But why pay all that money for something you know you're not going to enjoy? It's like the dingdongheads that ruin a concert by talking through all the songs or the guy at a GNR gig that spends 3 hours shouting 'Where is Slash?'. As another paying customer I do reserve the right to be annoyed at those that are actively trying to ruin the experience for others.
The entitlement issue comes from the fact that our tickets being more expensive than, say West Ham, somehow means we are more deserving of success, in fact entitled to it.
All that money is spent on the team, it's not taken by some greedy owner. The owners are supposed to be the custodians of the club, not benefactors with bottomless pockets. Occasionally they happen to be the latter, but it's quite frankly ridiculous to be expecting that from them.
So, tickets being more expensive than West Ham doesn't given anyone the right to expect higher levels of decision making or commitment by our owners, and is 'entitlement'. That's your view, and it's eminently reasonable: that is, reasonable as long as you also agree that your ticket explicitly only allows you to be in an allotted spot in a stadium at an allotted time, and thus expecting anything more than that (like an 'experience' not ruined by those around you) is blatant entitlement. What right do you have to be annoyed at the people around you? You seem to be implying an entitlement to something more than just the guarantee of no one else being in your seat during the allotted hours: ergo, I hope you'll be as reasonable as you were with regard to other fans being annoyed at the chairman/players/manager, and cease being annoyed at your experience being ruined: after all, that would be entitlement, and illogical.
That is why I hate that word: it turns otherwise perfectly intelligent, reasonable people into hypocrites, and sets up arbitrary divides between a fanbase that, more than anything else, is desperately crying out for unity right now. If you reduce the experience of being a fan of the club that I have no doubt you love as much as I do into its bare legal nature (you pay for access to a tiny bit of a stadium on average once or twice a week for 90-180 minutes), then expecting anything more than that becomes 'entitlement'. From there on, what entitlement is subsequently varies from fan to fan based on what they consider to be reasonable, which differs drastically between people. But what is common among everyone using that word is the absolute desire to set themselves up as superior to the ones they consider 'entitled', and the creation of an 'us-vs-them' mentality between fans, who in the end are all united by a love for the club that is supposed to transcend such stupidly illogical divides.
Different fans have different expectations from the club, even though they all obviously care for it. It is utterly infuriating to see the rush to occupy the moral high ground in those circumstances.
As for what the owners do, they're custodians who will earn hundreds of millions of pounds when they sell up. And at the same time, they're supposedly running a football club, a romantic endeavour that turns scholars into simpletons and allows cynical, weathered people to feel like children again for ninety minutes. Given those facts, it isn't exactly insanity to expect that they be there to help push the club over the line when we're chasing glory, or when a new manager's making a hesitant start, or when the fans are chafing in uncertain times and need a bit of relief. It doesn't have to be all three: hell, it doesn't even have to be undue backing from their own coffers, just a risk taken with the security of their own enormous assets in the background should that risk not work out and future income fall.
But no, to them we're customers, no better than the patrons of a supermarket. To hell with fans, or glory. Profitability, and as little involvement as we can manage: that will do perfectly fine for us, cry Levy and Lewis. And they know that when their relative lack of input begins showing and the club struggles in between our slow bumping up and down in upper mid-table mediocrity, the customers (who ideally shouldn't be so mouthy, but seem for some reason to occasionally dare to expect things from them) will always be pacified with a ritual sacrifice of a manager here, or a DoF there. They then quiver with fear when someone asks them to put their money where their mouths are when it comes to their oft-warbled 'ambition', and when the occasional 'ENIC OUT!' banner starts making the rounds, they swoop like vultures, clamping down on all dissent and turning the fanbase further into a quagmire of conflicting opinions.
If you're asking me to thank them for at the very least not actively taking money out of the club, that doesn't exactly reflect well on them, you know.
