The Irony of Manchester United Fans

Supporting a team demands having respect for the players and management and the Manchester United fans disrespected their team the day they took over their game against neighbors Liverpool

A disgrace.

That’s what the Liverpool and Manchester United derby is called.

Or at least that’s what it should be named since the 2nd of May 2021. Because that’s when the fun went out of the competitive rivalry that it was once was.

For many years the mighty reds of Liverpool and the red devils of Manchester United battled it out toe to toe at the top of the Premier League to see who could be the eventual winners of the league. Although neither was in the top spot every year that they competed against one another the fixture always saw both of them near the top end of the table and their game always had a bearing on the biggest football league in the world.

And both teams are geographically very close to one another and on two ends of the M62.

Although strictly not a derby because both come from two different cities their rivalry goes back to arguments over water rights. Because back in 1894 the Manchester Ship Canal was built after a group of Mancunian industrialists bought up land on the Wirral in Liverpool and built up the canal to bypass Liverpool’s dock area.

Back then, the spark was lit between neighbors and the rivalry was fought out on the football field.

And there were rules to it all.

Because the referees knew about the underlying tension and history and realized that their decisions in big games were not only about who got the 3 points in the game but also who got the bragging rights among the supporters.

And although there have been great games over the years between the two red teams once the players crossed the white line at the end of the game they shook hands and the aggression finished.

Because the players knew the power they had over their respective supporters and they realized if they let their bad feelings from one game linger it could cause societal problems for both Liverpool and Manchester United fans after the game.

But it all changed when Liverpool visited Old Trafford to play an important top of the table game against Manchester United in early May 2021.

A couple of weeks earlier both teams along with Arsenal, Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur, and Manchester City from England and Spain’s Atletico Madrid, Barcelona and Real Madrid and Italy’s AC Milan, Inter Milan, and Juventus had made the formal decision to pull away from the structured European leagues and create their own Super League structure. It would guarantee all 12 teams automatic qualification for what they felt would turn out to be the prime competition in European football.

But it backfired badly.

Because the supporters of those big teams spoke up at their distaste for the idea.

They hated the fact their teams were considered better than all the other teams in their countries and didn’t have to earn the right to play at European football’s top table.

Liverpool’s players were equally disgusted with it as was their manager Jurgen Kloop who had spoken out against the idea well before that time and reiterated his distaste when it finally came to fruition in late April of that year.

And the Manchester United fans especially hated the idea too.

Because their club was bought by the Glazer family in 2005 and the Manchester United supporters were not happy then but they put a lid on it until Liverpool came to play them sixteen years later. They hated the fact that super-rich people could come in and buy their club and dictate what was going on without the supporters having more control on whether it was right or wrong for the club and the greater Manchester community.

To say their anger was simmering was putting it lightly.

Because two weeks after the Super League was announced and the owners of all 12 teams pulled out from the idea as supporters protested their rage the Manchester Supporters changed the outcome of the top-of-the-table clash by making sure it was not going to go ahead.

Their supporters even used violence to make their point to their club owners.

Police officers were injured as they tried to control the crowds of supporters and one received a significant slashing to his face. And the supporters got into the stadium without being invited and stayed there before the official kick-off time of the game.

Above them the Sky Sports commentary team were higher up in the stand watching events unfold at ground level.

There former players including Manchester City’s Micah Richards, Manchester United’s Roy Keane, and Liverpool’s Graham Souness looked down and shook their heads at how some of the supporters were behaving.

And Souness was especially animated as he commented on how one supporter had lit a flare and thrown it toward their commentary box and how that could have injured one of them for the rest of their lives.

Could you blame him?

Hardly.

Because although he was a tough footballer no one deserves violence when they go out to watch a football game.

For those Manchester United people to call themselves supporters is ironic.

That was not supporting. That was opposing the team as they tried to play their game. They were undermining their identity as so-called fans.

The more they destructed the football fixture the more they gave their opposing rivals Liverpool more ground to object about being in seventh place in the Premier League table. And as only the top four teams would qualify for the European league the following season, the Manchester United fans were giving Liverpool a greater chance to be given a special dispensation to join the elite teams if their fixture with United was not going to go ahead.

Because none of this was the Liverpool football team’s fault.

So why would the Premier League punish them?

Even if the game went ahead on that day and Liverpool bet United they still would not have been in the top four spots that would mean immediate European qualification. And as United were more or less guaranteed this qualification for the following season they would have to take responsibility for their supporter’s violence. And at that time it was possible that they could have been given a ban from partaking in European competition because of this improper behavior.

It all seemed very ironic.

Maybe that’s why they were Manchester United ‘followers’ and not one of the ‘leaders’ that go out there and try to play themselves up to the top of a table in all areas of life, or take responsibility and manage a team, or have the know-how or resources to become an owner or chairperson of a major European team in the first place?

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