Men and women of a certain age will fondly remember ClubCall, the pre-internet, pre-mobile telephone service that cornered the market in ludicrously overpriced football tittle-tattle, interviews and match commentaries.

For up to 48p a minute of their own – or ideally a parent or employer’s money – fans could dial an advertised number to listen in on deliberately long-winded and often factually dubious updates about their club. For many, the alternative of being forced to endure the trauma of waiting for classified results, TV highlights or the morning and evening newspapers which furnished them with similar, but considerably less sketchy information at a far less prohibitive price, was just too much to bear.

All over the UK and Ireland, the permission of bill-payers often went resolutely unasked as football devotees furtively dialled up to be told v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y what was going on at their club. An innovative precursor to the even more lucrative sex chatline industry that continues to flourish in its wake, ClubCall can rightfully consider itself a pioneer in the field of premium-rate call services that made needy grown men groan, sweat and tingle with excitement.

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The internet eventually did for ClubCall and while it still exists, after a fashion, there is a certain irony that it is now just a written news service available only in website form. The prevalence of rolling sports news, around-the-ground commentaries, legal and illegal streaming, live score services, social media and football club websites allows fans to access whatever information about their own or any other football club that happens to be “out there” with a couple of swipes and jabs on their touchscreen. Crucially, they are no longer required to pay through the nose – or indeed at all – for most of these privileges.

Of course, if any football club was going to identify the inherent flaws in such technology, it was always likely to be Manchester City. Their infamous Tunnel Club suggests that a football club capable of monetising the sight of their players lining up for combat, adjusting their shorts and shouting “C’mon boys!” is capable of anything. More recently, the release of All Or Nothing, the fly-on-the-wall documentary José Mourinho hasn’t seen but considers classless, invited rubberneckers into the sanctuary of the dressing room in the hope of further enhancing City’s global brand. Small wonder, then, that it is also the Premier League champions who have become the first football club on the planet to embrace “the Fantom”.

Billed as “the world’s first smartband” and available for £79.99 a throw, the Fantom is to all intents and purposes an electronic bracelet that provides wearers with the kind of “inside information”, in-game stats, polls and quizzes they can quite literally find anywhere else on the internet without having to pay the thick end of £80 for a piece of branded tat. Aimed at the fan who wants “24/7 breaking news about City, from City, packaged in a premium aluminium housing with touch display and soft silicone straps”, this propaganda tool doesn’t so much tell everything you need to know about City, as everything they want you to know.

Its unique selling point, one which manufacturers Turnpike Fantom and Manchester City have been pushing keenly in their promotional material, is that the Fantom “lives on your skin”, enabling wearers to bypass the arduous and time-consuming process of actually having to remove their phones from their pockets when getting the latest hot takes from the Etihad Stadium.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest One Manchester City fan said the Fantom was the ‘best thing I’ve ever seen from Manchester City.’ Photograph: Carl Recine/Reuters

Curiously, they seem to have absolutely no problem discouraging anyone they think might buy it from reaching for their wallets.

But don’t take their word for it, let’s hear from some satisfied customers. “You don’t have to get your phone out to check things,” says John, a City fan and one of around 100 like-minded individuals who helped develop and workshop the new gizmo. “You don’t have to scroll through Twitter and things like that. You just turn your wrist and it’s there instantly. As soon as you get a buzz on your wrist, you look and it’s there. Done.”

Of course, the benefits of not having to scroll through Twitter and things like that cannot be overstated and Stephen was even more enthused. A City supporter for more than 60 years, he has seen his club win five league titles, five League Cups, two FA Cups and the European Cup Winners’ Cup. He has been through thick and thin, experiencing the delirium of celebrating those seismic goals scored by Paul Dickov and Sergio Agüero. He has watched some of the most exciting players in world football pull on his club’s shirt before strutting their stuff as regulars on the Champions League stage. Only last season, he bore regular witness to his team playing some of the most spellbinding football ever played in the English top flight. And his thoughts on the Fantom? “It’s the best thing I’ve ever seen from Manchester City.”

According to Andrew Gilligan, City Football Group’s Head of Research & Insights (no, me neither), the Fantom is a “matchday companion” that will in time enable the club to “analyse how our fans are behaving” by monitoring their matchday behaviour and – more intriguingly – matchday spending. Stephen’s unbridled enthusiasm for the smartband that lives on the skin of fans suggests it might also be messing with their minds.