Stands up and applauds that man! Dave, I share almost exactly the very same sentiments. The entire deceit, spin and downright lies about the prospective Kirkby move is what's done it for me. I no longer go the game and won't until we've a change at the top (starting with the CEO) and Kirkby's dead in the water. I'm tired of being lied to and like yourself see the "game" for what it is today. If I ever find time I might write, or at least try to, about the feeling experienced this past summer when the prospect of Kirkby increased dramatically. Great post though, Dave.

This concerns me greatly. In the space of 2 days I have read both yourself and Michael declare that you no longer go the game. I would not dare to question your credentials as Evertonians, as this site and the time that you spend on it offers plenty of evidence to your devotion to this club of ours. What has to be a major concern ,is that you are not alone in your decision not to attend matches at Goodison anymore. Many of my friends who used to trave home and away week in and week out, no longer bother anymore, some have got families that demand thier attention at weekends now, whilst others just havent got the money to spend and will take the considerably cheaper option of catching the game on Sky or even watching a dodgy stream on the internet.
Maybe it is just an age thing and the younger generation of Blues will take up the challenge and fill up the seats vacated by the older brigade, but I hate to paint a gloomy picture, and I fear the Wyness dream of filling the New Kirkby stadium with 50,000 Evertonians every other week is never going to happen. Football just isn?t the same as it used to be.

Well said Dave. I was also dismayed by the way the ground move was ushered through with what can only be described as a bunch of lies.
The chances of filling the ground at Kirkby are diminishing by the second due to Wyness’ economy with the truth.

Sorry, but I do sometimes wonder how genuine some of the post are oh here. A few weeks ago we got a series of Damascus Conversions ("I was a Yes sinner but now I have seen the video - there will be a Tescos! - and seen the light and repent!"). Now we have the "I don’t go to the match anymore - and really it’s all about Kirkby and the lies!".

So whatever it is - it turns out to be Kirkby again. Gents, I really do understand you not wanting to go to Kirkby. There are good arguments on both sides. But where exactly are all these blatant Kirkby lies? Some spin, I grant you. But anything as clearly, obviously factually incorrect as the claim on the recent KEIOC statement that 21,000 people - "a majority" - were against Kirkby. Now that is what I call lying!

Guys get a grip of yourselves.
Are any of you old enough to remember the bleak seventies, when we played worse football than can be imagined. Players like Latchford who came to Everton on a national record transfer fee only to hand in a transfer request the next season and every season thereafter until Kendall arrived got rid of him. Players like Terry Daracott, Jim Pearson and George Telfer. Home gates that barely nudged above thirty thousand when Goodison could hold fifty. No cups and hardly a derby win. Liverpool winning everything and Anfield full every week.
MOTD equalled one match that could have been a local derby between Burnley and Oldham.
On top of this the ubiquitous presence of the football hooligan.

The nineties where bad too, I don?t need to go over that as most of you will remember it.

The problem as I see it is; you seem to hark back to some mythical time when football was not ruled by money, played in some gentlemanly spirit and we all went home to hot cups of bovril that had been prepared by our subservient wife or mother.

Can anyone enlighten me, when did this special time exist?

Neil just as the yes voters believe all they read and heard the no voters translated a good proportion of it as lies, it’s subjective in the eyes of the beholder.

Peter I believe the cynism towards football being fooked started around the time Sky "re-invented" the game, did at any time before that you were absolutely certain we would not win another title or major trophy in your lifetime without a serious injection of cash to buy it?

In the 50s it was the worlds worst kept secret that clubs got around the 20 quid per week salary cap by offering all kinds of perks.
Anyone who thinks the past was a golden age with a level playing field was not there or living in fantasy land.

Neil,
The pertinent untruths regarding Kirkby are both factual and clear. Stadium for "practically nothing" pre-vote became a stadium for £50m min cost to club according to Wyness just after the vote, more recently £80m is the mooted figure. These figures dispel another untruth that there are "no plan B’s", since by definition if we have that money for Kirkby we can have it for redevelopment or the Loop. These were the headline quotes pre-vote!!! There of course is another untruth.... The club state that the Loop isn’t a viable site pre-vote, world renowned stadium architects HOK site-study report proves otherwise. Wyness declares the Kirkby stadium will be the most accessible in the country, his own transport consultants admit that the public transport provision is grossly inadequate necessitating the biggest park and ride scheme in the country, with self-confessed misgivings about the ability to disperse/transfer such large numbers in the desired window post match. Meanwhile you can only say KEIOC lied about 21,000 not being the majority of 36,000.....(it always used to be) or some such trivial assertion. Slightly selective in your sensitivity to lies and or untruths there I think!!!

Peter P,
Late 70’s we were quite good in relative terms, certainly better than the likes of Man U, Arsenal and Chelsea. Of course the big problem was that Liverpool’s dominance was in full swing, and apart from Notts Forest, there was little real competition..... but generally we weren’t that bad, and the crowds were as big as nowadays. I too have noticed some of my mates have drifted away in recent times. The costs are extortionate, in the 70’s it probably cost roughly the same to go the flicks as to go the match..... now it’s about 5-6 times the cost. The hype and marketing have kept the crowds, but it’s only a matter of time before the "big 3-4’s" monopoly kills it. I’m an addict, but there was a time when I said I wouldn’t even miss an away game, now they are much rarer for me, so you never know.

Dick
I agree with you whole heartedly, I was not around in the Fifties and too young for most of the sixties but started to take an interest around 1970.
I laugh at things like the newspapers decrying the current rate of sackings in the Premier League so far.
It was Everton who sacked Johnny Carey in a taxi and adopted a policy of win something within three seasons or your out.
1st Division football (premier League) has always been a nasty money driven business.

Gavin
I would stand and say Sky has done more good than harm in English football. Sky has marketed the game around the world and we have seen the benefits of this by the quality of players playing every week in the Premier League.

Just to answer your question I will be rude and ask you a question
Did the supporters of Nottingham Forest actually believe that they would not only win the league but two European cups, during a time when Man United, Arsenal and Liverpool where the richest clubs in England. Brian Clough did it on a shoe string budget, David Moyes is trying (and I fully support him) on a reasonable budget. yes to some extent the playing field is not level now but it certainly wasn’t level for Cloughie either. In answer to your question Gavin I did not believe during the mid seventies early eighties that we could win the league, we were shite. But I do now, I believe that Everton can still win the Premiership.

Gavin, I absolutely agree that there is so much subjectivity here.

Tom, we’ve been round this one before! The intelligent Yes voters (I know you don’t believe there are any) did not vote Yes because they believed the precise financials that Wyness quoted. Everyone who is not an idiot knows that these things are pretty unpredictable (Wembley etc.). They voted Yes for a whole bunch of good reasons that I and others have exhaustively explained here.

Wyness of course, like Liverpool FC, did not say that NO ground could be built on the Loop (you could build some sort of ground on my back garden). The point is that no adequately sized ground that does not cost Everton a fortune (MUCH more than Kirkby) can be built. And that remains true. How could a ground built with an insignificant partner and a reluctant local council on a traffic island cost more than a ground built on a big open space with Tescos and a highly supportive council? Use your common sense.

And the point about the lying KEIOC claim is not of course that 21,000 is a majority of 36,000 (I can add up too). It is the claim that all those 21,000 are against Kirkby. That is obviously a lie and you know it. All we know is that a lot of people didn’t vote, and of those who did vote more voted for Kirkby than against.

And I grew up supporting football in the Revie era, and I can assure you that it didn’t feel like much of a golden age of chivalrous sportsmanship and great ethics to me.

Fact is though Peter, No club will ever come up from Championship and win the league, unless they have a billionaire backer..... Forest did that! Several very small clubs won the league right up to the 70’s, Ipswich in the 60’s, Derby/Forest 70’s etc. Sky has done a lot to help promote footy, and we pay handsomely for it!!! The outcome of much of it has seen an elite form. There were always some clubs bigger than others, but the honours were shared much more broadly, now the select few share the spoils. I hope too that one day one will slip off their perch and we can sneak in, but in the meantime they’re building fanbases that will always sustain them.

Neil,
I have never said there were no intelligent YES voters, I challenge you to dredge the archives to find such. My belief is that people have been deceived, which is reaffirmed, judging by the fact that you averted the issues regarding the other untruths regarding cost, transport and consequent deliverability of redevelopment of Goodison. On the issue of the Loop, You make assumptions regarding this site that you cannot possibly know. Bestway are/were offering to make substantial contributions towards the project, at a site far more attractive and with far greater potential to attract much more valuable enabling developments than anything in Kirkby, as shown by the number and quality of developments taking place all over the city centre at the moment. LCC mobilised a significant part of their planning department just to look at this site which rather refutes your claims there too. The club’s contribution was said to be of the order of £60m, similar or even less than that for Kirkby...... another fact we were conveniently kept unaware of pre-vote. As regards the rather trivial criticism of KEIOC’s use of stats Surely it is a fact that 21,000 people were not convinced by Kirkby. They were the ones selling a proposal, only one option appeared in the ballot literature, and only 15k out of 36k were convinced. At the end of the day though, there was far more important content in the newsletter!!!

I can?t believe people are still arguing about the vote results.

Look the facts are ( I don?t remember the exact numbers so wont guess)

X people voted for Kirkby
Y people voted against Kirkby

Z people didn?t vote.

If X > Y then X wins.

The number Z is irrelevant as nobody know who they are or why they didn?t vote. To presume that they all didn?t vote becuase they were against the move is complete rubbish.

If they were that against it they would have voted wouldn?t they!

To claim the majority (Y + Z) didn?t vote in favour is utter garbage. For that matter I could say that an overwhelming majority (X+Z) didn?t vote against Kirkby so its an exceedingly popular decision to move!

Peter

We played a lot better football throughout the 1970’s than we have since 1990. 1996 and this year (up to now perhaps being the exception). What colours our perception of this era is Liverpools growing dominance. For most of those seasons we at least attempted to play reasonably attractive football. I seem to remember various cup runs and semi finals, the league cup final of 78, european football, nealrly winning the league in 74.
I am doing this from memory not with a book at hand but I am fairly sure that we had many top half finishes in that period compared to the period after 1990.
Your comment about the team with Latchford in is unjustified I take it you dont remember Dave Thomas, Martin Dobson, McKenzie and King et al. What I enjoyed about this era was despite there being money about there was not as much of a gulf between clubs. This allowed teams like QPR, Ipswich, Derby, Forest to actually compete for and in some cases win titles. Sky has imposed a boring autonomy on who can win things because finance dictates that Man U, Lverpool, Arsenal and now Chelsea can simply buy the best on offer. Although our loveable red friends still cant win a title to save their lives. I understand the sentiment of the lead article even though I still go all the time. The ground move will destroy for many of us a sense of identity and belonging we have with the club. I sense many of us (yes and no voters) know the club has misled us regarding the finance and legal agreements surrounding the Kirkby move, which is why our current optimism about the good stuff we are playing is tainted with an unease about where we are heading long term.

I think quite a few of us have missed the point here, it?s not a debate about when the game was better or the stadium move (although it is a contributory factor). I think Dave Lynch has every right to say how he feels and he puts his case extremely well. I haven?t lost interest in my team just yet, but football is entirely dominated by money now and it?s clear that there very few people of integrity left in the game today.

Marcus.
Thanks for taking on board what i was actually trying to convey.
This post was not meant to drag up the Kirkby argument, it was written to highlight the way football has been corrupted and taken away from the fans.
In fact the only people with integrity left in the game are the fans, but the whole circus that is football is designed to do nothing more that screw us for evey penny we have.

First of all, Chris you are absolutley spot on. The no voters are trying to hijack the didnt voters and use it as their own. In facyt the yes voters could do the same by saying they were not in favour of staying at Goodison. I know that people will say the question was about Kirkby and not Goodison but if they felt strongly enough about it they would have voted against Kirkby. IN 1892 I am sure there was some dissenters about Everton leaving Anfield. We do have to move that is clear just as clear as it was in 1892. LCC didnt give a shit before the move was announced because they were too busy looking after the welfare of the redshite accross the park.
I find it astounding that the main protagonists involved with this Website all claim to refuse to go to the game until things change at the top. I wonder when that came about. To be honest I do doubt their credentials as Evertonians because all they seem to do is slag the club off week in week out. I honestly beleive that this club would benefit from not having supporters of that ilk linked with Everton. Thge Tony Marshes, Michale Kendricks and Colm Kavanaghs of this world are the incessant negatives of this world and are best taken with a pinch of saly. Win 7 -1 and they tell you dont build your hopes up a good player comes on the scene he is a flash in the pan. This fact still remains that bestway and LCC havent stated how much Everton have to commit to for the loop site. THe vote went in favour of the move and it will go ahead and the club will move out of Liverpool along with thousands of scousers who have left their ancestral home and now live in Knowsley, St. Helens, Wigan and various other places throughout the North west. SO if you really want to help Everton, get off your arses and go and buy a half season ticket and start supporting your club again instead of whinging and moaning.

Great Article one of the best written in a long while. Mick Mac, you're asking fans to cough up their dosh to pay for Wyness?s and Kenwright?s retirement fund coz that?s all that?s gonna happen. Them 2 don?t give a shit about this club, the fans or what happens after this mess they?ve caused called "Project Kirkby". Idiots!!!!

Tom Hughes, you state "You make assumptions regarding this site that you cannot possibly know", Isn’t that what you are doing.

Mick Mac, good post mate, pretty much what I think, apart from doubting their credentials.

Dave Lynch I know where you are coming from, however, I will never lose my love for my club and no matter how the money men continually try to destroy the competiveness of the league I will still support Everton

Everton Everton Everton.....Everton Everton Everton.....Everton Everton Everton.....Everton....Everton!!

Dave if that is how you feel fair enough to be honest fans have stopped going the game for years, old ones go new ones come, my brother went to his first game in 10 years last week. I went to Nuremberg last week and them memories will live with me forever. Great article my arse it is just more blues having a moan, you hear them all the time on phone ins and message boards. What matters to most blues is the results on the pitch, there seems to be an obsession with Wyness & Kenwright on this site, last month it was anti Moyes posts, now it is just anti Everton. Why do you people even bother coming on these sites, if thats how you feel about the club. 6000 Everton Fans who traveled to Germany will do me not you moaning cynical so called fans, you have become sports spectators not fans so basically you are arm chair fans so to me you opinion is not worth a carrot, how can it be when you watch a game on a 32" plasma in the boozer. I go home and away and love this club but this Kirkby debate is clouding peoples views, people are now becoming narrow minded and bitter, this article is a clear example, how people make comments and then twist them to the Kirkby move.

Good work Tommy, I’m right behind you fella. Support y’team no matter what; I don’t give a rats arse who the chairman is, or who runs the club. I also dont give a stuff who plays for us, good or bad I’ll still support them. Wanting the best for your club is one thing, constantly slagging them off is quite another.

Up the blues.

To try and bring this back to the original point made by Dave Lynch (regardless of whether readers think it was an indirect attempt to re-visit the stadium issue), the fact remains that many fans do not like what the game has become ? wherever and by whoever it is played.

Post Heysel and the Taylor report, post Murdoch, unseen (and not so unseen) hands have, through money and social engineering, sought to change the game for ever. It is no longer the province of the ordinary working (or unemployed) person.

The former fans have largely been priced out and given second best - watching from home or down the pub. Super stadia and galacticos are for the richer ?customer? who likes their prawn sarnies and spends loadsamoey on tat - emblazoned with logos of football teams that play hundreds of miles from where they, the customer, was born and raised. Gone are the days you could stand on the Gladwys for the price of three or four pints of beer.

I live in a former mining village in Yorkshire, about 12 miles from Leeds. Are the people in the local Working Men’s Club Leeds United fans? Are they hell. Most of them support the Red Shi*e or "the Scum" (as the few Leeds fans call Manyoo). But do any of these people who proudly wear their replica shirts and drive cars with number plates bearing teams logos actually go to games? Hardly a one!

Football is going the way of opera. A strange thing to say? Er, no. Opera was once the province of the common bod - yes, believe me, many of Mozart’s operas had their debuts in ’lowly’ Vienna music halls and Puccini’s tunes were the pop songs of their day. But who now among the lowly can afford to attend the opera? Even with its massive subsidies from the lotto.

All that said, I think it is wholly unfair to single out the likes of BK and KW and heap the blame on them. These guys, if they are guilty (and I make no pronouncement myself) are only small cogs, and they come in on the coat-tails of generations of petty crooks before them.

It has to be said the growing alienation from soccer of us ?ordinary folk? is not a new phenomenon. I remember watching the likes of Nico Claasen turn out for Spurs in the 80s, seeing him usher in the era of cynical cheating and diving. And I was heartily sickened. I recall the shock I felt the first time I saw a pro put a ball into touch and then claim the throw in (hey, some of the people who play pro snooker are real dodgy, but they play fair). Things like that often made me feel I didn?t want to watch football at all ? live or on telly.

Occasionally we see glimpses of the beautiful game, and sometimes teams can buck the trend and upset the illuminati who seek to own the game (like when we ruined the so-called ?dream final? in 1995, thrashing Spurs 4-1 in the FA Cup semi) but for the most part soccer is a cesspit of greed. We have to live with this knowledge and cherish the all-too rare flashes of decency and beauty. We may be in the gutter but occasionally, albeit only once in a while, we can gaze up at the heavens.

For christ sake ! Read the post.
I did not say i have stopped going the game, or have stopped loving EFC.
I stated i go when it suits ME not when the tv companies dictate i should go.
Sorry i ever mentioned the unmentionable, cos it is you lot who have turned it into a Kirkby debate. NOT ME.
Tommy and all you others, the post is ANTI FOOTBALL, and the way it is run.
Use some common sense and stop being so blinkered.
Hobbsy. I had you down as someone of inteligence who you could have a reasonable and intelligent debate with ?

Stop living in the past, football has moved on, and in my opinion for the best. Would anyone on this site have took their wifes, kids and mams to the match 25 years ago, when hooligans ruled, filthy grounds and going to an away game was like going into a war zone. I went the Emirates last year with my Mrs and three kids last year, yes it cost a bomb but so does most things these days, the west end theaters cost the same as going the match. This is Football in the 21st century and for me it is much better, I remember the games in the late 70s and early 80s when 11000 fans went to Goodison, that is what would stop me going the match, not a chairman, who in my opinion has actually steadied the ship, same way Wyness as, remember Dumford & Johnson waste of time. The club is now respected throughout the country and the manager is highly thought of, two manager of the year awards. Someone said cynics are actually manic depressives and don?t wont to see light just darkness and after reading some of these posts me think that person is correct

Dave - my post wasn’t directed solely at you mate; it was a general dig at people who like to slate Everton rather than support them alot of the time. Wasn’t meant to piss you off.

Mick, my wife used to go to soccer games in the 60s and 70s, on her own. In the 1980s I took her to Goodison on numerous occasions.

Now we simply can’t afford to go. For us to go to the match twice a month, factoring in he cost of travel and refreshments, this would exceed what we pay on our mortgage (and let’s not forget, EFC is one of the cheaper teams to follow).

Modern stadia like the Emirates may be wonderful but I doubt I will ever get the chance to sit in it (regardless of the fact I think Arsene Wenger’s teams play beautiful football).

You say things are "better" now. For you, maybe, but for me, no. I’ve been priced right out of the game. How is that "better"? :o(

Oh and by the way; the original post makes alot of valid points - football has become media run, but then thats society today - media run.

Allan

What an inane position to take, you don't care who the club is run by or I presume where we play?

Tommy, I suppose we should just agree with everything the club say and not protest because let's face it, under the leadership of Kenwright we have enjoyed success on and off the field and he has never told us any lies before. What utter drivel, people can support the club and be critical of its leadership at the same time, they are not mutally exclusive.

Do you think all 6,000 fans who went to Germany voted Yes, or could even vote? Like you I loyally follow Everton FC, We the supporters are the football club, not Wyness etc. I am entitled to be critical if I want to.

For those who say we cant talk about Kirkby in this thread, please read the original post it says the ground move was the ?breaking point? aligned to the apathy EFC shows its fans, in stopping Dave going the match, does that not worry you? Is he by himself in thinking that? I don?t think so!! I think therefore to talk about the clubs leadership is a viable topic.

Dave, it was a good post and unfortuantely like so many other threads it resorts to either a) Name calling or b) The Kirkby debate.

As I said previously I can understand your concerns but I love football and Everton too much to let the big wig money men spoil it for me.

I have a season ticket and therefore it roughly works out about the same money as I would spend if I went out for a bevy to watch the game in a pub, so I will keep going until I simply cannot afford it, the money men love people like me but I am addicted to Everton and cannot help it

It?s a real pity that what started as a interesting post about the changing nature of the game has been distorted. I?m not going to speak for Dave (he?s perfectly capable), but I agree with his point that the premiership is consumed with greed and the game spins on money, nothing else. That?s where I find my interest waning, I don?t doubt there have been improvements and no-one is suggesting that it was all a bed of roses back when, but you only have to look at the plight of Coventry and Cardiff to realise something is very wrong. What Risdale did to Leeds is deplorable by any standards and is a direct product of the greed within the modern game. It?s not about Kirkby or boycotting your team, it?s about a game that?s eating itself and whether you still have the stomach for it (sorry about the metaphors).

Soccer games is it Chris Jones to me it is Football. I used to go the games in the 70s and early eighties and there is no way I would have taken my Family to the likes of spurs and Chelsea, you either never went on the bright and early to Euston in the 80s then. We live in a media driven world, global society and all the other bollocks that go with it and there is not a thing you can do about it, other then getting on here and slagging everything Blue. What pisses me of about sport supporters is they are never happy, EFC are about to go on what could be one of most successful seasons for years and all you moaning minnies can do is slate the chairman and CEO, you take a stand on them and there is no way you can back track and say well maybe they are doing just little bit of good for the club and its not all about the ground move .

Ed - I didn’t mean it quite that literally; what I mean is, that whoever is in charge it makes no difference to my support stance.

I understand the negative comments but look at football today.

some of the best players in th world, played in some of the best stadia in the world that are packed out (in most cases). Where you can sit and enjoy the football without having to worry about being beaten up on the way to or during the game.

Do you honestly believe the game is worse now?

The problem isn?t with SKY and what they?ve done, but the chairmen of 20+ years ago, for mis managing and under selling the game, allowing it to fall to pieces.

SKY saved football not ruined it!

Mick.
I understand what you are saying. Everton have to be a part of what is going on to progress.
It’s just that i wish to have no part in the hype and greed that goes with it. Like you i will always be blue to the core, but unlike you i will pick and choose where and when i go, thats my decision.
I hope the blues do go on and have their most succesfull seasons for years, and i hope you are there to see it all mate.
Some of us though feel differently, but isn’t that what makes life so interesting and sparks healthy debate. NSNO.

Yes football in the 21st century is an expensive interest, yes the players are overpaid, yes the Kirkby move is not everyones cup of tea, yes the chairman should take some flak along the way but Football today like it or not is about money. You have the choice though you go or you don?t. But at the end of the day at this moment in time football is massive, hundreds of live games, millions coming in from sky, middle classes choosing football to support rather than Rugby Union, this is modern football. You cant live in the past, you either move with the times or you die, I am not happy with the massive salaries and the cost of going to the game, but it is a big part of my live and when we are wining the last thing on my mind is Kenwright, but chairman come and go just like managers and players but Everton are Everton and nothing will change that for me, not even a move out of the city boundaries. Everton to me is about the team winning and the players playing for the jersey, the board only come into it when we are loosing badly like the great escapes of the 90s, that is when you hurt and you want yo kick the chairman in the bollocks but at this moment I am happy with the team and manager. I will deal with the ground move when it happens but my gut feeling is that we will still be at Goodison park in 10 years time and I think the RS will still be at Anfield, £500 million to build a ground and going up everyday, that is debt and bad management

Dave that is a fair call, I have loads of old mates who have stopped going the game or just go when they feel like it. I happen to enjoy going the match, especially when we are having a good run, I don?t go to as many aways as I used to but we get married and have kids so sometimes money plays a part. I try not to dwell to much on the politics of the game, but I am aware of it such as the G14 and the money involved in the champions league, but what do you do boycott the team you love because of something out of my control. I am an Everton fanatic, but its only a part of my life not all, but the pleasure I get going to watch the lads win is second to none, so for me I will continue to pay overpriced season ticket prices and £4 for a pie in some grounds, the same way you might pay £2.50 for a pint of pissy lager in the boozer on a Saturday afternoon

The bottom line I feel is that we were mislead with the figures on the Kirby option. From being told ?next to nothing? to now £80mill (after the vote) was tactical and very sly.
That alone should make people question Wyness? true motives for the Kirkby deal.
We need a bigger stadium but for £80mill of our own money there are other options. Building around the Loop?s restrictive roads may cost slightly more but what an exciting prospect it would be. A 60,000 city centre location would provide tremendous exposure for the club.
Failing that lest look at re-developing Goodison. Once again for that kind of money we can rebuild and even bigger Goodison.
Which brings me back to the opening post. With the current over the top coverage of football and the decline in attendances at most clubs (outside the ?big? 4). Would Kirkby really stem the tide for Everton and return us back to former glories? I doubt it. What Everton FC needs is something iconic to galvanize the fan base. Only a modern, bigger Goodison, or a big City Centre stadium will do...

Fair play to you Mick.
Hope you witness the success YOU deserve and the rest of the die hards with you.
Respect where it?s due.

Recent 'confessions' from both the editors of TW and some contributors have left me fairly gob smacked.

'The game is bent', 'Wyness lied to me', 'I don't want to go to Kirby'.....so (sic) I don't go to the match anymore and actively support the team?

Sorry, but I don't get the logic. If you didn't know the game was riddled with corrupt practices which planet have you been living on since the sixties ( and before)? Wyness had an agenda... quelle surprise! You voted 'no' and didn't get your way.... or perhaps you didn't get a vote because you don't go the game (?)

Why should any of the above stop you from going to the game? Why not just say I can't be bothered anymore, or can't afford it or whatever; instead of trying to justify your decision with the kind of pseudo logic alluded to above?

Whatever your reasons it's your choice, but you're missing a great season, with Everton (occassionally) playing some really outstanding football in front of the 35,000+ fans who can be bothered to turn up.

Your loss.

I have to say I feel very much as you do,Dave ,and have been steeling myself to make this my last as a season ticket holder.Perhaps I’m falling out of love with the game or maybe it’s just the 500mile round trip I make to games at Goodison.Some Saturdays this season (far from the worst in my 40years attendance)I’ve woken up thinking ’Oh shit, it’s Everton today.’And the ranting Evertonian on TalkSport does nothing to enthuse me!
Perhaps I’ll give it one more season before I retire to Marks&Spencer although I guess even Saturdays spent there would be better than Tesco!

Dave, I hear what you’re saying and agree with the sentiments and there were times last season when I stayed away (and regretted it) because I was fed up with the set up etc - pretty much the sort of things you’ve mentioned but I’m still too passionate about my team to stop going. I’m not saying that people who don’t go are’nt passionate too, I’m just saying that for me, despite all the dross behind the scenes, I can’t not go to the match. It would kill me to be at home when I know I could be there!

Living in London, most people I know here and chat to casually (cab drivers, people in pubs etc.) would be utterly shocked to hear the negativity about Everton which is so loud on this site. I know ’we don’t care what others say...’, but -

Just today, I had a Spurs bloke doing a spot or removals for me: "You’ve nothing to complain about mate. Everton one of the best run teams in the league now. You’ve stuck by your manager and now you are getting your reward. You’ll come fifith this year, mark my words. We have become a luaghing stock". And I hear this stuff EVERY DAY.

It’s great being an Everton fan again. Everton has become a highly respected club, building a real team of dedicated players, sticking by its manager, a respected professional as captain, no bung scandals, having a decent owner not involved in all sorts of shady shenanigans or get rich quick schemes. And even now playing some great football!

Reading this site, you’d think we were, well.... Spurs, or Newcastle, or Portsmouth, or Birmingham, or Leeds or something.

What is wrong with all you negative people?

I totally agree with David Hall, Chris Jones (Wakefield) and David Lynch.

I live in Belfast and get over twice or three times a year, because it’s a one off, i really look forward to it. When we don’t get over, i have to admit anything to do with Everton on any channel, i’m always on the edge of my seat.

You guys should see what we have to put up with over here in Northern Ireland, Liverpool fans are the worst breed of supporters i’ve ever met and have to put up with. They’ve never played the game and Liverpool FC is an extension of their over inflated ego’s!!!

Back to the original point, i’m too losing my love for the game, if Everton are on any channel i’m a nervous wreck shouting and cajoleing at the TV, but the "Big 4" (you don’t know how much contempt i have for that Sky marketing crap), Sky themselves, The Premier League, The FA, The Referee’s bias towards the Big 4, the media’s bias to them too, these are all ruining what is the greatest hobby and pastime on earth, one i thought i couldn’t do without throughout my whole life.

I came so close to walking away from the game after the Derby, that was pure corruption which football should be free from.

And i think Kirkby will ruin this club, but that’s only my opinion, if i’m wrong then so be it, i don’t want to annoy people, deep down, even from watching on from Belfast i think moving out of the Liverpool boundaries will ruin us and give Liverpool more fans, thus more money and publicity. Believe me listening to them sometimes i wonder if it can get any worse...Kirkby is a wake up call, if it goes ahead, i really fear for Everton FC...

We are Everton, support your team, if you can go the game go, if you cant that is ok, but come on I sense a bit of jealousy creeping into these posts regarding the so called big 4 and sky tv’s coverage of these 4. Declan if we remain at the present Goodison we will be ruined, the ground is one of the worst equipped grounds in the premiere league for modern day football, that is a fact not an opinion of what might or might not happen in 10-20 years time. I don’t believe there is one person who would stop going the game because of back room politics, you are liars, the reason you stop going might be the cost (the mortgage repayments need sorting), the team are shit or circumstances change, to come on here and post a thread like this makes me laugh, you go the match to support your team on the pitch, if you cant afford it ok or if your Mrs prefers spending your money in primarc fair enough but do us a favor, football has been corrupt for years, admissions prices have been going up year on year for forever, so dont bullshit me about all this crap about I am not going because of the chairman and the vote on the ground move. Put the dummy back in the pram and get behind your team or do us all a favor and piss off.

Keep the faith lads - i despair to see Evertonians lose heart like this. This era of the so called "big four" will pass. History dictates that. We just need to stick with our club and wait for the breakthrough to come - and it will eventually.

I visit Toffeeweb every week for views and news, it never fails to sadden me the number of anti-EFC rants on the site. Don?t try and be cute Dave, your original post was most certainly aimed at EFC ie Kenwright and Wyness, and not just a general moan about football. As other posts state, this has been the way of top flight football for decades. Your sham shock at the responses does you no favours. I have no doubt if we do win a trophy this season or in the next few years, I will bet my mortgage there will be many posts saying - ?Its only a Mickey Mouse Cup? - ? We won it despite Moyes/Kenwright? etc etc

For Gods sake if you have nothing constructive things to say-dont bother - just stay at home and listen to the radio and be pleased for the rest of us...

Tony - telling any Evertonian to "do us all a favour and piss off" is a ridiculous thing to say. Your not speaking for me mate when you say "us all".

A very interesting thread started by Dave who gave us his reasons for making choices.I have long held the opinion that going to the game is habit forming and its very hard to break that habit.However if you do break that habit then in most cases you also have some good justification to explain it,mainly to yourself but also to those that ask ’Why dont you go anymore’ I started with the habit of going to games but it turned into an addiction.Now that really is a different can of worms. We share all the same concerns about the club,game,media etc.But being addicted .................!!

Thommo.
Believe me my post was genuine, i know as i have stated that EFC have to be part of the greed factor, or die.
But i won’t be.
Your reply is non constructive and without foundation as you don’t know me from Adam matey.
I will be over the moon if the blues win trophies and for the lads who follow them everywhere as i have stated.
Go with the fat cats if you must and spare a thought for the Coventry fans today.
Do the FA and the prem that is awash with money care about them.
Do they FUCK.
What has happened to them only strengthens my feelings.

With respect; there’s always been a ’top 4’ whether that be 4, 3, 2 or 1 top team. This is nothing new. There has always been teams with more money/success than the rest and the fact that there’s more money around the game now can be traced back to Jimmy Hill removing the maximum wage.

To say you’d rather not watch Everton because of the money, the chairman or the way the club is run is your own choice - that said, it does strike me as cutting off your nose to spite your face.

The price of living in this country is scandalous, and thats got nothing to do with football - if you cant afford to go and watch live Premier League football thats probably more to do with the cost of living than it is the cost of football.

Allan.
The point is i can afford it. Maybe it’s the social conscience (never been able to spell that) i have, i just don’t know.
People on here will judge me, i know that.
But what i feel is what i feel. I love the club and have spent thousands in my 40 odd years following them all over the country and europe.
I just hate the state of football at present, the have’s and have nots, if you dont have you can’t compete. End of and that is bad for the game.
It’s like a sporting version of the Thatcher years.

Thought I make my point a bit clearer.

I?m not giving up on Everton, hell no, I'll never ever be able to do that no matter what happens. So I won?t be ?pissing off?, I just hate feeling cheated as a supporter due to greed, money and bad favourable towards the Big 4 refereeing.

If I was a season ticket holder, I?d be at every game so long as it was physically possible, despite all that?s going on in the game now.

When I said I wanted to walk away from the game I meant the game in general and all that it stands for (greed and money), the one thing that stopped me doing so, is the love for this football club. Once it?s in your blood there?s no going back, it?s a love affair that will never die.

But football in general is dying and the main reasons for it is money and greed. Sky and the self fulfilling G14 are the main culprits for this.

I don’t really buy any of this righteous indignation shit when it comes to people no longer going to games. Basically, if you can & want to go, you will - irrespective of biased referees, an incompetent board, overpaid players etc. etc. etc.
If you can go but don’t want to, then don’t but I don’t see why people have to justify their decision as some sort of tortured moral conversion.

As someone who has put in 45 years uninterupted support, I despair at some peoples views on moving to Kirkby.
Why do the pro Kirkby people not want to believe that there are other deliverable options like redeveloping Goodison or the loop site?
I wouldn?t set foot in any Kirkby stadium, do you know why? Because I believe it would be a totaly different club than the one that has been such a massive part of my life.
I wish you could all set your standards a lot higher and not so easily accept moving to another town 6 miles away to play in what can only be described as a ten pin bowling drome next to tesco?s.
We are Everton FFS! ? We're better than that aren?t we?

For me, the sad thing that comes out of this thread is the intolerance of some of those who have heartfelt convictions and strong views of their own. If you disagree with somone else?s strongly held views, do you really have to insult and abuse them as well?

This mailbag faclity is provided for open debate, not open (verbal) warfare. If you are not prepared to debate the subject raised on its merit, in a reasonable manner, without maintaining some respect for opposing views, then quite frankly, I am not interested in your opinion.

And while we're on that subject, can we please lay off this business of claiming something is a wind up or is not genuine. That is equally insulting. As I said elsewhere, if you really can't handle the open debate going on, then please sit on your hands or take you unwanted comments elsewhere.

One thing binds us together, that we are all Evertonians, which is why I HATE this Evertonian one-upmanship that goes on from some people. Either you show some respect for other posters or your messages will be removed and you will be banned.

END OF

Ed Smith
I clearly remember the Seventies and players like Latchford, transfer request second season and when asked after he scored 30 goals in 1977 did he still want to leave, he replied of course I do.
I also remember Duncan McKenzie, gifted and practically useless in a team environment, incidentally he only played 48 games for Everton and if I recall only one spectacular performance (against the Shite)
Martin Dobson was good player but he had played his best football and most of his international football before he arrived from Burnley.
Andy King was an outstanding player and Everton should have kept him longer.
Incidentally We never won a derby match for seven years during the seventies until Andy King scored that goal.