Why Are Footballers Obsessed With Conspiracy Theories? 

Barton might deny he is a grifter, but I deny he was a footballer.

The bird conspiracy is my favourite as the guy who started has even come out and said he just started it as a joke 😂😂😂

Turns out a fun mixture of limited primary education, little to no secondary education, and being easily mobbed by sycophants who will agree with any bullshit you say because you're their idol/meal ticket leaves you pretty vulnerable to daft ideas.

To be fair the writing was on the wall with Lovren and spurious claims when he announced himself to be "One of the best defenders in the world".

Feel like Joey Barton is publicly applying for a job in GB news

Most footballers barely went to school so they’re uneducated. And when you have millions of people idolising you and not telling you what’s right or wrong then you start to think you’re the messiah and have everything figured out

Don't want to start my own conspiracy theory, but while talking about Sausage and Egg McMuffins someone has replaced the graphic with a picture of a Sausage and Bacon McMuffin. I reckon it is the work of the Iluminati.

I wonder how the new concussion rules will make this video look in about 20 years

Also a pet peeve of mine... so many people insisting they are interested in TRUTH but then refusing to look at anything that might undermine their BELIEF.

Plus, Alfie, I am still hoping to see a video about how Kazakhstan fuelled sportswashing worldwide. Its move from AFC to UEFA in 2002 has been cited as the 21st century's first sportswashing case given Kazakhstan's authoritarian and repressive methods against its own citizens, and UEFA's inability to address this matter proved fatal as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Russia and Azerbaijan took up the Kazakhstan playbook to do the same evil businesses as we see today. UEFA's greatest mistake in 2002.

Have you done a video about players that are loved by rival sets of fans? only example I can think of would be glenn Murray at palace and Brighton but could be an interesting video

The frogs thing is slightly true. The water was tainted and made the frogs change their sex (quite a common amphibian trait).

Just a random thing, Ricardo Vaz Tê assaulted a friend of mine when he was still playing here in Portugal.

Last I heard lambert was working as a youth coach for us at wigan. Last thing we need is idiots like this influencing our young players 🙈

21:10 Let's not forget that the Magna Carta was written 400 years before the germ theory of medicine was introduced.

Before watching this, my very simple and straight forward take: Footballers spend their youth becoming footballers and at times completely disregarding their education (I'm a teacher, and every year I will meet a couple of wannabe football pros who completely ignore school). Having those giant gaps makes them much more susceptible to fill them with any old garbage.

You are in your element with these sort of videos about how football intersects with other aspects of life!

Buzzing to see Lee Barry Cattermole finally pop up on one of these 😂

Bro mentioned Nigeria and i have to say as a Nigerian myself I avoid group discussions with other Nigerians because it never takes long for the conversation to veer into the realm of conspiracy theories.

Speaking as a Coventry fan I say Hereford can have Icke.

building football knowledge and class consciousness at the same time 🙌

I don't quite understand how two Southampton's best ever forwards have ended up down these rabbit holes... Hopefully it doesn't spread to my fellow Saints fans! Something something chickens control the world...

Thanks for highlighting this Alfie, excellent video as always

You're very brave doing this Alfie - there are plenty of people who have gone off the deep end who I'm sure will be furious with you for posting it, but it needed doing. One of your best videos yet.

Being a Southampton fan is difficult enough at times but I have to say that watching Matt Le Tissier and Rickie Lambert go off the deep end has been really depressing.

Very funny, thank you. I was that crazy guy on the train laughing at his phone 😂

I’ve had a rough few weeks. Some of the ones liners you’ve put in this are absolute zingers. Inward chuckling. Well done Alfie. Thank you

29:22 I think it was Mustapha Hadji who believed he could cure injuries by putting a lump of raw steak on them

It's a working class sport. A lot of footballers have no academic qualifications and only a primary education, which isn't the only reason for falling for them, but more often than not it is this class of people who are more likely to fall for conspiracy theories. Outside of the time building their careers some are likely to fall prey to the sea of misinformation on social media. Influencers and popular podcast hosts like Joe Rogan have perpetuated lies in our modern day culture wars. Often hysterical and totally at odds with reality. I implore people to listen to Jon Ronson's new series of Spotify or BBC Sounds called Things Fell Apart and discover just how insane these conspiracies are and how they thrive and infect the community.

Because they grow up in small highly regimented lives to get to the top. It doesn't really leave much time for any intellectual pursuits. In USA we have Aaron Rodgers any Kyrie Irving, case in point. They get to this point by being good at one thing... sport. Watching Jamie Caragher and Micha Richards shows that footballers are even terrible at analyzing... football

Tell you what? I had an absolute slag of a glass of water earlier and it tasted like shit. Maybe the lanky fella is on to something?

I met Matt Le Tissier when I was eight. He was signing autographs in a sports shop in Worthing (I forget which one, but is was in Portland Road). It made my day at the time.

To be fair you video about corners was a very good video.

After retiring from Football David Icke was Sports Reporter on BBC South Today.....made in Southampton

CTE from heading a heavy ball for years could play some part

LeTish gets a hard-on on Twitter every single time a player goes down with a heart attack. Even if I would agree into looking into the underlying causes of young and fit players collapsing on the field, not even saying "Vaccines", the way he parades it each and every time is honestly twisted.

I've only just started this one, but...dear god. I think we need to talk about Joseph Barton. Again.

Conspiracy theories and football, 2 of my favorite things combined in a 40 minute video by one of my favorite creators? Yes please

Tremendous work as always buddy. 👍

Watched you for many years, great videos

Truly great analysis of the shocking invasion of idiotic thinking among mostly former football players. And yes, I think calling Joey Barton a football player insults just about everyone who's ever played the sport professionally.

To make it even stranger David icke currently resides on the Isle of Wight which is directly opposite of Southampton

Thanks Alfie. Much appreciated.

Hiring Joey Barton as manager of Bristol Rovers is probably the most embarrassing thing to ever happen to my club, aside from our time in the national league. I was so glad when he got sacked, and now seeing him go more and more insane with his right-wing grift is quite telling.

Because they were kicking a ball around instead of studying

Excellent,spot on lime usual, good one Alfie.

You’re right about these RU-vid rabbit holes. Keep digging.

Good stuff Alfie! 👍

Bit sad about Rickie Lambert. I`m not a saints fan, but always liked him as a player coming up through the divisions and making his England debut at like 31.

A lot of conspiracies are crazy, but so many HAVE been shown to be true that it's understandable people are more open to them now... It doesn't help that the news is rarely truthful, either.

appreciate u using ur platform uve built off of football to educate(an audience that may skew surprisingly young to due focus on football despite the level of the conversation u bring in ur videos)ur audience on the dangers and (imo)obvious and dangerous shortcomings, misunderstandings/stupidity, and bigotry of a lot of right wave thinking and practice

Footballers? Questioning the official narrative? DISGRACEFUL BEHAVIOUR!

Well, to be honest footballers become very very famous, they don't require that much specialized knowledge, education, or advanced critical thinking to succeed in their careers (compared to other professions), so it kind of makes sense that some of them say the most ridiculous shit. They're very average people who got famous.

Some people can't handle uncertainty. They can't accept sometimes we can never know the truth no matter how hard we try to find it.

This is a masterpiece essay on conspiracy theorists. I’m showing this to my wife. I love your stuff but this is special.

I absolutely love the surveilance Bird theory. Not because its reasonable or logical but because it was spread from a university Student as a hoax to see how fast such theories can spread.

American Football says hello via Aaron Rodgers, who was batshit crazy and would talk to teammates about chemtrail conspiracies even before the pandemic broke his brain (further?).

Great video, again. I came to the channel for the football; I stayed for the denounciation of "the economic, social and political systems that dictate most of our lives"!

Previous comment aside, this video cracked me up 🤣 When are you going to start doing standup, Alfie? 🤔🤷‍♀️ X

I wish I could be so blasé about politics like Le Tissier once was. I don't have the finances to NOT know or CARE what the politicians are cooking up to make our lives harder...

The higher up the league you go, the worse educated the players are. There's a number of lower league managers and players with degrees; Paul Hurst, Dave Challinor etc. mainly down to not expecting to have pocketed enough to retire at 18 like the Boehly Babes.

Hi, would you consider doing videos on the abuses in women's football? Whether that be the Spanish women's national team, Luis Rubiales, and numerous others? Also, I think a good video could be made on the presence of independent academies in Africa, for instance, the impact they are having, potentially developing better players in those countries, such as the Right to Dream academy, and the impact it could have on the European clubs linked to these academies, such as Metz and Generation Foot, and Right to Dream and Nordsjaelland?

Your statement about football clubs engendering an "Us vs Them (&Authority)" mentality that permeates everything - was a think a brilliant point.

because people are idiots, and footballers are people.

I do think it is a bit of generalization, given the thousand or so players in the EFL yet we can probably only name 10 of them which have said things pertaining to conspiracy theories. I doubt it’s any larger than the general population. A few bad eggs make the whole batch look bad.

iker not believing in the moon landing made me love him more

Video idea: How Alfie thinks of Thiago Motta's 2-7-2 formation.

Joey Barton and Pearl Davis. The combo i WOULD HAVE NEVER imagined.

I've always suspected that Tony Blair was actually an Auton from Doctor Who. There's always been something just too creepy about that artificial smile of his and you almost expect his hand to hinge away at the wrist to reveal a blaster.

#thepeopleschannel a video on the Bangladesh premier league and the rise of Bashundhara kings would be good A team who went into the top flight after promotion and won the last four league titles now! Are they the next Newcastle? Are they a team to keep a eye on next few years? Thanks Alfie 😊

Your videos are so entertaining its ridiculous If you are writing for yourself, you should write for a major network. You're gold

That thumbnail is absolute gold 😂

Everyone’s entitled to a different opinion.

Good to know that such players exist in other countries too. 😅😅

Craziest thing about cupping is that it actually has benefits according to science, but it has nothing to do with toxins like people say. I can't remember exactly what it does but it's something to do with blood circulation because of the skin being sucked off the muscles a little bit. I think.

superb work Alfie. 👋👋👋

And today you fully earned my subscription.

Just an incredible opening

"The idea that having a post office within 16 mins from your front door is equivalent to full blown stalinism" - Please point to those post offices, or other amenities, because plans are rather about digital and removing physical services.

Excellent 👍🏾 video 👏🏽

Is it not just a case (as you hint yourself) that a certain percentage of the population have fallen for these mad conspiracies and the numbers of footballers who have done likewise is probably statistically the same? Surely the government must keep tabs on the number of divies and their jobs, and can supply a thorough journalist, like yourself, with the appropriate stats? Well that's what the pigeon on my window sill thinks anyway....

I think this video probably underestimates just how many people believe wacky things. Smart or otherwise, people are falling prey to algorithm driven confirmation of bad ideas. It's probably not helpful to be surrounded by yes-men when you find a rabbit-hole to go down.

I thought this was a old video 3,4 years ago lol I didn't see this type of topic coming up lol

Matt Le Tissier & The Galactic Federation makes an awesome name for a psychedelic band 😁👍thanks Alphie

As a Southampton fan I must apologise for the insanity of our former players.

Why is everyone not obsessed with Conspiracy Theories should be the question 😊

Video idea. The expansion of the WC and its impact.

❤LOVE YOUR VIDEOS ❤

Birds aren't real is a parody They're mocking conspiracy theories

hey alfie, are there any "conspiracy theories" that you lend credence to? surely there must be some semblance of suspicion mulling about in your entirely objective, fact-based, and long-form content churning mind.

Some of these og footballer references are just mint. I have not heard Ricardo Vaz Te in time

Skilled rich people think they’re smart. They’re often very much not.

The only difference between a conspiracy theory and truth is time. Where there is smoke, there is fire

You can also think why European teams are so scared of Brazil curse. Since 2002, teams that beat Brazil in knockout stage are largely doomed to fail, with only France recovered.

This is like me at uni. Having a 1000 words of useful info, desperatley trying to get to 15,000

Can you really blame people for going crazy when there was literally a pedo island where the worlds decision makers would meet and do unspeakable things to children. Things have become very strange.

I don't think it's they are obsessed in general. There will be 600 players on the books of Premier League clubs alone. They are often idolised and whilst good at football often don't have a great education. So if one or two preaches conspiracy theories it's not unexpected due to the numbers, media attention and education.

That's just a theory... A Football Theory

The way you say Pearl Davis is gold lmao

Just because it's a conspiracy doesn't mean it isn't true