I’ve talked to many professional footballers in my time and, certainly when speaking to players who are currently in the game, many of them have a fairly, shall we say, not-exactly-glowing review of fans.

Of course, players will rarely say what they really think when presented with a TV station’s camera, or a predictable article in the paper meant solely to talk up their chances of a move/call-up/reminder they are still alive. They trot out the same old trite stuff – “Yes, the new manager is great, and I look forward to working with him.”, “Of course it hurts when the fans say harsh things on the pitch.”, or “It’s so much better now that it was since the last guy left.”

These aren’t meant as specifically Aston Villa problems, nor I am suggesting that the people I’ve spoken to in the past who have said that are anyone we have to concern ourselves with, rather that it’s how many footballers feel. After all, footballers know that if you put a single foot wrong, even if what you’ve said isn’t intended in the way that the media ran it, then you can be absolutely slammed in this country.

I remember, in a time before our skipper was diagnosed with leukaemia, Stiliyan Petrov had given an interview with kids magazine “Match”. I’m sure those of you from this country will remember it (or a magazine like it such as Shoot!), with it being, well, a magazine for kids. The reading demographic isn’t exactly a football analyst, rather the young lad who aspires to turn his evening habit (the football one) into a job some day.

Petrov, when asked about who he followed as a boy, mentioned Liverpool and how, as a boy, he had dreamed of playing for them. As a young boy growing up in Bulgaria, and as a person who is practically the same age as me, he will have seen the success of Alan Hansen, Kenny Dalglish, Mark Lawrenson, Ian Rush et al.

In the eyes of many, Petrov’s statement about Liverpool was innocuous. A young boy, living in a foreign country, dreaming of playing for a successful team is hardly an offence. I doubt Petrov, back then, would have contemplated the exact locations he may have plied his trade because, at that point, all his career would have been is a dream in his head.

Some fans, however, decided that such an announcement was essentially apropos to Petrov denouncing his current employer, and instead touting for a move to Liverpool. Anger raged (doesn’t it always across most of the internet?) and that was that – how dare a player possibly infer that he ever had dreams of playing for another club!

Those of us of a sensible mindset will know exactly what Petrov meant but players can get angry when they essentially have to watch every word they say. I should hasten to add before anyone might put two plus two here and think it is four, I don’t suggest for a second that Petrov is angry at our fans, quite the reverse, especially considering the outpouring of emotion for his plight.

It’s easy to see why players can feel a disconnect from the fans though. The old favourite that fans who attend matches do pull up at times is “I pay your wages” but, as I’ve illustrated in past financial review articles, the truth is that gate monies pale in comparison to the money that comes out of Sky. As warped as it sounds, the reality is that Villa’s team is paid for by more non-Villa fans than it is by Villa fans – perhaps a positive thing to realise when compared to the TV rights deals negotiated in other countries.

The fact of the matter is that football is a high pressure job. It’s not high pressure in the sense that players have to worry about paying their bills at the end of the month, but it is when some members of the public consider it wholly acceptable to scream at players in the street for x and y – I’ve heard first hand evidence of this, of stalkers, and of people leaving bedsheets in the front garden of said player(s).

So, can you be too surprised when many a footballer expresses their less than appreciative response towards their own support, away from the reality distorting cameras where, more often than not, all they are saying is as trite as the average AVTV interview about how, yes, obviously they love the club that pays the bills when, like many of the people who work in comparatively “normal” jobs, they probably don’t care less about their boss, or how the money gets paid – all that matters is it gets paid.

Perhaps this attitude, on both sides of the fence, drives a wedge deeper between “us” and “them”. Perhaps it only serves to reify the belief that footballers don’t care about the average fan despite, from personal experience, my knowledge of current employees of our club going to extreme lengths to help others and on the total understanding that they never get any publicity for it.

What do you think though? Clearly footballers don’t need the money from gate receipts to pay their wages when compared to the bumper pay day from Sky. Villa should count themselves lucky that the cut from TV is based on a straight 20-way split rather than based on who watches us, especially in light of our past few seasons of woe.

How do you see it? Do you feel more detached from footballers now than you did ten or twenty years ago or do you just accept that these people are just taking whatever money is offered to them. After all, wouldn’t we do the same if our current job offered us a pay rise, no questions asked?

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