Noel Gallagher's Manchester City journey is something most football fans can only dream of. From Barnsley to the Bernabeu, becoming mates with the greatest manager the world has ever seen, gradually witnessing your team tick off milestone after milestone across England, then Europe, then the rest of the world. He's seen things we'll never see.
But somehow, he didn't see this coming. The Oasis singer and Manchester City superfan was described as “bullish” by The Athletic, in the face of the bombshell that his beloved Sky Blues had been found guilty of breaching the Premier League's financial regulations, stating, “If you’re telling me that, because of some sponsorship deal that was signed nearly 15 years ago, the four in a row and Istanbul and all of those things now mean nothing and the club should be burnt to the ground, and its supporters banished to North Korea, then you’re being hysterical.”
Gallagher is no doubt in the majority when it comes to City fans: the first stage of grief is denial, after all. And yes, those titles, those moments, were earned on the pitch. No one can erase the ecstasy of Aguero; no one can rewrite arguably English football's greatest-ever title races, which came against Liverpool. But honestly: do Manchester City still deserve the fans defending them? Do they even deserve their players going out and playing – against Liverpool, funnily enough – in the first game back, post-international break?
It should be noted that the club strenuously deny the accusations even now: they will lodge an appeal against the ruling – which used the word “sham” five times, by the way – and any punishment that they receive for serious breaches and failure to cooperate with the investigation may well be reduced.
But this verdict is proof that Premier League owners do not see football in the same way that we do. You only have to look down the road at Sir Jim Ratcliffe, spouting repugnant comments about immigration while ignoring the fact he's insulting communities who helped build Manchester – all while claiming to be a Manchester United fan.
Football is a business to billionaires – we all know that – but perhaps all too often, we forget that it's not even a sport to them.
It's a tourism gig. People come along, they pay their money, they take pictures of Erling Haaland, and they share them online. Sometimes they win, sometimes they don't. Everyone watches it regardless.
Owners don't want fair play. They don't need working-class fans unless they help generate an atmosphere they can monetise. In the nadir of Arsenal's ‘banter era’, fans launched a campaign entitled #WeCareDoYou directed at ownership, Kroenke Sport Entertainment, after slipping into the Europa League for a third straight season. The question was rhetorical: but beyond the Jack Walkers of the world (of which there are very few left), does anyone who owns a football club truly care about it like a fan does?
No. Of course they don't – and City's ownership has failed to uphold the values that the club was founded on.
City have embarrassed, let down and taken their fans for granted. Not just the ordinary fans in pubs who defended them, nor the ones who made television appearances or spoke in front of big audiences to maintain collective innocence. Not just the ones who released seminal albums in the 1990s, either, or the ones who were there when Stockport and Macclesfield were closer reference points than Old Trafford and Anfield.
They have tarnished the name of Pep Guardiola, arguably the Premier League's greatest-ever manager, who won trophies having started the race halfway down the track. Kevin De Bruyne, David Silva, Vincent Kompany and Sergio Aguero: all some of the greatest footballers to have ever played the game, now with asterisks over their legacies.
And what of the current players? Were Elliott Anderson, Enzo Fernandez, or Ayyoub Bouaddi warned about any of this? Or were they told the same thing that Noel Gallagher was?
Some fans will probably see at least some of the backlash as an attack on them. It may feel personal. And deep down, there will be others who either don't care or don't see this as a big deal, as Gallagher himself suggests.
But Manchester City fans should be disgusted. A community founded by their great-grandfathers nearly 150 years ago sold its soul for a few trophies. They'll either be taken away or never respected again. Every name in every song on the terraces for the past decade has been stained by the scandal. And we can't go back and play those title races again: giving Jurgen Klopp a retrospective medal doesn't make it fine. In years to come, this decade of English football will be remembered with dark clouds over it. This was a golden era for the game in this country – but it was hollow and essentially didn't mean anything. Why do we even get into football if this is what it all comes down to?
The Premier League have ruled that City cheated English football. But no one has won in any of this. Not even those closest to the glory.
