Howson's channel was the first I saw earlier this spring and almost died of second hand embarrassment. Seen one video from Paddock and they keep popping up on my yt. Seems like they're just posting content for the sake of it.
“Fan Journalists”
- Thread starter Pogue Mahone
- Start date
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
Fair play getting Brian Brobbey on his YouTube
I like fan channels but I don’t want them mainstream. They serve a certain entertainment purpose…but they often lack any objectivity.
The trouble with these fan channels is that they end up believing that they are the voice of all the fans from their respective clubs and theirs is the only opinion that matters. So when confronted by other fans with different views they shut them down.
The Arsenal community seems to be on a real grift at the moment, more intent on amassing subs, likes and shares than actually producing quality content.
The Arsenal community seems to be on a real grift at the moment, more intent on amassing subs, likes and shares than actually producing quality content.
Yeah, I'm with you on this, agree. Don't understand the hate Goldbridge or Flex get.
They did? First time for everything i guess
That's not what this is:
I feel a lot of people criticize especially Flex's channel without having watched it at all. He puts out great content, and can sometimes be (annoyingly!) balanced. I say annoyingly because sometimes I just want someone to rant, especially after a bad result.
Not really. They've always been at the games as well as tours before. They only stopped doing that regularly since covid.
Flex is actually quite decent and much more measured than a huge majority of caf. Its the ones that do "reporting" with green-screen backgrounds that I find a bit weird.
Cant be bothered to check, tours maybe, home maybe but for away games specially Europe comp before covid i am sure they were sitting in the room more often than not.
Yeah ... I stopped taking Goldbridge seriously a long time ago. On the occasion I do watch him, it's for the entertainment/laughs. It's kinda funny so many Caftards let him get under their skin.
Can't guarantee they went to all of them, but they used to before covid. And also since covid, they've bought out the channel (before some media company used to own it) and I think things have changed for the better.
Joe and Jay are good people.
Goldbridge is a pisstake account surely
Dont subscribe to fan based stuff generally. Arsenal tv has put me off for life.
I can't stand this attitude, and this attitude is partially responsible for the shit situation the club is in. I've never met fans of any other sports team that think you are obligated to support every element of the team all the time. That's utter bullshit.
Some examples,
I didn't rate Moyes, he's a small time manager with a superiority complex, who plays shite football and never won anything. I didn't rate Felliani, because he's utter shite, nuff said. When United signed these individuals, whom I had established opinions on, why I am obligated to throw out my opinions that were based on years of my own observation, for blind loyalty to the club? And for the record, I was right on both, so I'm glad I stuck to my convictions and called out those mediocre signings immediately. I think that situation was the first real test for the "top reds" and even they had to admit the mistakes.
We didn't buy a midfielder for a number of seasons, because everyone was determined to stick by Anderson, he's our guy, we wrote a shite song about him, so we're going to stick by no matter what. We went a number of years not addressing an issue in the team because we had to give our Anderson another chance to prove himself, if we all just support him, he'll stop being crap. Or we could have shipped his ass and brought a proper midfielder that would imorove the team, instead of supporting the mistake we made in signing Anderson.
Rooney overstayed his welcome by about 4/5 years. In the last years of his time at United he was detrimental to our play, he was a complete momentum killer, due to his loss of pace, which meant he couldn't cover for his poor first touch, and he took the captaincy, which removed any sort of edge he had as a player, which was pivotal for him. We went years with most of our attacking moves breaking down at Rooney, but you couldn't dare mention he was no longer performing at the required level, because you must support all players at all costs (even if said player is threatening to leave).
I've been a fan for decades, through good times and now bad times, and my feelings have never changed, I love United, eat, sleep and breath United, things are good with United I'm happy in life, United's in a shit situation, it effects me, I feel it. I don't think being a proper fan means you support the club 100%. If you did support the club 100% what does that even mean? Who are you supporting? United (or the Glazers) are too cheap to buy a proper DM, for how many years running now? Should I support this decision? I know it keeps a few million quid in the glazers pockets, and you know, McTominey has a good attitude (even though he's spent years showing he's nowhere near good enough playing) so we should keep supporting him, hiding in our midfield, because that's what a good fan does, supports shite players so our foreign owners don't have to spend money. I watched last season, I witnessed those players embarrass themselves and us against liverpool, I watched them down tools vs City. In those moments, were those players supporting United 100%? Am I obligated, as a proper fan, to still support these mercenaries when they clearly don't care about the club?
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Flex's interview with Tom Heaton post match. Speaks well about Ten Hag and the impact he's having on the training ground!
Cheers. Good insight there
Journalism is a trade, fandom is not journalism.
The ones who have it as their trade have been pretty shit.
As time goes on & their access gets better I’d have more time for these fan channels than a bunch of journalists that grew up as [insert London club here] fans masquerading as neutral in their opinions but taking every chance to make snipes at rival clubs. There’s an idiot Spurs fan on Tifo that loves to do it to United.
At least these “fan journalists” aren’t being confused as reliable news sources.
At least these “fan journalists” aren’t being confused as reliable news sources.
Enjoyed that, Tom speaks really well, relaxed, good insight. Good interview all round to be fair.
I'd consider watching more of this, lets face it, it's free. Not keen on having to sign up for other shizzle and Goldbridge is a tool.
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Absolute nonsense
Absolutely spot on. Agree with every word of this.
People need to be realistic and honest. As fans we are naturally biased in favour of our own players vs those of other clubs. However to say you must blindly support anything and everything at man utd, regardless of how poor they may be, is mental to me. Archaic bollocks is what that is.
Thats not to say you should just be negative all the time but i dont understand whats wrong with being honest and realistic with our problems and calling out incompetence.
Not sure we ever played Fellani in the position he'd been so successful in at Everton.
Moyes took Utd to his average Everton League position, so we got exactly what we paid for.
Anderson was retained because of a fan song?
You don't have to support every decision the club make, otherwise there'd be no Caf, but once the game starts why wouldn't you?
For instance McT's scored but I'm not going to cheer because I'd rather we selected/bought someone else - you've got to be joking.
Would I rather we have a better team - yes
Do I wish we'd signed different players - yes
Do I think Fred is the answer to our midfield problems - no
Did I celebrate like mad when he scored today - too bloody right I did
But I'm old school. I remember us going down in '74, the cup wins under The Doc and Big Ron, the unbelievable Fergie era, but also Liverpool's domination both domestically and in Europe in-between. Football is nothing if not cyclic, nobody dominates forever. Enjoy the good times, endure the bad. Support your team through both.
And in retrospect are we actually a brilliant club or have we just been blessed by 2 god-like managers in Busby and Ferguson?
Their longer video with this as well including build up/match/post match
Glad to see Flex getting a bit more recognition, was guilty by association of Goldbridge i guess. He always seemed a bit more rational to me even then, albeit with the occassional outburst as is normal for fans.
I think you could bare them all if you really wanted to. Believe in yourself.
Who's moaning about Flex and them? If you don't like em don't watch...
Okay, Joe or Jay.
United View is the best I've seen. Flex is the most likeable personality of all the fan channels.
Goldbridge is a broken record most of the time; one man's opinion being repeated x3 a day. Howson seems a bit up his own arse.
Goldbridge is a broken record most of the time; one man's opinion being repeated x3 a day. Howson seems a bit up his own arse.
What do you think of Owen? Like him too he can be decent, and KG is always up for a laugh. When they have 6 or 7 people on screen then it can be a little frustrating, becomes a bit like this place where the angriest of voices steers the conversation in a negative direction.
Like all other areas of life, the so called “democratization of content” and basically giving everyone a platform has deteriorated the quality of the discourse. Proper journalism, in sport and otherwise, had to change how they work to compete with non-traditional content producers taking eyeballs and money away from them. That has manifested in more content of less quality across the board.
I’ve actually checked out all these channels mentioned here over the years, some are decent but discussion is weak and amateurish (Flex and his United View), some are pretend-experts (tactical genius Howson), and some downright insane (Goldbridge). Goldbridge being the most popular is consistent with the well-known recipe for success by now: quantity is king, strong opinions are good, and a dash of misinformation can only help.
I’ve actually checked out all these channels mentioned here over the years, some are decent but discussion is weak and amateurish (Flex and his United View), some are pretend-experts (tactical genius Howson), and some downright insane (Goldbridge). Goldbridge being the most popular is consistent with the well-known recipe for success by now: quantity is king, strong opinions are good, and a dash of misinformation can only help.
Was it Flex who used to run rantsnbants account?
Edit: Looks like it wasn't. Unitedview looks good channel, their content is good and presenter's presentation skills is class.
Thanks for the video, this is so good. Flex got a new fan
I follow a couple of them during the transfer period to keep myself updated.
United stand
Goldbridge - he's a sensationalist and he does goes in circles most of the time. However he tend to give the information early on so you can ignore most of his rants by just switching off. I tend to follow him because he occasionally comes out with an argument that you wouldn't have thought about. However in the past few weeks he's been unwatchable. He's such a pessimist that even I is Mr sunshine compared to him. Rick is a dinasour who thinks that we can win the treble with Mata and Matic as first teamers while there's actually another guy on his channel that is more pessimistic then him. I don't know his name since I switch channel the moment he speaks.
The United stand tend to attracts the chav part of our fan dom. All good people tend to leave (Flex, Levin etc) and the only decent person on it ie Beth gets catcalled by the fans
Flex - I used to love him on the United stand as he balanced Goldbridge greatly. He's respectful, quite knowledgeable and a true supporter. He set up his own channel now but its a bit bland. So I guess Goldbridge does carry a bit of his weight every now and then
Stetford paddock
Stephen Howson - The guy constantly goes out of point to tell us about his training (as if anyone cares), the Cups winner cup final and the pub team he assembled and whom he expects donations for. He's also the most pompous guy I've ever seen. At one point he said that he went to Carrington and players were asking for his autograph. The guy see himself as a bit of a SAF and John Rambo wrapped in one which is hilarious since he's an obese man whom while relatively knowledgeable is nowhere near to what he think it is. Also he sends his fans to feck off like once every 5 minutes
Jay is nice. He struggles in calling names right badly + he's obsessed with the weather but his content is great. Jesus is the typical well mannered down to earth top red. He's nice to share a pint with but will occasionally make you cringe. The best of them all is Mckola. The guy is knowledgeable, he sticks to the subject and even his accent is great.
The channel is decent if you're faced with one presenter at a time (and you take Howson with a spoon of salt the size of the dead sea) but it becomes unwatchable when they gang together in groups more then 2. The programme goes completely out of control, their very unfunny banter takes over that there's little information left.
Sam - United people TV.
I like Sam. He's well rounded, he keeps to the point and he comes across as a nice, well mannered guy. That's necessary in a 1 man channel. He is a bit childish at times but all passionate fans are like that (I know a think or two about that).
United stand
Goldbridge - he's a sensationalist and he does goes in circles most of the time. However he tend to give the information early on so you can ignore most of his rants by just switching off. I tend to follow him because he occasionally comes out with an argument that you wouldn't have thought about. However in the past few weeks he's been unwatchable. He's such a pessimist that even I is Mr sunshine compared to him. Rick is a dinasour who thinks that we can win the treble with Mata and Matic as first teamers while there's actually another guy on his channel that is more pessimistic then him. I don't know his name since I switch channel the moment he speaks.
The United stand tend to attracts the chav part of our fan dom. All good people tend to leave (Flex, Levin etc) and the only decent person on it ie Beth gets catcalled by the fans
Flex - I used to love him on the United stand as he balanced Goldbridge greatly. He's respectful, quite knowledgeable and a true supporter. He set up his own channel now but its a bit bland. So I guess Goldbridge does carry a bit of his weight every now and then
Stetford paddock
Stephen Howson - The guy constantly goes out of point to tell us about his training (as if anyone cares), the Cups winner cup final and the pub team he assembled and whom he expects donations for. He's also the most pompous guy I've ever seen. At one point he said that he went to Carrington and players were asking for his autograph. The guy see himself as a bit of a SAF and John Rambo wrapped in one which is hilarious since he's an obese man whom while relatively knowledgeable is nowhere near to what he think it is. Also he sends his fans to feck off like once every 5 minutes
Jay is nice. He struggles in calling names right badly + he's obsessed with the weather but his content is great. Jesus is the typical well mannered down to earth top red. He's nice to share a pint with but will occasionally make you cringe. The best of them all is Mckola. The guy is knowledgeable, he sticks to the subject and even his accent is great.
The channel is decent if you're faced with one presenter at a time (and you take Howson with a spoon of salt the size of the dead sea) but it becomes unwatchable when they gang together in groups more then 2. The programme goes completely out of control, their very unfunny banter takes over that there's little information left.
Sam - United people TV.
I like Sam. He's well rounded, he keeps to the point and he comes across as a nice, well mannered guy. That's necessary in a 1 man channel. He is a bit childish at times but all passionate fans are like that (I know a think or two about that).
In italy as well, it exist the category of fan journos, the 99% are a fan of the team and speaks for/to the club fan base/audience.
If you watch a Roma’s press conference you can see how difficult the questions are, and how the questions are emotionally moved
Nailed it!
Rick is the one that used to tout united tickets and made thousands right
https://www.manchestereveningnews.c...ster-news/father-son-spared-jail-600k-5762239
Then united signed him up to do it on their behalf another wonderful character not out for himself and people wonder why they get a lot of flack supporting these channels.
tbh this sort of news is unknown to most fans following these channels.