There's the rub. Still no comparison. A useful counter-force is a temptation for a fan to totally abandon Spurs and start supporting a club from the same division, ideally the same area. So I'll ask again: How tempted do you think the average Spurs fan would be, despite the ****e they've put up with for decades, to give up on the club and start fully supporting Arsenal or Chelsea? If the answer to that is 'not likely at all', then there isn't a counter-force and qed there isn't loyalty either. I shop at Tesco. I am often tempted to start shopping at Asda. But I don't. So I am a loyal customer. I support Spurs. I am not remotely tempted to support any other team, and haven't been since I was a very young child. That does not make me a loyal fan.
That's like saying that a husband is still loyal to his wife if he just leaves her or gets a girlfriend, but doesn't marry again. Not buying a season-ticket or going to games and either not going or going somewhere else is not the same as going to every match. It doesn't take supporting the filth or the other filth to change that. I don't like the concept of people being "better" or "worse" supporters and I don't think that this is the issue here. If someone's going to trek up to ****ing Newcastle on a weekday for a game gets rewarded over me, though? I can certainly see the justification for that, even if there are loads more considerations than just attendance, in my opinion.
Yes, trekking to away games is a relatively good measure of loyalty. The best measure of loyalty is probably financial though. A fan with lots of disposable income and free time isn't going to struggle going to Newcastle away, and will probably get there and back in relative comfort and then sleep in the next morning. Whereas a fan on low income who has to take the cheapest and most crowded train possible and not eat all day in order to afford a ticket, then be up for work at 6am the next day, is probably demonstrating more loyalty. Again, because the counter-forces to miss the game are far stronger. But of course the whole concept of a season ticket turns this on its head and says financial strength = loyalty. And that perverse equation gets stronger every time the club raises ticket prices, such that "loyalty" will soon be a luxury item only the wealthiest can afford. I think this is what bothers @PowerSpurs too.
But my whole point is that there are thousands of fans who can't get a ticket because of the club's pricing policy. In the meantime some of the fans who are effectively getting discounted tickets are moaning. More fans are being alienated by the current system than by a more equitable allocation.
My point is actually that it is being over rewarded already. There is a huge incentive currently for someone to renew their season ticket and sell it on for every match.
No. But I would price most of them higher and give a discount to people on benefits subject to them attending themselves or selling back to the club at cost price.
Some clubs have started punishing such behaviour already, but it's a tricky thing to approach, for me. Someone systematically abusing the system is one thing, but I'm sure none of us want to see genuine fans being punished for an illness, for example. There's a balance between creating availability for new supporters and alienating what are now known as legacy fans. The Premier League is already suffering in terms of match atmospheres for catering to the former, in my opinion. We all want to see full grounds with a loud crowd that contribute to the spectacle. I think that's good for the game, the fans and the financial aspect, too. Making it purely about how much someone will pay to get a ticket is contrary to that aim.
The number of season tickets ( including premium packages) more than doubled when the new stadium opened so most season ticket holders are not legacy fans by your definition. I agree the balance is tricky though.
It's being rewarded illogically. A fan who happened to be born in Stoke Newington in 1960 and got taken to every game by their dad before buying a season ticket, has done far less for the club than a 'PL era' fan out in Dallas who single-handedly set up a Dallas Spurs supporters club that now has over 200 members, all of whom pay to watch games and for merchandise, but the latter faces a wait of at least 4 years to even be considered for a ST.
I don't think that it did. There were 40,000 at Wembley, IIRC. I didn't define legacy fans either but many of them won't have had season tickets at WHL, including me and, if memory serves, you. I was on a waiting list at the old ground for years and got mine when we moved to Wembley, which I've since kept. I'm happy to see new fans attending games, regardless if they're from Tottenham or Seoul. I also don't think that it should depend upon how much income they can bring to the club. We should be actively attempting to avoid pricing out supporters for a short-term balance push. That's not what the game is about, for me. Those with plenty of money can always get a ticket. That doesn't mean that we should auction them off. Tottenham Hotspur (and every other club) may well be a business. That's not all that we are, though. It certainly shouldn't be the aim.
One alternative approach would be something like the Wimbledon system where you sell half the seats on long term debentures to the rich and sell the others cheaply through annual ballots. That doesn't reward loyalty at all though.
Yes, my terminology was inexact...the number doubled when WHL closed. But if everyone on the waiting list is a legacy fan then it is even more important that they sometimes get a chance to buy a season ticket. I think we should have a different approach to ticket prices but I don't think the current system exploits fans with season tickets. Selling them something for less than its market value sounds like the opposite!
Legacy Fans are just the traditional supporter base, as defined by the Super League negotiation leaks. The indication was that the clubs involved wanted to move away from them towards more lucrative Future Fans who would spend more per visit. I do not think that this is a desirable aim, either for the sport as a whole or for the club as a business. I think that the current ticket prices are excessive and detrimental to the atmosphere. That's a negative for the club in every sense. The Ticket Exchange is an excellent addition, though. Eliminating any sort of touting or profiteering from selling on tickets would make it even better. Removing season-tickets from those involved in such behaviour would be warranted, in my opinion.
Yeah if you fill the ground with whoever is willing to pay the most then I can only imagine the atmosphere would be flat. 60,000 prawn sandwiches corporate types mixed in with tourists. Football would die.
Perhaps there should be a singing audition with the principle criterion being loudness before you can buy a season ticket.....
This is what would happen if we removed season tickets. We'd see a weekly rush on tickets similar to what the Oasis reunion recently did, with supply nowhere near the level of demand. It would descend into a chaotic auction with fans sitting on ticket sites for hours just watching the price of their desired seat increase as supply shrinks. We have more than enough fans around the globe with the means to make this a highly lucrative system. It is impractical for them to attend more than a few games a season, but when they do they are basically willing to pay whatever it takes to get a seat.
It's the obvious financial step forward for most clubs with huge global fanbases, us included. Chelsea will be first to do it, mark my words. Scum.
