Why do fans support non local teams

Growing up in North East London kind of meant we had quite a mixture of people supporting mainly London teams and it was generally a case of people just following who their dad/family support.

For instance most of the kids at my primary school were probably Arsenal fans, then perhaps West Ham, then Man United (the glory hunters), then us Spurs fans with a few Chelsea and couple of Scouse fans mixed in. Only had one Newcastle fan and that was because he was actually a Geordie who moved south.

Notably we didn't have as far as a I recall any QPR fans (except a teacher who made this known to us) or any Leyton Orient fans. Come secondary school though the Orient fans were a little more forthcoming with admitting they were fans.
 
I support Arsenal, have been since the age of 16. I grew up in Canada so i would get into school early and go into the library where they had newspapers, even though i wasnt a huge football fan at that time i remember the old division 1 championship and seeing Arsenal and Liverpool fighting it out for the title. But for some odd reason, i just liked the Arsenal name so started to support them even though none of their games were ever shown on TV.

A few yrs later moved to UK, where i started to pay a bit more attention to Arsenal but i think it was during the invincibles season that i really started to properly support Arsenal.

Already told the missus that our kids will be Arsenal supporters, thankfully her brother is also a huge Arsenal fan himself.
 
I can get how you can follow a team from afar..its easy to do so and its always a big successful team people choose..I notice nobody ever follows Hartlepool united or Berwick united from the other end of the country

what I dont get is how people truly have that emotional attachment to a team they have nothing in common with..theres nothing quite like that bond you get standing (as I used to) or sitting shoulder to shoulder with friends experiencing the highs and lows of really supporting a team you love

being a fan should be a shared experience, being able to hug perfect strangers due to pure elation

being a sunderland fan is hard work, but I could never envisage supporting anybody else, its part of me...winning isnt everything ( just as well!!) but it means the highs such as yesterday are amazingly emotional experiences which I dont believe you can get by not having been part of that clubs fan culture.
 
ANONANON said:
What draws people to support a team that is hundreds of miles away? Such as someone living in birmingham supporting man united or liverpool. Why not support west brom, wolves, aston villa, birmingam city etc.

What drives that person to think "i've got all these local teams, but i'm not going to support any of them.


I don't get it.
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If you flip the question.

Why should people support their local team?
 
Rossi~ said:
If you flip the question.

Why should people support their local team?
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as somebody has said previously..its almost tribal

I turned to sunderland as an 11 year old, the friends I made in my first year at secondary school are people I am still friends with...and as a group we would go to games..it becomes a shared experience..greater than the sum of its parts. Match days were adventures, freedom given to us by our parents, all part of growing up.

and as we got older and moved away its the thing that still binds us, we get together as often as possible and again it becomes a day out, meeting up, catching up in the pub, reliving shared memories of great match days or stupid things we got up to. the match then, dissecting it all afterwards and we all go our seperate ways, looking forward to the next time we can all meet again..it may be weeks or months these days.

remote fans will never experience the true pleasure of supporting a rubbish team who can just very occassionaly give you more pleasure than you ever thought possible watching a game
 
FTM said:
I can get how you can follow a team from afar..its easy to do so and its always a big successful team people choose..I notice nobody ever follows Hartlepool united or Berwick united from the other end of the country

what I dont get is how people truly have that emotional attachment to a team they have nothing in common with..theres nothing quite like that bond you get standing (as I used to) or sitting shoulder to shoulder with friends experiencing the highs and lows of really supporting a team you love

being a fan should be a shared experience, being able to hug perfect strangers due to pure elation

being a sunderland fan is hard work, but I could never envisage supporting anybody else, its part of me...winning isnt everything ( just as well!!) but it means the highs such as yesterday are amazingly emotional experiences which I dont believe you can get by not having been part of that clubs fan culture.
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So basically you mean people who don't go to matches and watch it on TV?

Some of the 'fans' in the stadium are some of the biggest bells around and don't know how they can call themselves supporters
 
I go and watch, support and generally get depressed about Sheffield Wednesday.

I also have a string of teams I follow and go and watch when Wednesday aren't available, such as Donny Rovers, Manchester United.

I'll always watch football regardless of whom it is and despite working, Uni and a busy social life I try and watch as much as possible.

Love German football & Spanish & South American :).

I'm yet to convince Purdy to come to a match with me, the ball bag.

English fans and the English media annoy me too & there are a lot of fickle fans around as Purdy said.
 
I suppose my 2 closest teams are Kingstonian and Fulham. When growing up, however, I didn't know anyone that supported either of these and my neighbour supported Spurs so I went with them and have stuck with them through thin and thinner :p
 
Why must you support your local team?

Unless you actually are willing to pay to watch your local team, it doesn't even matter.
 
ANONANON said:
What draws people to support a team that is hundreds of miles away? Such as someone living in birmingham supporting man united or liverpool. Why not support west brom, wolves, aston villa, birmingam city etc.

What drives that person to think "i've got all these local teams, but i'm not going to support any of them.


I don't get it.
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I know the answer to this and it all started with a certain football team in the 50s.
The tragic event that caused long distance fans was the Munich Air Disaster and supporting the Busby Babes from another area of the country became the cool thing to do which of course then led to other teams being supported from afar.
 
There's nothing wrong with supporting a PL team if your local team sucks but to support one which is in the opposite side of the country is just stupid. If you live in the south and decide to support Man Utd, it's just stupid.
 
Why though? Considering the vast majority of fans watch most games on tv anyway then why would geography be a better way to decide what team to support? I'd say ditching your local team because it sucks requires as big a leap than choosing another team based on location.

Let people crack on with what they want as far as I'm concerned.
 
So what will i do, local team is Blackburn Rovers, i will be moving to Glastonbury in 5 weeks. Do I support Glastonbury Town FC or Blackburn still?
 
FTM said:
what I dont get is how people truly have that emotional attachment to a team they have nothing in common with..theres nothing quite like that bond you get standing (as I used to) or sitting shoulder to shoulder with friends experiencing the highs and lows of really supporting a team you love

being a fan should be a shared experience, being able to hug perfect strangers due to pure elation
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None of what you said there precludes supporting a non-local team. One could even make a (somewhat flippant) argument to suggest that supporting a local team is the easy option as it requires the least commitment, with the real emotionally attached fans being the ones supporting teams far away who give up basically a whole day to travelling even for home matches.
 
Support Liverpool due to my Grandfather spending time there as a youth - although he never made it as a pro (for multiple reasons, one of which being he could earn three times the money in the car business so didn't apply himself properly)
 
I have always supported liverpool, though I was born there :)

I am trying to support my local team here (Perth Glory) but it is so flipping dismal I end up watching the local basketball team instead Perth Wildcats :)

Good thing about sport here - stadiums packed with women ;) and its a hot place .....
 
I should support Arsenal, having been born just down the road, but we moved away when I was fairly young. I started supporting Liverpool after their 4-3 victory over Newcastle in the 94/95 season (I was an impressionable 8 year old!).

To be honest though, as Purdy will tell you, I'm not the most devout Liverpool fan ever. Personally I'd rather see a great football match than watch one through rose-tinted specs.
 
Most people I know (who are into football) support the local team and a premier league club (usually whoever top dog at the time) always been the way. Funny though how now we are a championship club the "supporters" are coming out of the woodwork.
 
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