Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

We're not really here: Manchester City, mobility and placelessness

2009; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 12; Issue: 6 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/17430430902944217

1743-0445

Simon Penny, Steve Redhead,

Digital Games and Media

In a contemporary football landscape of locational and geographical change, the analysis of Manchester City Football Club and the relocation to the City of Manchester Stadium highlights some interesting issues surrounding the new British football stadium and a sense of place. In reaction to the placeless stadium environment, thinking around the sporting tophilia can then be developed around these new cultural spaces by looking at how the power of the fans to refigure and renegotiate their fandom has been used in a variety of ways to try to create a sense of identity within the new stadium space. A bringing of the ‘old’ to the ‘new’ appears to be central to the attempted creation of place in these new social spaces with no history or identity of their own, whilst the physical presence, organization and mobility of activated fan groups such as Bluewatch present not only the collective concern over the ability to identify with the new stadium environment, but also demonstrate the power to organize as a collective force to make an impact on how the stadium is appropriated and to change activity within. With the current drive to relocate within British professional football showing no signs of slowing down, the move to these new stadiums will continue to be a rich and fertile ground for the analysis of the sporting tophilia and indeed for the development of football fan culture itself.