It doesn't take much to start a media 'storm'. Bombard the inbox of an 'editor' and before you know it they have been gifted their next subject or topic to take into work. Cynically you could say that these groups do the jobs of journalists - gathering information or misinformation and presenting it to media outlets to re-run. It used to somebody's actual job to do that kind of thing. So now you get a mob mentality taking over the agenda and quite frighteningly it is rehashed by news outlets you always assumed would know better.
And so what next for the Peoples Group of Merseyside Everton Footballing Righteousness. They demand answers. Answers to the questions that anybody who studies football with a less than myopic view on things will already have. Football is a money-led industry and only so many people have that kind of money.
In a universe not that far away there was life that existed that was not measured against the power of money. In fact there was a mystical saying that money was, indeed, the route of all evil. This obviously has been kicked into touch in a footballing sense by SKY and the wealth of opportunities opened up by the Murdoch revolution of the game. Pause for thought......
Everton are in itself a fantastic case study of football today. A club that seemed to have missed out on most of the business opportunities that the past 20 years of top flight football has bestowed on the Premier League. There are few who have been relegated out of the top flight, even fewer who have only had a fistful of managers and even fewer still who are run by a life-long fan who made good in the business world. A business that did not rely on over inflation and manipulation of populations.
Instead, Everton have found themselves surrounded by billionaires. American led global businesses and a rich Sheik who has his 'project' living just a few miles away. Everton have inadvertently become a niche Premier League club, one that was exploited when David Moyes termed his new employers - The People's Club. And how that backfired.
Everton are not the people's club of Liverpool. They are not who all the locals support - nor are they supported on the street like a modern day Che Guevara. They are the club in Liverpool who families can go to watch. They are the club who kids can say to parents "can we go to the match tonight?' without it being something other than a romantic notion. Everton can provide a personal touch in a way that the local store can and that the wealth of the five Tesco stores in the two mile radius from where I write this cannot.
Oh, but how we laugh at the local store. It isn't the super branding. There is some satisfaction among the fans of the Manchester super-rich clubs and the Liverpool global brand that they can play out in front of packed houses in Malaysia. A satisfaction that they are supported better there than Wigan or Blackpool are on their doorstep, or even, and here comes the greatest fulfillment of them all, Everton. Madness.
Everton as a club can only offer its unique way of football. If you have an ear to the ground at the club that the local press in Liverpool certainly do not (rehashing quotes from post match end of season games when the clock strikes June) then you would know that David Moyes has accepted Everton better than most.
His club has a great set of the youth players that not only Liverpool Football Club has rejected but much of the northwest. The priority for Everton this summer was to keep Ross Barkley and Jack Rodwell on their books. It is not hard to read into the comments of Moyes - who remarked on the success Liverpool built around James Carragher and Steven Gerrard - he wants his own players and the club will succeed if allowed to build on its own.
If Everton had Wayne Rooney in its strikeforce in the past two seasons there is a great argument to suggest they would be looking forward to another Champions League campaign. There are no more than a few Wayne Rooneys and in this sense the greatest scar on Everton was the selling of one of the world's greats at a time when football could have embraced them.
It is that event that hangs like a shadow over Everton. And if there was an ultimatum of 'never again' made by David Moyes to his board than it would have been made at that moment. The signing of players like Ashley Young, Phil Jones, Jordan Henderson, Stewart Downing are neither here nor there. These are players bought by clubs who have surrendered a youth policy in the past and will later pay the price. £100 million judging by that particular list.
It comes to something when Everton groups want parity in the market with clubs like Stoke City - well, so flies the argument. John Woodgate, bids for Carlton Cole?
David Moyes has paid a heavy price for buying beneath the level of top players. Andy Johnson and James Beattie arrived to much fanfare, as did Yakubu, none have lasted the five years on their contracts - and the close to £30 million spent was wasted.
It would be a better world in which we live if we embraced what we had rather than enviously look towards the 'riches' of others.
Yet, football encourages a greed that most seem unable to keep at arms length. Football used to be an integral part of society. Sadly it reflects much of its philosophy in 2011.
Proof positive that it is all about how much you can spend rather than what you spend it on.
Football is not a brand or a project to fans. It is somewhere you go to enjoy. If you want to support an attractive looking firm or business Exxon Mobil and Nike shares are readily available at any city broker.
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