Abstract
Chapter 6 looks in detail at cases whereby fans have reluctantly, and collectively, come to the conclusion that their aspirations, hopes and ideals for their football club can no longer be realised within the ‘shell’ of the club in its current, established institutional form, and have instead formed ‘breakaway’ clubs. Driven by a belief that their ‘parent club’ has been taken away from them, whether geographically or figuratively, rebel fans have taken the maxim ‘the fans are the club’ to heart. Such a step into the unknown is however fraught with cultural contestation and conflict, challenging as it does some of the core tenets of traditionally-held ‘authentic’ fandom.
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Porter, C. (2019). Rip It Up and Start Again: Locality, Loyalty and Culture Wars. In: Supporter Ownership in English Football. Football Research in an Enlarged Europe. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05438-0_6
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