“Cross-Homage; is it football fate or marketing genius?" - by Nicola Crichton
The harsh sun beats down on the canopy of the local pub. The atmosphere is absolutely electric and ablaze in the glorious colour of the red and white of St. George. Today, England are facing Northern Ireland in a bid to secure their chances of going to the 2006 World Cup in Germany. Cries and chants for David Beckham and Frank Lampard reverberate through a packed room of England supporters. The ball is placed in the centre circle and the whistle is blown. A roar of ‘come on England’ and the heart drenching rendition of ‘Three Lions on a Shirt’ can be heard streets away. This is just another England match watched by 200 Bulgarians in the heart of Sofia.
“St. George, Union Jack and the Three Lions are something like a holy symbol, a kind of icons.” says die-hard England and Chelsea supporter Lyubomir Vasilev. Also known as “The Moon” to fellow football supporters in Bulgaria, he lives and breathes English football and its heritage. The question is why? Lyubomir has never lived in England nor stayed in England for a long period of time, but he devotes his life and his body in the form of tattoo’s to the English game. The rejecting of ones national team and shunning a local club side is not just a phenomenon within Bulgaria, it is happening worldwide. Is ‘Cross-homage’ the future of football? How is it being kicked off and nurtured?
It’s not an academic term, nor one coined by large money spinners and media conglomerates that are associated with the football world but ‘Cross-homage’ seems the best way to describe the process a supporter takes when he or she refuses to pledge allegiance to the club side down the road and looks overseas for alternatives. “I have about 10 now, 8 of those are Chelsea ones. I still have to get the new crest put on there”. Lyubomir shows off the tattoo’s on his body with a huge smile spread across his face. “I’ll show you some more” he says with haste. Thrusting photographs, he narrates each one - “This is another of my friends. There are more lads in Bulgaria with tattoos like this”. He proceeds to show a picture of a Leeds supporter who appears almost green from the amount of tattoos on his body. He rolls down his sleeve, sighs and recounts past England and Chelsea matches with a huge passion.“In 1999 England play against Bulgaria in Sofia there was about 4-5000 England fans - and I've read in a Bulgarian newspaper that about 200-300 Bulgarians were in the English crowd wearing England national team shirts or shirts of various English clubs. I was one of them”.
It’s not just Europe’s elite of the Premier League that is creating this ‘Cross-homage’. The ‘so-called’ smaller teams have huge pockets of supporters and now Division 1, West Ham are no exception. “There are 45 supporter’s clubs for British teams in Norway. We are organized in a union and there are 55,000 members, 400 of them are members of Scandinavian Hammers”. Based in Kristiansand, Norway - Stein Roar Olsen is a member of West Ham’s Scandinavian Hammers (SH) and is the editor for a West Ham supporters fanzine called ‘Scandinavian Bubbles’ (SB). He is also a supporter of Norwegian side Viking Stavanger. After the FA Cup final between West Ham and Fulham in 1975 (2-0), Stein was hooked. SB has been in publication since 1988 and is into its 88th edition so far. “Rune Jensen is SH and fanzine's founder. There was an earlier Scandinavian club, run by some Finnish guys in England, but when they stopped he decided to start his own supporter’s club. It began as a Norwegian supporter’s club for West Ham, but it soon got members from Sweden and Denmark”. The membership price is 180 Norwegian kroner (about £15), they make a small profit and all the profit is invested in making the club better and better.
“I think a lot of it is from ‘exiled’ fans that make themselves known” says Chelsea’s ‘Big Blue’ Radio commentator Gary Taphouse. “The club has supporter’s groups all over the world. When we went to CSKA Moscow in the Champions League there was a Russian Chelsea supporters group and they had a huge following.” But who are these people who contact the radio stations? They have email handles such as ‘Bluman’, ‘Maltese Cat’ and ‘Smile at Chelsea’. “The emails we get come from all over the world. Hawaii, Islands in the Pacific Ocean, Germany, Russia, Scandinavia - they literally are all over - and the far East of course” says Gary.
But how can fans be part of this electric atmosphere if they are so far away from it?. The coverage of English games in other countries appears to be greater on National television in places like Bulgaria than in England. “The Premier League is still the most popular Championship here every week, five Premiership games are live on TV” comments Lyubomir. Stein believes that television coverage attracts more supporters. “We don't see West Ham much on television these days playing in the Championship. There are very good coverage of the Premier League in Scandinavia, but not the Championship”.
“I plan my business around Chelsea” says New Zealand born Patrick Ferrall, Managing Director for London based IT and computer support company, Matsco Solutions Limited. A supporter for 33 years, in 1972 Patrick came with his brother who is a Crystal Palace supporter. “I didn’t like ‘Palace much at all and went and saw a Chelsea game and have been a Chelsea supporter ever since. I was looking for a club to support. I guess I had a few friends in New Zealand that were Liverpool supporters. I had gone to this game at Stamford Bridge, really enjoyed the atmosphere. I stood in the Shed End with a whole bunch of really good people and I just really liked the supporters, the team, the style of football. I liked the whole concept of Chelsea” He is part of a twenty-four-supporter group that have traveled to all of the away European games for the last two seasons. “Some from as diverse places as Uganda, New Zealanders - it’s a good mix of guys and girls as well”.
How does a foreigner get hold of a ticket? Simple, it’s just one click away on the internet. “Matches, tickets are just as easy for a foreign supporter to get as someone just down the road” says Dianne Broom who works for Chelsea’s corporate sales department. Worldwide there are 65 official supporter’s clubs “and that’s not even considering Chelsea’s recent league success” she continues. So what are the clubs doing to get people supporting them from far and wide? Is there any real initiative that is in play? Arsenal’s marketing manager, Adam Hillier said “It’s not commercially viable for us to start initiatives to encourage foreign supporters. The route that we take is through international soccer schools endorsed by Arsenal”. The same views are expressed by Chelsea.
The FA (Football Association) promotes English football abroad by setting up coaching schemes, administration workshops and sports medicine on their International Development Programme (IDA). The FA has Goodwill Ambassadors also, with ex-top flight players such as Ian Wright and Gary Mabbutt visiting poorer countries of the world. Chairman Geoff Thompson believes that carrying out schemes like this is "using the power of football to build a better future”. Within these programmes, charity matches and international friendlies between England or England 11 sides (teams consisting of past and present players) and other countries take place allowing those in lesser developed countries chances to get up close to stars like David Beckham and Leeds’ Lucas Radebe.
Despite what the club sides say they do to encourage and nurture the support of fans in other countries, they failed to mention pre-season tours such as Arsenal’s Amsterdam Tournament alongside Ajax and Chelsea’s tour in the USA last summer along with Newcastle United. Putting the New Zealander among the Americans, Patrick Ferrall regularly watches Chelsea matches in bars full of ‘foreign supporters’ while on business in the US. “The Chelsea New York Blues and a supporter’s club of 40 from Texas came over. In the pub across one wall they had these full size flags and they were handing out Chelsea New York Blue badges”.
So going away from the typical pub meetings that could be presumed as Jack-the-lad types propping up a bar with some pre match tipple, could this be a new set of trends between supporters or just a small alternative from the norm? “Chelsea has sadly become the new Manchester United. Given our success there are a lot of new fans and although I wear a suit occasionally but not to football, there are a lot of ‘suits’ that are around in football now. Especially in the home European games because I’m in the M.H.L (Matthew Harding Stand Lower Tier) Gate 13 where my season ticket is. I always get moved to the Shed (stand) Upper and I am stunned when people manage to get tickets and can’t even recognise the players” says Patrick.
It’s not as if England is a guilty party in the process of ‘Cross-homage’. The phenomenon could be bought about by the increasing number of English footballers endorsing world wide brands such as Nike and Reebok. Through newer media forms such as the internet and through television adverts, youngsters not just in England but wherever they may be are exposed with limber, muscular bodies wearing stretch fit tops or football boots that look like oyster shells with small ‘ticks’ on them.
What’s the appeal to an English football fan who supports a club overseas if the English domestic league is so exciting? . Every Saturday afternoon I watch all the different people get on the train. Going to the place that I call home as far as football stadiums go, I pass Selhurst Park. Not all of the shirts on display are linked with the home and away sides. The young men sitting opposite have got a distinct South East Cockney twang in their accent. They comment on Iain Dowie’s tactics and have full praise for Aki Riihilahti. One has an Inter Milan shirt on, the smaller one in the middle has an Ajax shirt and the third has a Real Madrid tracksuit top on over his Crystal Palace shirt. These are obviously not the extremists of the ‘Cross-homage’ effected supporters. So why wear another team’s shirt as a secondary club? “There are a large number of people, who claim that they like Chelsea, walking on the streets wearing a Chelsea shirts but at the same time for them Chelsea is just one of the many teams which they like. They like some teams across Europe and the world. Chelsea are getting more popular yet and everyone want to be with the strong of the day. They are Part-Time supporters or Plastic fans”. Lyubomir folds his arms and scowls.
Gary Taphouse believes the pull factor is because the Premier League “is exciting and everyone wants a bit of it. If you’re in a country where the domestic league isn’t very exciting you look abroad and see where the other leagues are - where the glamour is. Clubs like Chelsea are all about glamour.”
What about teams like West Ham? Will their supporter base gradually die out if they don’t win the FA Cup again or get into the Premiership? If it really is about the ‘glamour and wow’ factor that encourages ‘Cross-homage’ it seems that clubs like Chelsea will be experiencing more of an influx of diversified support after winning the Premier League. The coverage of live English football on television across the globe exposes more people to the ‘allure’ of the Premier League and through the internet they can have their say and join a community. But is ‘Cross-homage’ the fate of football? Lyubomir sits comfortably in his seat taking a sip of his beer. He drinks the last drop and puts it down on the table and kisses the badge of his shirt. “Well, I know a Preston North End fan, who has every Preston home shirt from the last 15 years”.
posted by Nicola Crichton at 8:36 PM
