact, Ashton have put their entire club shop on the app – you can buy season tickets, scarves, player sponsorship and a plethora of Emmerson Boyce memorabilia on there.

For football clubs, having a means to make the purchasing process easier will help to promote them, working to increase their revenue – customers appreciate a quick, no-nonsense way of finding what they need above everything else. Mobile phone apps (especially ones that work!) offer such convenience – and I’m pleased to report that Shocal offered a seamless, secure way of buying my ticket (I was even tempted by the Emmerson Boyce cushion they had in the shop too). On approach to the ground, the representative of Shocal scanned the QR code on my phone and I was in – no waiting around, no fishing in my pocket for the right change; straight in to beat the queue at the bar for my can-of-Carling-in-a-plastic-cup. Yep, still no Leffe behind the bar.

Whist having the club shop on an app is great for non-league sides to potentially increase their revenue on a more consistent basis, it should go without saying that ticketing apps won’t be needed for the vast majority of games at this level. However, I won’t be surprised to see ticketing apps brought forward into the professional ranks in the next year or two. As someone who has apps for buses, taxis and Wetherspoons, I’m actually a bit surprised they haven’t been introduced already – the ordering ease they provide can’t be questioned. Not great news for paper tickets – as a collector myself, it’ll be a shame to see these physical reminders go, but with the time and money it costs to produce, print and send them out, it doesn’t make sense to keep doing it.

Another experiment that was conducted for this match was a livestream. Broadcasting games over the internet is nothing new, but the pandemic has provided an opportunity for service providers, leagues and clubs to experiment with it on a mass level. As a groundhopper, you can probably guess that I’m against streaming and television in general – I don’t think the way it has influenced the game (changing kick-off times, encouraging people to not go to the match, growing a generation of fans who have never been to a match, who then label clubs as ‘tinpot’ for having empty seats, etc) has been positive – but we mustn’t kid ourselves any different; just like the ticketing apps, they provide a quick and convenient way of watching football.

For the professional level, I’m very worried about the effect it’ll have when things eventually (hopefully!) get back to normal. Despite a few boomer hiccups with the EFL’s iFollow service, it has generally been a success in providing fans with access to games. Before the pandemic, football games held at 3pm were not allowed to be streamed in the UK to protect crowd numbers – but as we’ve seen through the rise of streaming services and YouTube, the money is moving from television into the streaming market – Amazon already have a Premier League TV deal and will no doubt be pushing for more slices of the Sky/BT pie in the next few years.

If television has the power to move games, streaming companies will be powerful enough to dictate what they want too – it isn’t inconceivable that a streaming company will come in with a big offer for the EFL and as many of clubs (including my own) are currently on their arse, it stands to sense they’d submit to anything asked of them. Unless clubs let people in for free, I can’t ever see the vast majority of stadiums being anywhere near full – again though, it makes perfect sense; people don’t want to travel to games, spend extra money on programmes and catering when they are able to watch it from the comfort of their own home.

 So where does that leave non-league clubs? Here at Ashton Town, they provided those who couldn’t get a ticket with an opportunity to stream the match for £1 – and 362 took them up on that offer. I have no idea of the cut they may have got, but let’s just say it was half – that’s £131 going to a club that usually gets 50 people on the gate (add that to 150 who were the game, and that’s over 500 people watching a game between a 10^th tier side and an amateur club). The signing of Emmerson Boyce was the obvious attraction, which is why (beyond the odd curiosity like a former pro in action or a big match), I can’t see the streaming of non-league games lasting long-term – there simply isn’t a big pre-existing audience there to tap into. The attraction of non-league football is the ground and what you experience there, so unless they bring in some virtual reality app that recreates everything (the smell of the mud, the materials of the wonky stand, a dog pissing on an advertisement board, etc), the same people will continue to go these games.

However, just like how the shop app provides a way for non-league sides to promote themselves, I think the streaming of matches in non-league can give a curious local the opportunity to see a side in action, potentially encouraging them to go one day or at the very least, buy an Emmerson Boyce keyring. It’s how you use the technology that matters – and as these experiments continue, I hope clubs and leagues are able to find a way of encouraging people back to games, rather than presenting them with reasons to stay on this ‘new normal’, streaming games long after the pandemic is over.

As for the match itself, it was great to see Boycey back playing football – he’s obviously a legend at Wigan for his 9 years service and winning the FA Cup, but he’s a great man to boot; always willing to get involved with local community projects and charity work. Playing at centre-half, he marshalled his new side to a 5-1 win over Orrell Athletic – who despite playing their football many levels below their hosts in the South Lancs League, put up a great show. They certainly scored the goal of the game when their forward lobbed the Ashton goalkeeper from just inside the penalty area!

While the signing of Boycey can be seen as great marketing for the club, his ability and experience will undoubtedly help Ashton on the pitch too. Straight from kick-off, he was rallying his teammates and dishing out instructions – just by this brief insight, I can only imagine playing alongside him will encourage players, getting the most out of their own abilities and even help to improve their own game. I hope more former professionals consider similar moves; if grassroots clubs are given the means by the FA to offer a way into coaching for them, I’m sure we may see more of this.

As it turned it, the experiment on this night was a success; everyone had a great time, easily socially distancing in the 2,000-capacity ground and the ice cream van parked inside the ground even played the Match of the Day theme for our half-time entertainment. Ashton have already got tickets on the app for their opening league home match against St. Helens Town in October, with a maximum of 300 now allowed in – so I made sure to snap one up.

Here’s hoping the professional clubs are just as successful with their own experiments so we can all get to games as safely as possible. In the meantime, we’ll have to settle for the television and livestreaming.

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Football: Together In Adversity

It’s been a couple of days now since Wigan Athletic were relegated* from The Championship – despite 1 defeat in 15 games, collecting 18 points in 9 games after the Coronavirus lockdown, sealing a 13^th–place finish. After being put into administration for unfathomable reasons, the club was deducted 12 points, dropping them into the relegation zone after the final whistle sounded at the end of the 46^th and final game of the season.

An appeal* against the removal of the 12 points is in the works, but it’s the immediate future of the club that’s the biggest concern at the moment – everyone is for sale at rock-bottom prices, including many of the talented U18 team that I’ve covered this season on this blog. It’s sickening to think about the progress we have made is about to be flushed away; our future ‘assets’ being sold for peanuts just so the club can keep going until a buyer is found.

It can be easy to get angry and appropriate blame – but there is nothing I can do but hope justice is done. In the meantime, instead of dwelling on the negatives, here’s why I’m feeling proud of the club at the moment: 

The Players and Staff. It can be easy today, what with the vast amounts of money players receive (even in The Championship), to criticise them. Every mistake, bad shot or poor cross is set upon and labelled as an example of them being ‘overpaid’, ‘not worth the money’ or simply ‘not bothered’. Their commitment is questioned when a run of results doesn’t go the way as expected – they ‘don’t care’ about the club and ‘can’t wait’ to leave.

By this episode alone, I can say all that is bollocks. To a man, the players at Wigan Athletic have strived to get the club out of a mess that wasn’t anyone’s making but the owners in Hong Kong. Already on reduced wages thanks to the Coronavirus, the players accepted an 80% pay-cut for their June payment, apparently with no dissension. They went on to record 2 wins and 3 draws after that – including the amazing spectacle that saw them beat Hull City 8-0, with 7 goals coming in the first-half. I hadn’t seen anything like that before – and I’ve played amateur football!


We came up agonisingly short in the end, but it’s no disgrace. These players will be remembered for their commitment and willingness to keep the club in The Championship, despite many of them being set to leave/sold on. People like captain, Sam Morsy, who leads the club on and off the pitch; putting out positive messages to supporters, even calling at a young supporter’s house, unannounced, to give him his shirt. Manager, Paul Cook, creating a positive environment around the club when times were hard (especially earlier in the season when we couldn’t buy a win!), taking it upon himself to ring up staff who had been made redundant. Then there’s staff like Jonathan Jackson, the chief executive who himself was made redundant, but has still been going into the club, working tirelessly to help out the administrators.

These people may earn more money than we do, but the vast majority of professional footballers come from the same backgrounds as many of us – they understand what these clubs mean to supporters. Many club owners obviously do not. 

The Supporters. In a similar manner as players, it can be easy for people to throw their arms up and flounce off when things are hard. It’s a well-worn cliché, but supporting a club the size of Wigan Athletic is like a family (indeed, there are probably families out there much larger than our fan base!) – Yeah, we may argue with one another most of the time but when there’s a crisis to deal with, everyone comes together.

From positive messages to the club and players online, donating money to the crowdfunding page, thinking about ways to raise even more money; selling their memorabilia, throwing garage sales, creating t-shirts, mugs, art prints, keyrings, etc, to spending days investigating the shady characters that have put the club in administration – Wigan Athletic supporters have been relentless in trying to do everything to save their club. They haven’t turned on the staff or each other during all this – all they’ve asked is ‘how can we help?

It isn’t just Latics supporters though, as people from other clubs have been a big help in trying to spread information about what’s happened, pressuring the EFL, even donating money themselves. Nothing I can say will be enough to thank them – they know that unstable owners are a plague on the game in England and it has happened too many times and it needs to end. 

Journalists and Politicians. I never thought I’d be writing this (what with these two groups often battling one another), but the media and local politicians have worked brilliantly together; quick to listen to what was happening at Wigan Athletic. The administration was initially reported as solely being a result of Coronavirus, but as it became apparent there was more to it (a club with no external creditors being put into administration is odd, to the say the least); they rallied around and got information out there, seeking answers.

Wigan MP, Lisa Nandy and the Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, have been a great help in liaising with the EFL and communicating with supporters, the Shadow Cabinet Leader, Kier Starmer and Shadow Sports Minister, Jo Stevens, also got involved in bringing it to the attention of the government. Media figures such as Colin Murray used his platform on Radio Five Live and the EFL highlights show on Quest to draw attention to it too – then there are the numerous commentators, bloggers, vloggers, podcasters, experts in various fields many of them, who also helped.

All these people have recognised that football clubs are a crucial part of the local community – they don’t just provide us with something to watch and shout at every other week, but their presence allows local people to find work, pubs, shops and restaurants to make money, kids somewhere safe to play football (and dream about playing for their team) – football clubs like ours are a vital part of people's lives. They’re more than a business.

I think it’s this aspect that has struck a chord with people outside of the club – just like Bury, Wigan Athletic aren’t a brand to shopped about around the world; they are community club that welcomes anyone with open arms. What happened to Bury should never happen again, what happened to us should never happen again and what is currently happening to Charlton (uncertainty over their own ownership) should not be happening. It could easily be YOUR club next – so when will things change?

A great place to start would be the government petition set up by the Wigan Athletic Supporters Club – calling for a review into how the EFL’s ‘owners and directors test', it is the best way to push for change. It needs 100,000 signatures to be put up for debate, so if you would like to offer your support, you can find it here.

At the start of this Coronavirus pandemic, I was reminded of a quote by the Starbucks chairman, Howard Schultz. Responsible for saving the coffee company from going bust and turning them around to become the corporate multinational giant they are today, the overriding sentence from his book, Onward: How Starbucks Fought For Its Life Without Losing Its Soul, was “In times of adversity and change, we really discover who we are and what we’re made of."

I thought about that while hearing about all the panic buying going on; how it would make us look in the annals of history? I think it’s an apt quote for what’s going on with Latics right now too; there’s a lot of work ahead to save the club but whatever happens, everyone can hold their heads up and say we did all we could. Which is more than what I can say about the body that runs our leagues – but we’ll leave that for another time!

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Wigan Athletic’s Administration – (Further) Exposing The Weakness In Football

Football is exciting because we’re aware that a single swing of a boot can change the outcome of a match – we accept this, it’s why we buy a ticket and get so involved in the narrative playing out on the pitch. What we don’t expect to change in an instant is the status, nay the future of our clubs.

Just a matter of hours after a fantastic performance against Stoke City – a 3-0 win that put them eight points clear of the Championship relegation zone – my club, Wigan Athletic, were put into administration. There was no warning, no build-up – this wasn’t the result of months of uncertainty or because of mountains upon mountains of debt – it was a calculated move by the club’s new owner who had only got involved four weeks prior. He has effectively booted the club into uncertainty and it seems that the English Football League (EFL) has a lot of questions to answer.

When Dave Whelan, the man who had transformed a struggling fourth-tier club into one that graced the top tier for eight years and won the FA Cup, sold Wigan Athletic to Hong Kong-based International Entertainment Corporation (IEC) in 2018, we were told that the club had a bright future. Initially, it was going okay – the team flirted with relegation but this wasn’t overly unexpected in The Championship where the financial gap between clubs is becoming ever-wider. IEC sanctioned investments into the infrastructure of the club – the Academy was expanded to meet Category 2 grading, the stadium got a touch-up in places and we even got a big telly put in the corner of one of the stands. It was starting to go well on the pitch too – despite a difficult start to this season, the team has been one of the best performers in the division since the turn of 2020. So what happened?

In June, IEC sold the club to a company called ‘Next Leader Fund’ (NLF). Both of these companies are headed by Stanley Choi, a professional poker player who through IEC, has an interest in a casino in The Philippines. Prior to the sale going through, the consensus was that Choi was taking the club from the Hong Kong Stock Exchange-listed IEC to NLF, a private company based in the Cayman Islands, so that ‘decisions could be made quicker’ (any changes to IEC would have to be announced on the HK Stock Exchange).

NLF was only set up in January 2020 and it borrowed £28million from IEC to fund the takeover. The terms of the loan raised eyebrows when announced on the HK Stock Exchange – the interest rate was 8% rising to 20% if it wasn’t paid back within the first year. This amounts to roughly £100,000-a-week in repayments that Wigan would not be able to afford – the EFL approved the takeover. NLF was announced as being 51%-owned by Stanley Choi, with the remaining shares being held by one Au Yeung Wai Kay. On the 24^th June, Au Yeung took a majority shareholding in NLF (believed to be 75%), paid off the loan owed to IEC and immediately put the club in administration – despite there not being a single creditor.

Why? Why would Au Yeung invest so much money to buy the club only to put it at risk with less than a month to go until the season is completed? It makes no sense on the face of it – if he found that he had got over his head, he could have got the club through the season and put a Championship club on the market. Instead, he called his lawyers who notified the administrators and the club’s future – both in the short and long-term – was put at risk.

Obviously I need to be careful here as any theory is unsubstantiated – there is no clear reason why Au Yeung has done this. A young Wigan supporter, who happens to live in the same area as EFL chairman, Ricky Parry, chatted to the man about it – and he mentioned a rumour about bets being placed in The Philippines on Wigan being relegated. Almost immediately after it was announced that the club was in administration, the EFL sanctioned a 12-point dedication – which would put Wigan at the bottom of the league. The theory is that seeing the team perform well, Au Yeung moved quickly to gain control of the club and place it in administration. You can, by now, imagine why he might do that.

It seems nuts to even suggest that anyone would go to such great lengths to do this – I’ve heard about how crazy Asian betting markets are but do they really take bets with the equivalent worth of tens-of-millions of pounds at stake? Without any other clear thread to pick on, this is the only theory that makes a modicum of sense. The only other theory that I’ve seen is that IEC wanted to dump the club because it was costing them too much – the loan repayments saw them make a small profit. But again, why would Choi not seek to sell the club externally (rather than to himself) and why did Au Yeung effectively write off his investment?

This is a world away from what supporters should be worrying about – we should be looking forward to the match against Brentford today; the two in-form sides in the division going head-to-head but it has now been tempered with an urgency of we need to win to claw back the points that the EFL may end up taking away. Whilst relegation is only a setback (when compared to the club going out of existence!) it will thin-out the field of investors and may even lead to the club being asset-stripped. I know I’m a supporter and therefore liable to be biased, but purely through their performances, the players don’t deserve being relegated – it isn’t their fault that some shady Far East character plunged the club into the mire mere hours after taking charge.

It’s important to get one thing straight – Wigan Athletic’s administration has got nothing to do with the Coronavirus pandemic. The club was ticking along (as well as what can be expected during a pandemic, anyway) and had even agreed contracts and signed up players for next season. This isn’t a result of a club spending beyond its means – it’s something far more sinister, which is why it needs investigating by the EFL, the government, perhaps even Interpol.

What has been pleasing, is seeing Wiganers and football supporters of all clubs come together on this – everyone sees that the EFL’s checks and balances simply aren’t fit for purpose. A great example of this can be seen through Wigan's supporters – in a couple of days they have found out more information on Choi and Au Yeung than the EFL ever did. I say that because I refuse to believe that the EFL let the takeover pass if they had access to all the information that’s floating about on Twitter right now – if they did, then the governance of football in this country is rotten.

Hopefully, this will be the tipping point for the government to reign in the powers that run football – Wigan MP, Lisa Nandy, has spoken brilliantly about the issue, lobbying the Sports Minister and doing the press rounds. Having worked closely with the club’s Community Trust – a charity that has spent the last three months delivering essentials to people on lockdown, ringing them up and seeing how they’re doing – she understands, like us, that football clubs are about more than what goes on, on the pitch. They are the beating heart of our communities in most cases.

As for the players, to a man they have come out and shown defiance – the captain, Sam Morsy, typifies this. Just a day before the club went into admin, he paid tribute to the cardboard cut-out of the son of a Latics supporter, who lost her baby at just five-months-old, by placing his shirt over him. Like many of our players who have been and gone, he understands that the club is a family – it isn’t the biggest club around, but it doesn’t want to be. We all want to feel part of our clubs and Wigan Athletic, with its community outreach, harnesses that brilliantly. It was no surprise to see Sam was the first to come out and say that the players were going to fight to keep the club going (though knowing the combative style of his play, I hope he doesn’t mean it literally!)

It’s difficult, to sum up my feelings right now because I’m still trying to come to terms with what’s happened. So whilst I spend the next few days trying to collect them, cheering on the lads from my television screen as I do, I would heartily recommend you read this blog by Sam Whyte – though obviously Wigan-centric, any supporter of any club can transfer their own experiences to the spirit of this piece. It beautifully sums up why football is important to us all and why it needs protecting from the characters outlined here.

Finally, I would like to mention that the Wigan Athletic Supporters Club have set up a fundraising page to see the club through the season – the staff at the club were not paid and there are other costs that need to be paid to host/get to the remaining games, so if you would like to help out, please visit the crowdfunding page. Also, if you could share information about what’s happened (including this Tweet that sums everything up brilliantly) or contact your local MP; the more people with influence that can be made aware of what’s happened, the better. It isn’t just the future of Wigan Athletic that’s at stake here now – our game MUST change.

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Cardboard Fans Are Human Fans

In my previous post, talking about ‘the new normal’ watching football, I commented on how clubs
were introducing cardboard cutouts to give supporters a presence at the games they cannot go to. Being a dedicated guardian of everything that’s cool and trendy in football (?), and somewhat of a Grumpy Gus, I immediately dismissed this as ‘a bit ridiculous on the face of it’ – it just seemed to be a quirky way for clubs to earn some extra coin by doing something that was fundamentally pointless. Oh, how wrong I was.

Aside from the cardboard representations of the supporters who couldn’t be there, there were also celebrities and other, shall we say, ‘controversial’ figures taking up seats in empty stadiums. It was mostly seen as a bit of fun for people – the opportunity to have themselves (or their favourite people) at the ground in cardboard form was a novelty, something to ‘banter’ about if you will. Then, there was a story at my own club, Wigan Athletic which made me completely rethink my take on them – why they’re important.

Five years ago, Latics supporter Christine Lamb lost her five-month-old baby, Jack, to sudden infant death syndrome. Like Christine, Jack’s father, Stephen, is a Latics fan – in fact, they both met during Wigan’s run to lifting the FA Cup in 2013 – so it was inevitable that Jack would have grown up to be a fan too. In tribute, Christine (after a suggestion from her children) decided to get a cutout made of Jack so he could ‘attend his first game’. Not there in person, but in spirit at least – just like all the other supporters who couldn’t attend owing to the lockdown.

When I saw this story, it all suddenly made sense – the poetry of it is quite beautiful, in fact. They are ostensibly cardboard cutouts, inanimate objects that have taken a minute to create, but the feelings and memories they convey to those who know them make them real. All of a sudden, these ‘cardboard fans’ were ‘human fans’ – and their presence provided people with an opportunity to pay their respects to loved ones; telling their stories to people who didn’t get to know them.  Is anyone really gone if we remember them and pass their stories on? No, of course not – they live on in our hearts (and for special occasions like these, as cardboard cutouts).

After learning about Jack, Wigan Athletic refunded the money, but in a typical example of the tight community the club has come to represent, Christine immediately donated her refund to the club’s Community Trust; a charity that undertakes a wide range of activities for the betterment of the lives of local people (they’ve especially been busy in the last three months of this Coronavirus pandemic, checking in on vulnerable people and helping to deliver supplies).

My boys 1st game at @LaticsOfficial he passed away before he was 5 months I had paid for the cutout as it seemed fitting, wigan athletic refunded the money, lovely gesture iv donated it to the @LaticsCommunity Trust in Jack's memory.. I know every player will do my boy proud 💙 pic.twitter.com/wfv7lVgvkg

— Christine (@Christi71740851) June 27, 2020

I couldn’t help but feel inspired by the community spirit that has been shown by the club and its supporters during the last few months – things like producing cardboard cutouts, donating to charity and giving someone a ring to see how they’re doing may seem like small gestures, but small gestures can make a huge difference to a person’s outlook on life. As a big focal point in our communities, football clubs are in a great position to inspire us, that we’re all part of something – and what are our football clubs if they don’t represent us? What’s to left to support?

When we’re able to get back to normal, Christine hopes to embark on the annual Latics fans walk to raise money for Joseph’s Goal (a charity which I’ve covered in my report of the Wigan Athletic charity game at Ashton Town). It was supposed to be a three-day excursion to Barnsley this year, but it obviously got postponed – but whenever the next one is, Christine will attend with her son.  So if you would like to support her efforts, please consider donating to her fundraising page.

Cardboard fans are great – although, I’m not sure I’ll change my mind about the artificial crowd noise; let us hear the players swear and curse as nature has intended!

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Watching Football In ‘The New Normal’

Saturday 20th June saw football ‘return’ – at least for me. My team, Wigan Athletic, are currently involved in a 7/8 team battle to avoid the Championship relegation zone, with the promotion places similarly being competitive.

With so much money at stake, the league was always going to continue in some form – aside from the obvious windfall clubs will get by winning promotion to the Premier League, the drop in TV money from The Championship to League One is massive too (which explains why League One and Two were ended with Points-Per-Game).

With the rest of the season being played behind closed doors, this leaves season ticket holders somewhat short. As a season ticket holder at Wigan, I was presented with 3 different options instead of being able to attend in person:

• A pro-rata refund.
• Put credit towards next season’s season ticket.
• ‘Donate’ the remaining credit to the club for a streaming pass for the remaining 9 games.

As I’ve already spent the money, I’ve missed watching games and I’ve got everything I need to stream it on the telly – I chose the latter option. It offered great value; I get to watch the remaining 9 games (instead of the 5 home games I would have been entitled to) and the club keeps the money, so everyone’s a winner. I should say that this was the best option for me – in times like this where money is scarce, it’s understandable that people would want refunds.

Hooking up my laptop to my telly with an HDMI cable, I got settled for ‘the new normal’ watching football – to be honest, I didn’t notice much difference. Our match was a particularly important one at Huddersfield, who are also hovering around the bottom end of the table. Obviously, no crowd being there made for a weird atmosphere, but I found that after 10 minutes of watching the game, I didn’t really notice, as I concentrated on the play.

The most interesting aspect of these remaining games will be to see how the home teams get on without a home crowd there to cheer them on (and to sway the referee, which we all know doesn’t happen…) – and there certainly were some interesting results in The Championship, where only TWO home sides managed to win (Cardiff and Blackburn, who we are hosting next week, coincidentally). Winning 2-0, Wigan continued their pre-lockdown form; it took a while for them to get going, but once they were able to get their pressing game sorted, the team controlled the match from then on.

Huddersfield looked a little tired if truth be told – despite making the five substitutes (the rule brought in for these remaining games) they still had a player going down with cramp late on. Whilst the players have been in training for a couple of weeks, they’ve essentially had to fit in a full pre-season in that time, with only one-or-two friendly matches for practice. You can’t get up to speed physically in that time.

Overall, the streaming service was great – full HD, no connection issues or anything. Apparently, supporters of teams who use the iFollow service had connection problems at kick-off – the server provider not making concessions for the sheer volume of people who would have been streaming. Although Wigan’s feed is provided by iFollow, it’s hosted on another server – so it was fine for me and the millions of other Wigan fans across the globe!

The issue with the atmosphere at these empty grounds is a sticking point for many – as I said, I don’t mind it, but others said they found it a hard watch. The Premier League games have seen crowd noise pumped into the grounds to make up for it – I don’t like it, to be honest. It’s been designed to ‘create familiar surroundings’ for the players and the people watching back home. The problem is that I know it’s fake and the players know it’s fake – wouldn’t that work to provide a negative effect? I even watched one game where it was clear someone was in charge of a soundboard and had to do the ‘ooohs’ and ‘aaahs’ whenever there’s a chance, but unless they’re psychic, it’s always going be a couple of seconds behind.

Another thing clubs (including Wigan) have done is to have cardboard cut-outs of supporters (and certain notorious people) at grounds – again, I’m not a fan (it sounds a bit ridiculous on the face of it), but as they’re raising a bit of money for the clubs who’ve had their income streams hit, I’m more willing to let it slide. Our cardboard cut-outs cost £20 for the remaining games, so I’m currently racking my brains of a notorious celebrity that will get through the censors!

The good thing about our teams playing behind closed doors is that it shines a spotlight on how important supporters in a match-environment – hopefully this dystopian future where we all watch on television in the homes we live, work and play in 24/7 won’t happen now, as we’ve experienced what it’s like? Maybe the importance of supporters will be shown some appreciation when games do resume with cheaper ticket prices…okay, I concede that’s less likely than the dystopian future!

So whilst this new normal will do for now, I hope we get back to being in stadiums before long – it isn’t just the matches we all miss, it’s everything we do before and after; the meeting up with friends/family, travelling, going to pubs, exploring new places, meeting new people…you can’t recreate that with streaming, WhatsApp or Twitter.

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Was The FA Too Hasty To ‘Null and Void’ Non-League Over COVID-19?

With the ongoing situation with the COVID-19 virus growing increasingly severe by each passing day (virtually placing people on lockdown in their own homes), the Football Association have taken the decision to nulland void the 2019-20 season for all non-league teams in steps 3 and below, as well as the women’s leagues below The Championship.

Whilst there’s obviously more than football to worry about with this emergency, with nothing else to do but stay inside for most people, it’s not really a surprise there’s been much speculation on the status of the 2019-20 season.

It’s the haste in which the FA have taken the decision to cancel the non-league season that has caught many by surprise – as of yet, there is no firm idea of what will happen with club football at the top levels of the game (the consensus is that the Premier League and The Football League will resume in the summer), which makes the decision to cancel the non-league football season now all the more perplexing.

Why Has The Non-League Season Been Cancelled?

It’s important to acknowledge what a difficult decision the FA faced – there are thousands of clubs that make up the leagues below step 2 of the non-league pyramid and wiping all those results from the records must have been a result of a great amount of deliberation.

But let’s not kid ourselves here; money is the biggest driver in most decisions in football and it’s no coincidence that the part-time leagues were the first to fall. It’s not just the television deals and sponsorships that the professional club garner that make deciding what to do with their seasons more difficult – but also for the fact they’re able to employ vast legal teams to challenge any decision they may find unfavourable.

Also, cancelling the season now provides leagues with the chance to start afresh next season – no having to reschedule fixtures and no having to fit in 2-3 games a week to squeeze everything in. Even if football could resume in the next few months, it’s unlikely that crowds would be allowed back – just like how television provides lifeblood to the Premier League, crowds are the income provider for the non-league game.

Solid enough reasons you might think, so why’s the cancelling been seen as problematic?

The Problem With Cancelling The Football Season

The biggest issue I have with what the FA have done, is that the decision seems to have been made too quickly – the clubs weren’t even consulted and were taken by surprise as much as everyone else was. If you’re making a decision that will affect the status of people, surely you would garner a majority view before you proceed?

The problem with cancelling football at this moment is that we’re in the backend of the season – it would have been easier to cancel it a few weeks or months in, but many clubs only have 10 matches left. A number of them have either already won promotion, are miles clear at the top, locked in promotion battles – or are completely marooned at the bottom of their leagues (somehow, I don’t think they’ll mind the season being cancelled!)

It has to be said – nulling and voiding makes a mockery of their efforts throughout the season; all those games and goals will be wiped off the records. For many clubs, this season could conceivably be the difference in them grabbing the opportunity to progress, building themselves a long-term future – or not. Many have already spent what little money they have to upgrade their facilities to fill the grading requirements of the league above – wiping the records for this season makes it more difficult for them to win promotion next season, leaving them with massive bills to pay (with less income that they would have got at the level above, had they won promotion).

Although I think that ending the season may prove to be the right decision for non-league (we’ve no idea when football may resume at all levels), nulling and voiding was not the right way to go about it. Ending the season as it was or using a points-per-game model is much better than completely wiping the records, surely? I’m of the opinion in their haste to be seen to be doing something, the FA panicked.

The Reaction To The FA Cancelling Non-League

As you might imagine, quite a lot of clubs aren’t best pleased with the decision. South Shields, who are leading the Northern Premier League Premier Division by 12 points, are heading a legal challenge on behalf of clubs who want to challenge the nulling and voiding. The open letter, signed by representatives of 66 clubs, have accused the FA of [taking the decision in] ‘needless and inexplicable haste’, [with] ‘a total lack of substantive dialogue or consultation with affected clubs’ and [having] ‘no consensus’ with the leagues.

I wish them all the best, although sadly, I don’t hold out much hope – it isn’t a coincidence that the status of professional football (which includes many clubs in the National Leagues) is still up in the air. As mentioned, these clubs and leagues have the resources to make more of a challenge if they deem they’re being handed a raw deal. This doesn’t make it right; I think all levels of football should be treated the same because otherwise, what’s the point in us having a competitive pyramid if everyone can't move within it? 

What’s your opinion on the non-league season being cancelled? Was it the right decision? Should the FA have waited or ended the leagues in another way? Leave your comment below or tweet me @pints_pies

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Bury FC Expelled From The EFL: Why Our Football Clubs Need Protecting

If you were to explain to someone why you supported a football club, how would you do it? How can you covey the feelings that connect you to your club? Why you spend copious amounts of time and money following a football team around the country for (often) very little reward?

As of the 27^th August 2019, Bury FC have been expelled from The Football League after 125 years of membership – and I defy anyone watching, listening or reading the outpouring of emotions from their supporters to not understand why they supported their football club. Because, as I find myself repeating progressively as time goes on, watching football is about more than just watching football.

It’s difficult to comprehend why this has happened – we know how it’s happened; the club couldn’tprove to the EFL that they had sufficient funds to see them through the season, and proposed takeover deals collapsed or didn’t have enough time to go through – but it’s hard for me to understand why a succession of club custodians (and the EFL) has allowed Bury to get into this state.

Ever since the club was served notice of their possible expulsion, one word has been a constant in the national and local news coverage – community. It can be easy to forget in the times we live in (where the cost of transfer fees and the wages of players are thrown in our faces through television and the internet), that football clubs are supposed to represent a town, the people sat in the seats, a collective ideal, even. Football clubs should not represent the avarice of businesses and amateurish penny pinchers. Sadly, many have forgotten that.

Bury FC: Where Did It All Go Wrong?

Money has always been difficult to come by for Bury – living on the doorstep of two of English football’s biggest clubs tends to cut into the number of supporters and sponsorships you can get. So already, money is scarce; investments need to be thought out intelligently and preferably, backed up with a safety net. Over the years, they haven’t had this – getting into financial struggles that have threatened but not, seen them go out of existence as a Football League club. Until now.

The problem for clubs further down the pyramid is that there is a lack of interest from investors who a) know what they’re doing, b) have genuine intentions and c), have the money to put their plans into place. This is where the league needs to step in to protect these clubs – one of the more alarming facts to stem from this sorry mess was Bury owner, Steve Dale’s, business record. Out of the 51 businesses he had involvement with 43 have beenliquidated. Now I appreciate that the EFL were under pressure at the time to sort a deal for Bury out (Dale purchased the debt-ridden club from Stewart Day for £1), but based on that evidence alone, he should have never passed ‘the owner and directors test’ – you can get a good picture of his record by simply looking online.

So what can the EFL do? It needs to realise the true value of clubs. It needs to put in place new legislation to prevent things like high-interest loans from beingtaken out on football grounds. It needs a new way of deciding whether the guardians (because that’s what they are) have it within them to look after the club. It needs to find a way to have more supporter or local council involvement at board level to protect these community assets.

The Effect Football Has On The Local Community

Community assets are precisely what our football clubs are. Visualise what’s around the ground of your local club – there’s likely a plethora of shops, chippys, pubs, restaurants, hotels, etc. Even if your local ground is in the middle of nowhere, people will visit your town just to see a football match, perhaps even for the weekend – it may be the only reason that most visitors have in coming to your locality. So the local economy, people’s jobs and livelihoods are majorly impacted by the standing of the local football club.

Community is about families too. The busy lives we live may mean that we don’t see each other that often – football gives us that opportunity to get together and be a family. Family isn’t just about blood ties, either – football provides the means for mates, who have known each other for years, to get together to enjoy a common hobby and have a laugh. People can make new friends with those who they sit near – some people even fall in love after meeting at the football. Our clubs are the home for the family it has created and without them, our towns and lives would be poorer without them. This is why the EFL needs to put those changes in place to protect them.

My last visit to Gigg Lane was in 2015, as part of my ‘doingthe 92’ book project. Back then, things were looking positive for the club – I even commented on how previous owner, Stewart Day, was spending money, bringing in signings that would get them to League One and beyond. Oh dear.

As I was reading back at what I had experienced that day, this particular section seems somewhat poignant in the circumstances: 

As I take my seat in the main stand, the PA tells us that a man at the game today is celebrating his 100^th birthday (even he wasn’t born when they won the FA Cup) - in comparison, the (supporter) mascot is 5 years old. For me this is what some people who criticise the game don’t get about football - clubs like Bury are very-much rooted into their local communities, catering for all people, some of whom are 95 years apart. All we’ve heard in the last few weeks is about new television deals and high ticket prices, clubs like Bury show that football is for families, for everyone. 

Whatever happens to the club from here (the likelihood is that, without any re-admittance into the EFL, they will be wound up), I hope (I know) the supporters will group together and give the town a football club again. In the meantime, English football has got a lot to do to ensure that nothing like this happens again – the work starts now.

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The New Football Season Cometh

As I’m writing this, the ‘start’ of The Football League and National League season is barely 15 hours
away (I say ‘start’, as Luton Town and Middlesbrough have just played out an enthralling 3-3 draw, live on the telly).

Nevertheless, in a few short hours, near enough a million people will be winging their way to football grounds across the country, walking, driving, catching the coach, train or tram. Supporters everywhere will be going out for the first time in their new replica shirts; singles, couples, families and mates.

Whilst on their way, they may stop off at a favourite pub, café, restaurant, shop, food stall, ice cream van (it has been warm!); supporting the businesses and communities that surround a football club. Chats will be had about the game, their hopes for the season aired, as dreams of success are created. The more technological fans will be taking photos of themselves, others, the scenes around the ground, posting them on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat for everyone to know that the football season is back.

On arriving at their destination and before they take up their seat/spot, friends who haven’t seen each other since May will shake each other by the hand again, swapping stories of their summer. Pints will be sunk and pies will ate – as they await for the drama to unfold on the pitch.

The two teams will come out to applause that probably won’t be as loud for the rest of the season – those clapping are doing it enthusiastically after missing being at a game for so long. Then everyone will settle down to watch; all the new players and the old ones too. New managers playing new tactics, the old managers playing their usual ones – or perhaps something new. The opening game, especially, will be a dull affair or an exciting end-to-end slugfest – and we’ll love it either way. Perhaps there’ll even be a number of goalmouth scrambles to get excited about as well?

This is what the start of the season is for many of us, and we can’t wait!

Crusty The Pie – The Football Mascot We Didn’t Know We Needed, But Got

Just to rope in the name of this blog (again), it would be amiss of me not to celebrate my own team’s novel approach to supporter engagement (and marketing in general) for the new season. Crusty The Pie, the brand-new Wigan Athletic mascot, has been a social media sensation today. Covered on the BBC Sport website, Sky News, ESPN, even NBC in the States, Wigan’s perceived love of pies led to a club competition that saw two children create an amphomorphic pie, complete with his own kit that has ‘Crusty 8 The Pie’ on the back!

I must admit that I was slightly unnerved at first – as ever, I worry about how the decisions taken by the club would be perceived by the wider football community. Would it make the club look backward? No, the vast majority of people loved it – pies and football go hand-in-hand for some supporters and so you could say that Crusty is seen as an embodiment of what being a football supporter is about.

One of the reasons why I do get worried about this kind of thing, is that the 'Wigan is famous for pies' stereotype is born out of a reputation that has been manufactured – yes, we do have many independent bakeries and chain outlets selling the culinary delight, but so do many other towns in the North of England.

The ‘Pie Eaters’ moniker was created during the events of the 1926 general strike when Wigan miners were starved back to work, whilst their colleagues in Leigh, and other nearby towns, stayed put (easy to do so, when you’ve food to eat). Brilliantly, this furthering of the myth helps to get one over on those who tried to shame the town; as we take the name for ourselves, creating a culture which has ultimately seen Wigan’s children create a football mascot with!

From a marketing standpoint, it’s a genius move – the aforementioned news outlets have had tens of thousands of people liking, sharing and commentating on the story. There’s no real negatives to it – after all, it’s a mascot designed by kids, for kids – any adults getting upset over it should have think again, to be honest. As a (literal) Pie Eater, I’m just hoping the quality of the actual pies at the ground improves!

So here’s to a great season of repartee, entertainment, pints and pies – I’ll be kicking off mine tomorrow, with my season of groundhopping also starting very soon.

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