Yeah agree with pretty much all of this. And it's why I find it hard to believe that those in other areas will suddenly jump at the chance to move to the Northam when they could have done this at any point over the years. Anyone attending football matches this century will know that if you want to sing regularly then there's certain sections of each ground which they should buy tickets for.
I’m probably going to repeat a lot of points which have already been made, but my recollection and interpretation of our fan history is that the Dell was kind of a gift and a curse. A curse on the capacity but a gift with its close proximity to the pitch and the way the noise stayed in the stadium and got the whole ground involved. At the Dell as a fan I would probably sing for roughly half the match depending on opponents and how the match was playing out. I’m not one to start chants and I never sat in amongst the traditionally louder areas of the stadium on a regular basis. I now sit in the chapel and I probably find myself singing full chorus twice at a push, most of the time it’s clapping and shouts of encouragement or groans lol From personal experience, I think it’s obvious that if the majority are singing around you then you’re more likely to be involved. Those who sit around me who are usually very placid will get involved if Pompey are in town for example. When we moved to St Marys I think the plan from the club was that the Chapel would be the home end, if I remember correctly the family stand was in the Kingsland corner. The first major issue at St Mary’s was the standing. The last few all seated seasons at the Dell the louder support stood in the archers road end and other areas largely remained seated. When everyone moved the fans that wanted to stand and those that wanted to remain sitting all got jumbled up. A popular past time in those early seasons was the singing of “stand up if you love the saints” as the poor stewards managed to get everyone sat up to row Z, before having to start from the front row again: for me standing became one of the core reasons for the migration to the Northam. Most clubs gave up on policing away fans from standing and it became accepted, so I think the club thought it hypocritical to be demanding home fans to sit whilst away supporters had carte blanch to stand up uncontested in the same stand. After a few seasons Stewards gave up on the stay seating and by this time the Northam had won its reputation as the vocal home section. for this to work and for the stadium to get louder I think the safe standing is the key and the away fans should be the opposite end of the ground to try and spread the atmosphere. You’ll then get the few fans who like to sit close to the away fans for “banter” and then you should see the noise spread and this will naturally encourage others.
Nah I don't think that's allowed in this country. Which is a shame as grounds in Germany I believe got a ratio of 1.2-1.7 to every seat when it was mass installed over there. Albeit I don't think SMS would have been likely to gain much anyway due to the rake not being very steep and lack of exits.
Listened to the Phil Parsons clip on Solent. There are seats to be gained apparently, due to unused ones on matchday for safety reasons. I think it will work personally.
Would that not be lost in segregation wherever the away fans end up though? My reply was based on whether you can more actual (rail) seats in the area but I understand that's prohibited here.
Maybe yeah, think he was just referring to a slight gain in the Northern unless I misunderstood. Shame that it doesn't actually increase as you say.
I’m sure there aren’t and the stand goes up to the top but I think they’ll move to the Kingsland FA Cup is interesting, we have to make 15% available for away fans, but that’s subject to local Safety Advisory Group approval and I wonder if they might reduce it when it moves to that corner. Apparently it’s 9% at Goodison I’m sure
However, the Northam’s not very big if you don’t want to move for Cup games. The Itchen corner will probably move and the pockets of noise elsewhere e.g. back of the Chapel may do as well. Increased capacity there and standing may also bring in more new younger fans As for me, I’m happy sitting and singing occasionally as I do now and standing and singing more for away games … if I could get tickets for them
I think that SAG can approve less but on a game by game basis. I don't think we can simply refuse to even consider less due to where we've moved our away fans though I may be wrong. I think it'd surely have to form part of our plans for where we end up moving them. Got a source for that Everton figure? That would only be approximately 600 more than league games and I find that hard to believe.
We're not going to have much more standing space than now though as the club will likely enforce sitting in other areas. I don't understand why they're only doing half the Northam tbh they could do much more.
Re Everton Lincoln got 5.5k in 2018 - https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.lincolnshirelive.co.uk/sport/going-going-gone-imps-sell-2342692.amp My *** packet maths says that's roughly 13-14%
You may be right Got it wrong, it’s Arsenal, Everton are away FA.Com "In regards to the Arsenal v Everton Sixth Round tie at the Emirates on Saturday 8 March, the local SAG has chosen to allocate just under 9% to the Everton supporters”
We’ll this all needs to be covered in the consultation but they may not enforce it It’s a trial, suck it and see
Yeah Arsenal have been known for doing this recently with the bigger Prem clubs while still offering the whole allocation to smaller clubs. A lot of tit for tat going on it seems. Clubs have definitely had around 9k at Emirates before.
Sorry suck it? I don't understand. They will have to be seen to be trying to enforce it I believe as it forms part of the conditions for implementing safe standing. The blind eye which is turned now by the authorities won't be anymore and the club run the risk of having capacity reduced or safe standing licence revoked. Feedback sessions should be interesting. Fingers crossed I get picked for it it! Has anyone else on here registered interest?
Its a trial, so they won't want to go too big too soon before they've trialed it i.e 'suck it and see' how it works If you're right about enforcement of staying seated in seated areas then ironically we'll end up with less standing However, they're already supposed to be enforcing it and aren't
Ah I'm with ya now And yes they are in theory but in practice a blind eye is turned and I think that is less likely to happen once a designated standing area is in place. We'll soon find out as you say. Interesting times ahead!
We’re a bunch of grumpy southerners, the atmosphere will always be trash. We just need to accept it and move on
