madmac summed it up for me.

 

'If you truly support a club then you always care'.

 

Blue is the colour and you'd better believe it.

Exactly!  I said the same in a similar thread recently (I can't remember which one - ah just checked, how could I forget it was the Boaring Boaring Chelsea one).  Aston Villa, Newcastle, etc have season upon season of winning no trophies only the (very) occasional victory against a rival to keep them going.  That's what being a fan is about.  Yet some people here are throwing their toys out of the pram as soon as we're not steamrollering our way to a trophy.  

 

I know that it's galling to pay £50-60 on a ticket and come away frustrated but there's no certainty in football.  But to say you don't care about the results any more is just baffling to me!  

 

Ages ago I'd agreed to go to the cinema without checking what day we were playing so couldn't see our match last night but the last thing I did before the film started, and the first thing I did when it ended, was check the score.

agree with the crux of what it is you are saying, however i can understand why people are frustrated. Its all good and well saying "imagine how newcastle and villa fans feel", but we are not newcastle, nor are we villa. Our first XI is a highly decorated selection of international players, serial winners and supposedly elite professionals. Success breeds expectations, and at the moment this team is underperforming - so I actually feel that people who are fed up paying their £50 - £60 to go and watch a team of champions get turned over by relegation fodder (admittedly we seem to have turned that corner) are within their rights to think "f**k this". 

 

the "where were you when we were sh*t" brigade doesnt chime with my views, because chelsea are no longer sh*t, so its irrelevant. just because chelsea have had some hard times, doesnt mean it should be acceptable now given the level of investment, the facilities, and the overall quality of the infrastructure at the club. the bottom line is that this is a team of champions who were flirting with relegation; events of the 70s and 80s bear little significance, particularly to fans of the younger generation who were still swimming around in their dads balls at the time. 

 

i know what you are saying, but i think there is two sides to it. given the nature of the game today (which i hate as a "business") i can completely understand those who are fed up with it and who have fallen out of love a bit with the game. Over priced, over hyped, with failure on the pitch and players on over £100k per week, per week, delivering nothing other than soundbytes to foreign press about how they would quite like to leave if they had the opportunity. 

 

its not on. although in saying that, i will still follow chelsea. The game, however, needs to be completely re-visited from top to bottom in this country, and throughout europe to make it more accessible, to ensure more of a level playing field and to remove the stranglehold that the likes of bayern, barca and real have on the nature of the "competition" as a whole.

 

its all going to sh*t. 

Ridiculous thread.... When we were battering around with minnows in the UEFA cup i cared when were struggling i cared when we were winning trophy i cared now we are having a horrible season i care even more because the recovery will be so much sweeter sticking it to all the trolls pundits and media.

agree with the crux of what it is you are saying, however i can understand why people are frustrated. Its all good and well saying "imagine how newcastle and villa fans feel", but we are not newcastle, nor are we villa. Our first XI is a highly decorated selection of international players, serial winners and supposedly elite professionals. Success breeds expectations, and at the moment this team is underperforming - so I actually feel that people who are fed up paying their £50 - £60 to go and watch a team of champions get turned over by relegation fodder (admittedly we seem to have turned that corner) are within their rights to think "f**k this". 

 

the "where were you when we were sh*t" brigade doesnt chime with my views, because chelsea are no longer sh*t, so its irrelevant. just because chelsea have had some hard times, doesnt mean it should be acceptable now given the level of investment, the facilities, and the overall quality of the infrastructure at the club. the bottom line is that this is a team of champions who were flirting with relegation; events of the 70s and 80s bear little significance, particularly to fans of the younger generation who were still swimming around in their dads balls at the time. 

 

i know what you are saying, but i think there is two sides to it. given the nature of the game today (which i hate as a "business") i can completely understand those who are fed up with it and who have fallen out of love a bit with the game. Over priced, over hyped, with failure on the pitch and players on over £100k per week, per week, delivering nothing other than soundbytes to foreign press about how they would quite like to leave if they had the opportunity. 

 

its not on. although in saying that, i will still follow chelsea. The game, however, needs to be completely re-visited from top to bottom in this country, and throughout europe to make it more accessible, to ensure more of a level playing field and to remove the stranglehold that the likes of bayern, barca and real have on the nature of the "competition" as a whole.

 

its all going to sh*t. 

 

I can see that with football becoming a business with highly paid players who sometimes don't seem to care, it can feel very different to the old days.

 

If the OP had said "do you feel more disconnected from the current players than the old guard" or "has football changed too much to be so emotionally attached to" I may have seen his point.  But to say "Does anyone else just not care about the matches"  no, I can't understand that.

Sorry but couldn't be that Life happened? As many grew in age they lost interest, chasing careers, health, family etc. Just don't agree what is being posted or sacking of a manager is enough to make someone leaving a forum he/she enjoys being on.

 

not really.  I'm talking about people who I know outside of this forum, who were long-time good and/or bad posters, some great posters, who have become disenchanted with the level of posting, the attitudes of most (not all) of the newer members towards nearly everything, the all-pervading expression of "we deserve, we want, we have a right to........"   These are people I know and talk to at the bridge and elsewhere, and I think the view is mostly one of disappointment and sadness that such a great forum has really been over-run by these sort of members.

 

I said once on a previous discussion that we are all fans in our own way, but only match-going fans "deserve" anything, and all they "deserve" is a team trying for a full match.  Those of us who never go to the bridge are not lesser fans, but "deserve" nothing as all we are giving to the club is some ethereal and nebulous concept of "support".  

 

Those who go to the bridge are owed a performance by the team, in return for their money AND their performance as a crowd.  Sadly, over this season, we have quite often not received a performance from the team, but, equally, over the last many years, the team have not consistently received a performance from the crowd.  Seems the crowd will perform for the big games (sometimes) and when the Spuds come to town, but rarely, if ever for the lesser matches.  The away fans are still top, though!

I can see that with football becoming a business with highly paid players who sometimes don't seem to care, it can feel very different to the old days.

 

If the OP had said "do you feel more disconnected from the current players than the old guard" or "has football changed too much to be so emotionally attached to" I may have seen his point.  But to say "Does anyone else just not care about the matches"  no, I can't understand that.

yep - think thats the issue, hence why i said that i agree with the main points you were making. 

 

i get annoyed when we underperform, but i would admit that i feel less concerned about it when we have little to play for. in the title race last season, any dropped points and i would be sh*tting myself until the next weekend of fixtures, keeping an eye on city / arsenal results etc. This season when we are languishing in the bottom half of the table, its hard for me to have my weekend spoiled by a sh*t result.

 

im just a bit "meh" about this season. the players are supposed to be the fans' representation on the pitch. if they are not giving back what we are putting in, then i can see why shoulders are shrugged. 

 

i would love to sit them down individually in private and find out what the actual f**k has been going on this season. i hate traveling the length and breadth of the country to end the day in abject disappointment, up to £300 lighter after transport, tickets, booze and food are factored in. that's football though. swings and roundabouts and we will be back where we belong before too long. 

 

Understandable to be disappointed about the season and club's handling of it as well as player performances...we all feel that way...but to say you don't care about chelsea now just stinks of someone being spoilt by success...most of the players and people running the club are the same as just nine months ago when we were celebrating two trophies...I bet nothing like this was being said back then...to turn so quickly when things have got tough reflects just as much on you as the club's deficiencies this term..

I for one was as tense and into game at PSG as ever...Mikel scoring, how can you not care about that...great moment and it will be another great night at the bridge for the second leg...hope you're there to experience it and remind yourself what watching the blues is all about and that you keep the faith no matter what...otherwise, what's the point?

Understandable to be disappointed about the season and club's handling of it as well as player performances...we all feel that way...but to say you don't care about chelsea now just stinks of someone being spoilt by success...most of the players and people running the club are the same as just nine months ago when we were celebrating two trophies...I bet nothing like this was being said back then...to turn so quickly when things have got tough reflects just as much on you as the club's deficiencies this term..

I for one was as tense and into game at PSG as ever...Mikel scoring, how can you not care about that...great moment and it will be another great night at the bridge for the second leg...hope you're there to experience it and remind yourself what watching the blues is all about and that you keep the faith no matter what...otherwise, what's the point?

I laughed out loud with delight in the cinema when I saw that Mikel had scored!

 

Wish I could be there for the return leg - the night two years ago was absolutely ace!

Edited February 18, 201610 yr by Beerqueen

I can see that with football becoming a business with highly paid players who sometimes don't seem to care, it can feel very different to the old days.

 

If the OP had said "do you feel more disconnected from the current players than the old guard" or "has football changed too much to be so emotionally attached to" I may have seen his point.  But to say "Does anyone else just not care about the matches"  no, I can't understand that.

 

Not to sound rude but did you read beyond the title? I'll understand if you didn't because it's an overlong wall of text and whilst the title is 'does anyone just not care.....' the content of the opening post touches on the things you've alluded to. In a sense the sentiment in the title is the consequence of those things.

 

As it is I don't think it's just things changing over time. I was lucky enough to be able to stand/sit and moan on the concrete in the old shed. I was 'fortunate' enough to sit in the West Stand when the wooden chairs would fall down and take a finger off. The club has completely changed but for me there was always something that I could relate to either on the pitch or off it.

 

That's what is absent now and it's not just this season because results have been bad. In 2011, the club tried to rob the CPO of what they had fought for in the 1980s when they SAVED this club. In 2013, the club hired a coach that the fans largely despised. This year having let Lamps and Cech go in questionable circumstances, they fire Jose and then let the most important player this club has had in arguably the last 50 years.

 

Actually, hyperbole time - he's this club's greatest player and probably it's biggest icon and I say that as someone who walks past a statue of Ossie every other weekend.

 

Results don't really matter. I would've been happier sticking with the coach who I identified with and loved and I think that's true for a lot of supporters judging by the support he was still getting.

 

If it was just about results then I would be all over us winning the Champions League or FA Cup but for me they're nowhere near as important as us building something that the supporters can truly get behind over a longer-term.

 

It's why 2012 was different. We were still on this journey with players who cared about the club like JT, like Lamps, like Drogba and when they won the Champions League it didn't really matter that we weren't the best team in Europe because it was the right end to THESE players journey, one they started in 2004 (obviously some earlier but talking about as a group). That was the reward for Moscow, for Ovrebo's semi-final debacle, for the work Jose started.

 

So no, the matches right now are incidental. I still make the same pilgrimage I have done for years and I still see a lot of the same faces I have done but that bit that lasts from about 14:45 to around 17:00-ish....it's not really that important at the moment.

Not to sound rude but did you read beyond the title? I'll understand if you didn't because it's an overlong wall of text and whilst the title is 'does anyone just not care.....' the content of the opening post touches on the things you've alluded to. In a sense the sentiment in the title is the consequence of those things.

 

As it is I don't think it's just things changing over time. I was lucky enough to be able to stand/sit and moan on the concrete in the old shed. I was 'fortunate' enough to sit in the West Stand when the wooden chairs would fall down and take a finger off. The club has completely changed but for me there was always something that I could relate to either on the pitch or off it.

 

That's what is absent now and it's not just this season because results have been bad. In 2011, the club tried to rob the CPO of what they had fought for in the 1980s when they SAVED this club. In 2013, the club hired a coach that the fans largely despised. This year having let Lamps and Cech go in questionable circumstances, they fire Jose and then let the most important player this club has had in arguably the last 50 years.

 

Actually, hyperbole time - he's this club's greatest player and probably it's biggest icon and I say that as someone who walks past a statue of Ossie every other weekend.

 

Results don't really matter. I would've been happier sticking with the coach who I identified with and loved and I think that's true for a lot of supporters judging by the support he was still getting.

 

If it was just about results then I would be all over us winning the Champions League or FA Cup but for me they're nowhere near as important as us building something that the supporters can truly get behind over a longer-term.

 

It's why 2012 was different. We were still on this journey with players who cared about the club like JT, like Lamps, like Drogba and when they won the Champions League it didn't really matter that we weren't the best team in Europe because it was the right end to THESE players journey, one they started in 2004 (obviously some earlier but talking about as a group). That was the reward for Moscow, for Ovrebo's semi-final debacle, for the work Jose started.

 

So no, the matches right now are incidental. I still make the same pilgrimage I have done for years and I still see a lot of the same faces I have done but that bit that lasts from about 14:45 to around 17:00-ish....it's not really that important at the moment.

 

Yes I did read your original post but, again, not being rude, I think most people would take your post title as the most important point you are trying to make and perhaps you should have given it a more pertinent title.  

 

I do agree with a lot of what you said - maybe even 90%.  All except the title!

 

And to repeat what I said earlier, I cared less about the results when FSW was boss.  I just felt so conflicted between wanting the manager to fail but the team to win. 

Understandable to be disappointed about the season and club's handling of it as well as player performances...we all feel that way...but to say you don't care about chelsea

 

 

But I didn't say that.

 

Chelsea aren't just the matches. Chelsea is the whole club and I care deeply about that which is why I'm so worried about it's future.

 

most of the players and people running the club are the same as just nine months ago when we were celebrating two trophies...I bet nothing like this was being said back then..

 

Not much of this is new. It first struck me that the people running the club really didn't care about the supporters in 2011 but in 2013 that exploded with the Benitez hiring and whilst it's died down because we had Jose back, all those wounds have been reopened and deeper not because we lost to Bournemouth or Liverpool, but because of the bigger things.

 

Again, the results don't matter. Now you can say that's bullsh*t and if we were top of the league I'd be completely different, but all I can say is 'nu, uh...you don't know me' (in a sassy voice). 

 

I for one was as tense and into game at PSG as ever...Mikel scoring, how can you not care about that...great moment and it will be another great night at the bridge for the second leg...hope you're there to experience it and remind yourself what watching the blues is all about and that you keep the faith no matter what...otherwise, what's the point?

 

It's tough to explain why I wasn't that bothered when Mikel scored. To put it succinctly, it's inconsequential.

 

Now that is obviously crazy. It puts us back in the tie, we could advance, we could win the CL, financial implications, Hazard graces us with his presence for one more year etc.

 

The whole point of sport isn't trophies. That's the physical representation of something else. Call it what you want.

 

Fraternity.

 

Brotherhood.

 

Family.

 

Supporting a club is a stupid thing to do. It's emotional investment with sometimes no payout but we do it because there's that feeling. A ball crossing a goal-line is meaningless. But when it's your team scoring it, your player who you've watched for years struggle to reach that level, your fellow supporters going nuts.

 

The best goal we scored last year was for me, at home to Liverpool in the league and that's because from the Matthew Harding Lower it looked like Loftus-Cheek had scored it. He hadn't but for a moment there I thought that the player I'd watched in the youth ranks for years had risen above every other player, against the team I hate more than any other and got his first goal in front of the Shed.

 

But it wasn't. It was John Terry, the guy we love more than any other and who Loftus-Cheek hopefully follows. That moment though was beautiful. The result didn't really matter, we'd already won the league but that was as sweet as anything I'd felt at Stamford Bridge. That's what supporting a club is about and that's what I want us to build more of. The results come when you do the other things properly and I don't think we are.

Just watch this, it will make you feel a bit better

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9E_vwHbR5Ag

The whole point of sport isn't trophies. That's the physical representation of something else. Call it what you want.

 

Fraternity.

 

Brotherhood.

 

Family.

 

 

Connection? Love even?

I wonder if supporters of other football clubs at the level where the Big Money is feel something similar. If so, the fact that players are no longer considered "our" players but as mercenaries, is probably the result of the ridiculous amounts of money being spent at European clubs. Man City supporters for instance may feel the same. A football club is an international business nowadays, and those don't often invoke love.

I hadn't expected this from myself, but it's starting to bother me that we have so few English - or even British - players in our squad. And I'm not even English, and don't live in the UK! Most clubs are starting to feel like an American Football team: those teams can just up sticks and move to a different city altogether. Chelsea FC is a group of expats that could also play from any European city. What link to SW6 is left?

Still, I'm adjusting to reality, and even if this squad is uncharismatic, as an earlier poster said, I still support CFC wholeheartedly (and hope for a few British youngsters from the academy to break into the senior squad).

Edited February 18, 201610 yr by Valerie

Connection? Love even?

I wonder if supporters of other football clubs at the level where the Big Money is feel something similar. If so, the fact that players are no longer considered "our" players but as mercenaries, is probably the result of the ridiculous amounts of money being spent at European clubs. Man City supporters for instance may feel the same. A football club is an international business nowadays, and those don't often invoke love.

I hadn't expected this from myself, but it's starting to bother me that we have so few English - or even British - players in our squad. And I'm not even English, and don't live in the UK! Most clubs are starting to feel like an American Football team: those teams can just up sticks and move to a different city altogether. Chelsea FC is a group of expats that could also play from any European city. What link to SW6 is left?

Still, I'm adjusting to reality, and even if this squad is uncharismatic, as an earlier poster said, I still support CFC wholeheartedly (and hope for a few British youngsters from the academy to break into the senior squad).

 

I don't think we realised how lucky we were to have 4 England internationals all arguably at their prime in the team (John Terry, Ashley Cole, Lampard and Joe Cole).

 

JT and Lamps were links to a pre-Roman era as well so even when rivals said we bought mercenaries, we still had that link to that time.

 

Beyond them you really felt that the leaders in the squad and the coach got what this club was about and actually cared. Now I think you've got JT, Dave and Willian. Maybe Costa although I think he's just passionate about winning. Maybe it would've been better to keep Cech and sell Courtois despite Tibo being the better long-term option because we're lacking something, maybe leadership, maybe a bit of soul.

the good thing about us being crap right now is everyone else is crap too, us english football fans are all in it together

I will always care about Chelsea football club........but the personnel are just passing through, that's why I would never allow my kids to have a players name printed on the back of a shirt.....that's all bollox