Now is a good time to pick a Premier League team
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Constable Echelon
I don’t fault Hotdog’s love of Liverpool for two reasons:
(1) As he’s said before (and I believe it to be true): “You don’t pick your Premier League team, it picks you.”
(2) I think a big reason that most soccer types seem to go for one of the Big 4 (Man U, Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool) is that until recently those were the only teams you were ever likely to see on tv or hear about. If you were into the Prem before the last couple of years those four teams were your options.
Fox Soccer Channel has changed the game in that regard. You can choose anyone now and be assured of a chance to catch at least a third of their games. If you want to go a little deeper BBC Sport is a fine website (certainly a cleaner navigating experience than Soccernet), and every team has numerous fan sites of varying quality to keep you in the loop. (In my team Everton’s case I get my news from ToffeeWeb.)
The increasingly available EPL means that you don’t have to be the out of area douchebag that roots for the Yankees or Cowboys or Celtics because they win.
That said, here I would like to push for someone to adopt Chelsea as their squad. They are the most hated team in the league due to their free spending Russian oil magnate owner Roman Abramovich. He’s the 15th richest man in the world according to Forbes, and most certainly does not run Chelsea like a business. “Like Brazil is everyone’s second favorite national team, Chelsea is everyone’s most hated Premier League team,” offers Hotdog.
Abramovich is like George Steinbrenner or Mark Cuban in terms of his aforementioned willingness to overpay for players and his exceedingly short leash for coaches. All first year Chelsea skipper Avram Grant achieved last season was taking Man U to penalties in the Champions League Final. John Terry fell over on the wet turf in Moscow, Chelsea lost, and Grant was promptly axed. His replacement is Luiz Felipe Scolari, who headed up Brazil’s World Cup Champions in 2002, and most recently was the coach of Portugal’s national team.
I want someone to be a Chelsea fan because I get sick of listening to Liverpool, Man U, and Arsenal fans whine about how Abramovich’s loose wallet is terrible for football. Talk about the height of hypocrisy. Much of what keeps the Big 4 the Big 4 is the fact that they have the most money, and as there is no salary cap can just let the smaller teams develop talent before offering the lesser clubs lucrative transfer fees to consolidate the best players. “Man I love this sweet capitalism that keeps us on top, but curse Chelsea and their capitalism.”
Bill Simmons wrote an entertaining two part column about his experience picking a Prem team that is actually quite informative. I advise you to reread that, pick a few teams that sound interesting to you, watch a few games, and one of the teams will just speak to you. Lord knows he could use the traffic.
The Premiership runs 10 months out of the year starting this Saturday with a season that continues until May 2009. It’s the perfect thing to passively follow, providing you with a live sports option on weekend mornings as you prepare to go to Husky games, watch NFL, or do whatever the hell it is we do after football season is over. Also if you miss your game you don’t have to worry about someone spoiling the result before you get to the DVR because not many people follow it, and you won’t accidentally run into highlights on US tv. And the best part? No ESPN taking the joy out of it.
So get on board folks. This is your year!
And go Toffees!
August 14th, 2008 at 6:04 am
I made the decision a few years back to support Aston Villa - What pushed me over the top was the fact that - although they don’t will much - they manage to maintain a staunchly elitist fanbase. The Unis are decent; the club motto is ‘prepared’ (elegantly simple) and it is an American owned operation. Runner-up to AVFC was the US-heavy Fulham, however, like Simmons, I could not support an organization that was owned by M. al-Fayed.
August 14th, 2008 at 12:00 pm
WTF?
August 14th, 2008 at 1:40 pm
Does this mean I should change my tattoo of the Man U logo on my shoulder blade? I love those guys.
August 14th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
I love the Chelski.
August 14th, 2008 at 4:10 pm
This sounds like something I could get behind. I love soccer, but even stronger than my love for soccer, is my love for things that don’t take a lot of effort. I just don’t know where to start now. I had to cancel the soccer channel a while back because the $4.95 a month was getting a little steep. That’s two 40oz. a month that I can’t go without. So what other viewing options do I have? (Sidenote of Cosmic Rhythm: I’m listening to a little Floyd on shuffle in my office right now and as I’m reading this article on soccer, the song “Fearless” came on. For those that don’t know the tune, at the end of the song you hear a bunch of hooligans singing what I think is Liverpool’s song, but I’m not sure. I don’t know if the universe is trying to tell me I should adopt Liverpool as my team, or if the universe is in cahoots with the Constable and I should add Liverpool to my list of most hated along with the Yankees, Lakers, Duke, etc. I’m not sure how to segue out of these parantheses I’ve started so I guess I’ll just ride them out. I’m stuck in a post within a post. Anyway, who is Liverpool’s biggest/most hated rival that’s not one of the big 4? Maybe that’s the team I’m meant to get behind. I need an EPL mentor to help me shop for a team and set up a fantasy team. Who will help me? I’m not good at thinking for myself. When should I end this post? Someone please tell me or I’ll keep going. I’ve never really though about the…….sometimes I feel………and then when it does…………the thing is, you can’t……….) Anyway, I’m in. I think the EPL could at least scratch my soccer itch until next year’s MLS season when the Sounders FC get going. At least we have Kasey Keller, a 38 year old washed up keeper. Was Tony Meola not available?
August 14th, 2008 at 7:18 pm
Why Liverpool’s biggest rival would happen to be Everton, the favorite team of myself, Paul McCartney, and Sylvester Stallone.
October 17th, 2008 at 7:19 am
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