For football fans Pep's arrival in the Premier League should be a cause for celebration. One of the great midfielders of his generation, Pep has cemented himself as one of the all time great coaches. His Barcelona and Bayern Munich sides were not only tremendously successful, but exciting and beautiful teams to watch. In Pep's sides, backs are never against the wall and buses remain unparked. The ball is passed fluidly, quickly and always forward. So why, especially as a Manchester City fan, am I not more excited about this? I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a considerable part of me that is. His appointment was one of the major factors in my decision to renew my Sky Sports subscription. Yet I can't get away from a question that is just playing endlessly on a loop in my head; what exactly am I watching? What the hell am I supporting?
This isn't a complaint about the players, I've long since made my peace with the obscene money they make in exchange for endless matches of poor to average performances. Football is now a piece of the entertainment industry and that will always bring with it unimaginable amounts of money. They would be more foolish to turn it down and have it simply return to the pockets of the club owners. Besides, it's not as if I would be inclined to turn down a six figure weekly income if anyone was stupid enough to offer me one.
Instead, this is a worry about where the game has gone in terms of the bigger picture. Not the players but the clubs, the leagues and governing bodies that oversee them. We are currently in the throws of another international tournament and once again everyone involved with the English national team have managed to be a massive embarrassment to their country as a whole. This also provides an endless amount of entertainment for all non-English football fans (including myself) and that irreplacable smug feeling of superiority over them. England's Premier League has, by some distance, the most money of all the major leagues, it boasts of having the best players (La Liga would politely protest that one I'd imagine), the best teams and generally, erm... of being the best. Yet, England have gone out in the first of the knockout rounds to Iceland, a country with a population the size of Croydon.
The reasons for this are well documented by now and can be largely boiled down to one factor. With the inauguration of the Premier League, English football threw the baby out with the bath water. The grassroots programs in the country are notoriously underfunded and once again it is worth noting something else; Iceland, that tiny country with it's semi-professional leagues, has more UEFA coaches than England. The money is going somewhere but sadly it's not going to the two places it should, fan support services and grassroots investment.
This brings me to the crux of the problem (it takes me a while but I generally tend to get to my point eventually). City have signed Pep, so what do their crosstown arch-rivals Manchester United do? Do they promote from within? Do they promote someone who will adhere to and hopefully enrich the club's long-tradition of youth team development and attractive, attacking football (a tactic which, it should be noted is how Pep got promoted to coaching the Barcelona senior team)? This, after all, would buy into their much trumpeted club mythos.
No, they hire Jose Mourinho. The man is a walking trophy cabinet, that can't be denied, but he has nothing in common with the team ethos or DNA of which United and their fans are so proud of (and rightly so). It's incredibly unlikely that Mourinho will develop or promote players from the youth teams. He might but then he didn't at Chelsea, Internazionale or Real Madrid, so it's hard to see him changing his policy now. His teams are not famed for their attacking vigour but for their defensive stoutness. His Porto side were one of the most abject teams (to watch) to ever win the Champions League. His tactics are undoubtedly effective but could never be labelled entertaining. The appointments of Mourinho and Guardiola are therefore symptomatic of the Premier League's greater problem. English football is no longer about footballing development or sustainability; It's about celebrity, it's about entertainment. It's about big names on the marquee and the blind, vain hope that all of those components will add up to big numbers below the line on a balance sheet.
Mourinho is a statement of intent from United. He's the big flashy new car parked in the driveway after the family two doors down upgraded their own earlier in the year. Sure, the golf clubs wont fit in the boot, the terms on the lease plan mean you'll technically never own it and your insurance bill has just doubled but at least everyone in the street is taking note. At least all the kids in the cul de sac are staring a bit more enviously as you reverse slowly out of the drive.
United's commercial partners (official noodle partner, official paint partner etc...) are certainly sleeping better and as a club they'll find it easier to attract some of the world's galacticos to Old Trafford. Yet, they are no longer Manchester United. The tether that tied this current rampaging corporate beast to its history of the "Busby Babes" and the "Class of '92" has been looking a little threadbare for some time now. With Jose's appointment, that last pathetic little bit of string has given way. They've joined Chelsea, Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain in the new world of football teams as lumbering corporate behemoths. A new world where historical legacy is used not as source of community placement or local pride but as brand identity.
Consider these points in relation to the recent faux outrages concerning Raheem Sterling's fancy sink. It is no longer enough to judge the game on what matters most; namely, how well those millionaires managed to kick the ball around the varied assortments of hallowed turf up and down the land. Mistakes, skill, effort and performance levels are no longer viewed simply in footballing terms; the drama of life away from the pitch is given as many column inches as the drama that on-folds on it. It is without question that Pep and Jose have been appointed as much for their box office potential in the nation's gossip columns as for their considerable coaching prowess. Should a player play badly for a couple of games, it is no longer sufficient to muse that he might be having some issues off the pitch. Now it would seem, we must speculate wildly about any number of the possible vice distractions that the man may have succumbed to.
We are now in the position were the haves and the mores of the Premier League's excesses are waved in our faces as reasons to envy players, reasons to put them in the position of lifestyle role-model. Football players are no longer just idolised for their athletic abilities; they are now a part of the fully-fledged culture of envy and self-promotion. I blame David Beckham's hair. We celebrate the sheer crassness of their wealth; then when things waiver just slightly, we use these same things to crucify them. We beat them about the head with the immaculately fitted leather-interior of their new Bentley. The same Bentley we had just been told by some snake-oil peddler to put up on our wall as a part of the latest "lifegoals" exercise. Football isn't a sport anymore, at least not in its upper echelons, it's Keeping Up with the Kardashians on a wet grassy area in England.
And yet, and yet...I can't help myself.
I know I won't be able to stop myself. Match of the Day and MOTD2 will be both set on series link. The fantasy team will be painfully prepared and updated every week. Livescore will become the most used app on my mobile and the Guardian's football page will be the first stop on my lunchtime reading list. On at least three occasions I'll justify it all to myself by promising that this is the year I finally invest some time and attention on the Airtricity League. Or perhaps this will be the year I finally, properly, just give myself over to the Pro12; their grassroots investment and fan support services are unparalled after all. But not this year, I know I wont do either of those things. My cursory glance at the Union Berlin score will help me sleep better (St Pauli would just be too obvious) but I know I can't escape it and I know it's now gone long past the point where I can defend it.
For all the upcoming drama the new Premier League season will offer, the coverage deserves to be played on Sky Living as much as on Sky Sports. It's coming up fast, my annual period of self-flagellation.
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