Too Much Football On TV? The Question Has Always Been There

Is there too much football on TV? There might be now, but even in 1981 the question was being asked. This piece from the Arsenal programme of 20 April, 1981 (Arsenal v Palace, won 3-2; we were third in the table, Palace bottom) was prompted by the decision to show the full 90 minutes of the League Cup final replay between Liverpool and West Ham live on television a couple of weeks earlier.It points out that although too much televised football might be bad, as fans wouldn’t see the need to bother going to grounds, showing full matches has the advantage over highlights of not raising expectations – new fans who’d only seen highlights might expect to see 90 minutes of non-stop end-to-end action!
It was possible at the time to “watch the best of six or seven games a week without contributing a penny to...