In the Northam’s defence, last season was probably not the best first season ti judge the change given the season we had but I wonder if it may improve this year.So I'm sorry to bring the mood down somewhat but I genuinely feel this has been an absolute disaster and one of the worst decisions the club has made.
One of my first objections to this in the original fred before it was confirmed was that I didn't believe we had 7k fans who regularly wanted to sing and contribute to atmosphere.
That very much felt the case last season when I was in it but being at the opposite end yesterday made it even more obvious that there's a few individual pockets and it's not really a proper end at all. I reckon before the equaliser there was a maximum of about 3/4 occasions where the entire end was singing in unison. Too many atmosphere tourists in there which is one of the reasons I ****ed it off.
It just feels to me that we're trying to be something we're not by creating a 'wall' and we're simply not that sort of club/fanbase. We don't have that united group when it comes to singing but instead have different types of people who would congregate in different areas and that generally worked well for us.
I still can't believe some people genuinely believed that tucking the away fans in a corner would make them quieter/less dominant. Somebody should have told the Wrexham fans
If anything it's actually made it worse imo as previously even noisy away supports could be drowned out by either side when our fans were on it. An obvious example is that I've never been impressed with Pompey's support at St Mary's as whenever they tried to get going they'd immediately get drowned out by fans either side and end up giving up. Now you have families one side and the second most expensive seats in the ground on the other. I honestly fear that this upcoming derby will be the worst ever at St Mary's for us atmosphere wise.
I still think the routes to and from the away end are a disaster waiting to happen too for those high risk games. I fail to see how a police escort through the parks can be effective compared to one long wide road.
We didn't have any of those last season but likely to have some this and I think we'll see a fair few issues. Imagine the skates visiting in the league cup and having to be escorted through that route in an evening match. Would be chaos.
Rant over.
I moved the opposite way to you this season. I’ve always sat in the Chapel but tried the Northam out a few times last season and bought my season ticket in there this season. I know it’s difficult to tell when you’re in it but I thought we were all together on several occasions yesterday but I do think the way the game was going for large parts probably didn’t help.
Hopefully this season we will have more to cheer about and that will be a better time to judge the impact.
Time will tell I guess but I agree that the ‘banter’ between the home and away fans has been lost. Maybe the club were hoping that the Chapel would start singing!
