Are you tired of the top flight? Why fans are unhappy with the Premier League experience | first division

YoIt's about an hour until kick-off at Stamford Bridge and Everton fans are crowding outside the gate leading to the away end. It's Monday night and people look tired, fresh off their buses at the end of a five-hour journey. Some are waiting for their friends with cups of coffee in their hands, others are looking for spare parts. Meanwhile, the constant topic of conversation is the Premier League's profitability and sustainability rules.

“As a fan the only thing you want is to go to the game, you want to watch it, you want to live and breathe your team and your club and everything,” says Hanif Karimi, who follows Everton At home and away. “Instead, you spend your afternoons reading reports just to see what they've done to us.”

Karimi has traveled from Southampton for the Everton game, as he and his son Jasper always do. He estimates an 11-hour round trip each time they travel to Goodison Park and says the cost means his family hasn't had a holiday for years. But when he talks about the sport to which he dedicates his life, there is a tone of disgust in his words.

“You know, when we played Man City, our entire first XI cost less than Jack Grealish, who was on the bench and came on for 10 minutes,” he says. “And yet, we are the ones who are done for by a point deduction, by excessive spending, while they can do what they are doing, get all the oil money, run it through their different companies, through their PO boxes or whatever they are doing and getting away with it.

“There is no doubt, our ownership over the last seven years and more, the days from Bill Kenwright to (Farhad) Moshiri is shocking; We have been mismanaged from the top down. It's horrible, but I don't love the coaches, I don't love the owners, I love my club, I love my team, I love going to games with my boys, and this will never change.”

If you know, know or are a person who likes to physically support a Premier League football team you will probably have heard opinions like Hanif's. You may have even articulated them. Every fan of every club seems to be in some way frustrated, angry and probably a little cynical about the game they love. There have certainly been tougher times to be a football fan (after all, stadiums are largely safe places these days), but this season appears to have accelerated trends that have soured the fan experience.

A short list of the factors involved would include: an increase in costs across the board, from travel to tickets to food and beverage; matches scheduled at inconvenient times (the bank of visiting coaches parked a few blocks from Stamford Bridge would probably not have started their return down the M40 until 10:30 p.m.); matches interrupted and emotions destroyed by VAR technology; the source of PSR charges, rulings and appeals that have not only complicated the experience of being a fan but tainted it. And then there is what Karimi calls “the money game.”

Speaking to fans of clubs fighting to avoid relegation from the Premier League this season, money was a constant topic. It could be money your club doesn't have or money the owners have wasted. More commonly it was money that others had, money that they could not compete with, or money that they believed unduly influenced the outcome of events on and off the field. At the same time, it seemed that these were problems that could only be solved with more money.

“We have the only Saudi prince who is not rich,” says Catherine Woodworth, who has followed Sheffield United throughout the country for 70 years. “And he has bought more clubs since he bought Sheffield United. We never see it, do we? Never see it. So it seems like there's a little bit of frustration with him.”

Woodworth speaks from her seat on the chartered coach that has taken her and a horde of other Blades to west London for United's match against Brentford. Sitting next to her is her friend Helen Barker, who also laments the purchasing power of her club.

“Chelsea last week (when Sheffield United won an unexpected tie), they had a player they had bought for 100 million pounds. That’s more than the cost of our first team, second team and third team combined,” he says. “When we had Paul Heckingbottom, the money he was given to spend was £20 million.. You won't even get a player, right? And that's why we don't have quality in the Premier League. What can you buy for £20 million?”

Woodward and Barker argue the relative merits of being owned by a non-billionaire Saudi prince versus those of an American private equity fund, and the result is a tie.

Woodworth and Barker are happy to see a return to the championship. “I can't wait to say goodbye to VAR,” says Barker. But despite inequalities, ownership structures and name-calling (“On Twitter, fans of other clubs are saying, 'Why were Sheffield United allowed to be in the league'?” says Woodworth), none of the two wants to wave the white flag in the Premier League.

“I always feel like anyone can support a winning team,” Woodworth says. “When things aren't going well you need your followers, and that's why we're here. “We are here to support you when you need it and you need it now.”

With that final sentiment, Woodworth captures the other constant theme among the fans who spoke about the travails of themselves and their team: none were about to give up, from the Irish family who travel every week to watch Sheffield United to Brentford fans who have followed their team since League Two.

“We've spent years and years watching the team in places like Workington and Rochdale, Darlington, on a Tuesday night – we've done all that,” says Bees supporter Alan Gilding, who took a philosophical approach to his team's performance . recent struggles in the top flight. “We are going to enjoy this while it lasts. “It's good to know we're up there getting the money and the prestige that comes with it, but I wouldn't be too worried if we finished in the Championship again.”

Jock Stein said that football without fans is nothing. Most of the time it can seem like those running the game have forgotten. But the psychology of the loyal supporter is complex: an unconditional love fueled by disappointment as well as joy. The feeling that emerges from a snapshot taken during a Premier League weekend is that, despite everything, the fans are not going anywhere. Like the guy, they deliver.