Loyalty in football - lost in time

Loyalty in football - lost in time
Money has killed the value of loyalty in the game, and it explains why we see fewer Steven Gerrards, Ryan Giggs, and Francesco Tottis. 
by editor Wong Yang

On Saturday, Liverpool fans around the world paid tribute to their faithful skipper Steven Gerrard. The Liverpudian has served the Merseyside club professionally for 15 years, and was thanked for his services with his testimonial match and dinner on Saturday. As fans of other clubs looked on, the question was - do we have more of such players in our own teams?

In today's football world, fame and fortune mean everything for most players. They receive big money to fill their big pockets, and will ply their trade for whoever pays them the most, because dollar signs tempt, and the allure of power can be so great that a player will leave the club that had brought him up and developed his potential as a youth player. Lucrative wages can make a player say "Yes" faster than Zlatan Ibrahimović can switch clubs.

Now then, where are the role models of loyalty? Though it is true that we can name a few players who, without a doubt, are dedicated to the club they belong to, the reality is that these players are of a dying breed. In the money-driven football world of this globalised era, money buys temporary loyalty. Although you cannot buy a Jamie Carragher- A grade loyalty, you can ensure that the player is on your side, that is, for now. But there is only one Gerrard, one Giggs, and one Puyol. The "stay loyal to your club" group gets smaller by day, as more money is pumped into this mad machine of materialism.

Players play with dollar signs in their eyes, coins in their ears and cheques in their heads. The world we live in explains why deciding if a player can be considered a legend or not may no longer depend on how much of his heart is with the club, but solely on his skill.

To make matters worse, the loyalty of fans is bought in a different way too. "How many big-name players do you have in your club?" and "did you win anything this year?" are now the hot questions. Fans these days may rally behind the club during its glory days, but scamper away once success is no longer as close as it once was. It is the reason why my presumption that the definition of "fan" would assert that the fan is loyal is wrong.

We must realise that loyalty has to be bred, not bought. It is bred when a person feels a sense of belonging to his home, and some may argue that it ventures outside football. As he becomes an increasingly committed fan, his "home" is his home team's stadium, and it is by interacting with other fans that he gets that "sense of belonging". 

Loyalty takes time to be developed, but its effects are tremendous. Just look at Stevie G and the Anfield crowd chanting his name, or the Barcelona supporters singing their anthem before the game.