For once...rags talking sense...
RAG1: The problem with suggesting that any reservations about Man City necessarily must be a consequence of jealousy or obsession is that there is never an indication of a natural point where it would be justifiable to have some and it not be due to the green eyed monster. If they bought every player on earth, for example, would it then be acceptable to wonder about the effect that is having on the game? Unless you are seriously prepared to defend the position that Man City, and Chelsea before them, are just a natural extension of everything that football should be about, the people who are suggesting that any concern expressed is not serious have all of their work ahead of them explaining why this is so. Simply suggesting that it must be due to jealousy is itself not serious.
Personally, and despite my own feelings about how the owners of both Chelsea and Man City earned their money, I actually enjoy the fact that other clubs provide a real challenge. Does anyone genuinely want to win the league against clubs who have spent half of what we have and against teams that are so obviously inferior that it completely dilutes our own achievement? Whether we would admit it at the time or not, it is possible for it not to even really be an achievement to win the league and for it to be a spectacular failure to come in second place.
And despite my reservations about the future of football, I genuinely don't begrudge any other football fan the satisfaction and enjoyment that I have felt in supporting a club that competes at the very pinnacle of the world game. I don't care if every Man City fan hates me with a passion, I've been so very lucky to have been alive during United's most successful period in their history, and I can't seriously wish to hog that limelight and for all other football fans — of which a vastly disproportionate amount don't ever get to see their club win anything — to stand by and congratulate me for being quite so damn fortunate.
I don't fear Man City's team and I certainly don't fear the reaction of their fans if and when they are successful at some point. Despite the fact that I am not a gloater, plenty of people are and more than enough United fans will deserve every moment of stick that they get when City do eventually win something big. And if we keep on winning that will only make those achievements that bit more special, as in 06/07, not simply because we had gone a few years without winning after a period of becoming rather blasé about it all, but because it was against such an accomplished, well managed, and well funded team as Chelsea.
You could certainly argue that Man City, the club and its owners, won't really deserve that success, but I don't believe that you could say the same about their supporters.
RAG2: Some good points raised there.
The point is, we, as a club, have dominated for a long time, and that success brought wealth which increased our stranglehold on the game. Now others are doing it, and its a bit hypocritical to complain about what they are doing.
They are only doing what United have done in the past. Only on a greater scale. Can we complain when someone else takes over the mantle as richest club and uses that wealth to forge ahead of everyone else. Isnt that what we were doing for most of the 90s. Buying the best talent. Taking on youngsters with the promise of more than what anyone else could offer.
City are now doing what the other regular top 4 clubs have done in the past, and thats using their wealth to try steal a march on the others. United, Arsenal, Liverpool and Chelsea all happen to have been the biggest spenders in the premiership era. No coincidence that they also happen to be the four most succesful teams in that same timespan.
We can bitch about it killing the game, but thats no more than what other clubs accused us of doing in the past. Go ask any supporter of other premiership teams how United got their success. Most will say they bought it, just like CHelsea did. Just like Blackburn did, and to a lesser extent just what Arsenal did.
10 years ago you wouldnt ever see a cHelsea top in the high streets. Now they are everywhere. If City follow a similar path, then the same will happen there. And the more fans that start to support them, the more money they make, and the more they can afford to spend bigger. Just like Chelsea have done.
We have to face the reality that other clubs have followed our methods of the past, and are now using it against us. We are now going through what other clubs watched us doing. Using our money to its best advantage.
I completely agree it makes things more interesting, and should United overcome the challenge that is being set in our way, then its all hte more sweeter. What better way to get one over on them by beating them with a team that costs a fraction of what theirs did.
In a way its refreshing to be coming frm a position of weakness. Rather than going into each season expecting to win, its nice to know for once that to win the league we've got to do it when no one thinks we can..
[strike]WAG[/strike] RAG OF THE DAY
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