Following yesterday's disappointment and Saturday's jubilation something came to mind, if the form tables were the other way around, i.e. only losing one at home and having lost 6 away would there be such anguish over the curent plight. I recall last season under Hessy when te home form was top draw but the away form was suspect, even with the club outside the playoffs there seemed to be much more positivity around the place. Why is home form consider more sacred and important than away form, is it simply the number of fans involved? If we lose at home there are more people to moan, is that all it is?? Also are we doing the quality of the league a diservice? Look at yesterday's result Rotherham draw at home to York (like we did) and Port Vale lost at home to Exeter (erm... like we did). These "shock" results aren't that rare, the quality difference beween the teams isn't that big, so are we overconfident in thinking that we should be simply brushing teams aside at Priestfield?? Just a thought...
Three reasons why home form is so important. 1 There are 10 times as many supporters at home compared with away games. 2 Those fans want to see the team win and to be entertained (ideally they want both but they must hve one or the other). 3 League 2 clubs are more dependent on ticket sales than higher divisions. Poor home form means low income, the vicious circle that follows needs no explanation. The trouble at home this season is that it was obvious from the word go that entertainment levels have been poor and that results were flattering Gills in September and October, results from November have accurately reflected performances, not once has anyone suggested they were unlucky when losing, but Gills have been fortunate on accasions when they have won.
I believe bristol407 has highlighted some of the reasons that mirror my thoughts to which I add this from my own personal circumstances: I save for my season ticket to cut my costs, the detriment side for me as a supporter is I cannot afford the away games or travel time, also I have to consider my own well being stuck on a coach for 5hrs. This is with the exception of a few away games due to the support of my not606 friend. Hence the team is more likely to be judged on 90% more performances at home than it is away. So instead of having 500 judges you have now got 5,000 judges. Sadly the views of 4,500 supporters are going to far outweigh the more fortunate 500 travelling fans. It's quite simple logic really, when you also take in the cost of £20-£25 per ticket or whatever the cost is these days. All for L2 football. Fans feed the greed of our modern day game and that also feeds the voices in return. I think there is also a certain amount of disrespect built into the modern day football fan but that is a completely different 'social' argument.
Don't think there'll be too much negativitity come late April, if we manage to hang on and secure a top 3 place. Would be a fitting summary to the season if we choke and leave the field to boos in the final home game vs Wimbledon, but then secure promotion on the final day with victory at Burton.
All good points so begs the question. As season ticket holders would you prefer to be 7 or 8th but being well entertained each week, or if we go up will it have been worth it? (have to admit even listening on gills player it’s a bit depressing.) That said I used to get frustrated under Hess at the games I made it over to see. There was a lot of hoof ball and were even getting beat 4-1 at home on occasions when it really mattered, this all topped off by not even getting a playoff spot at the end of it. Perhaps the perfect compromise was Stimo. We played great football at home under him, far better than under Hess or MA. We were woeful away but away form doesn't seem to matter so much now apparently? This would have kept home supporters happy with attractive football and got us promoted. win win ( ok..and straight back down again) For the moment I trust in MA to deliver this season and then rebuild a team for league 1 next season.
Do not wind us all up Belfast. Anything is better than Dimson although you are quite right to give him some credit for entertaining football at home. It is completely tasteless though to dress up dwarfs in football kit and then parade them at Priestfield. No wonder the opposition could not stop laughing. The football last season was fabulous entertainment but there were too many 2-3s and 3-4s that should have been 3-2 or 4-3 in order to keep the faithful happy. But everyone would have preferred last season's home form if only the away form could have been somewhere near what has happened this year. Hessy had the incredible handicap of Dimson's leftovers whereas MA has had no such deadweight. But if MA gets promoted as I think he certainly will, then he is entitled to all the bragging rights he wants so long as he can achieve midtable next year. Time will tell or maybe he will cut and run before he has a relegation on his cv.
Some valid points there Bristol, bums on seats is important to keep the club going but how does success influence that equation? By this I mean does having better home form but less success, like we had under Hess or having "relatively poor" home (by comparison) but greater success give better returns? One well to tell would be to look at the average attendences comparing two season but that doesn't take account into things like prize money etc.
Sorry to hear you have had to watch some less than entertaining soccer at Priestfield during the last few months. However, what I remember of our League Championship winning year of 63/64 things were not a lot better....maybe even worse There was no Roy of the Rovers stuff. Yes, like now we had a vg G/K and Defence, but the rest were mostly average players... like now? Under the system of only two points for a win, a draw was a more prized result than today. Also G/K's were allowed to run around their areas bouncing the ball for minutes on end like a Harlem Globetrotter before rolling it to the R/B who passed it square to the L/B before feeding it back to the goalie again. Eventually, losing patience, the centre forward would rush forward to clobber the goalie, or the ref would book the keeper for timewasting to the pleasure of the howling home crowd. At the end of the season though, we thought it had all been worth it to finally escape Div 4, to which we had become an inaugrial member some years before. So hang on in there....next year will be much better. Trust me... I am over in November,God willing UTG!
You would have summed it up all very nicely for me OTiC but you missed out one very important aspect of the much loved game in those days. It only cost a few pence to get in! Hence I believe the powers that be behind the modern game have bred the decease of the modern day boo boy. Yet then they complain. Massive salaries, massive costs to the working classes, I could go on but I'll save everyone the pain.
We will go up. No doubt about that. If one looks at the table 80-82 points should be more than enough to clinch 3rd. Which means we need between 15 and 17 points. We have not been very easy on the eye or very good since october, but you dont have to be, this is the 4th tier afterall. The fact that us and port vale have built up such a cushion over the rest will see us limp over the line. If im honest when i found out we last the other night it didnt even really bother me such is my confidence that we will go up.
I agree with you major. I could not go to the game but when I found out we had lost it did not bother me. Probably because of the last few weeks there was a few away games that I never predicted we would win, so really on balance we are still very much where I expected us to be after the Oxford defeat. How many times in the past have we turned Oxford over in the same manner, so I suppose they did owe themselves that 84th minute winner as disheartening as it may be. We would have all quite happily have settled for a point but alas it was not to be as simple as that for me really.
I was lucky enough to still be a season ticket holder for Stimsons season in league 1, and that was the best football we have played at Priestfield since the days of Peter Taylor in my opinion, but for whatever reason we were abject away from home. From the 5 â 0 victory v Swindon on the opening day of the season to the wins v promotion chasing Southampton and Leeds in our last 2 home games that season we played passing football through the midfield that was a joy to behold. I canât comment too much on this season as I have only been to 7 games, (I work alot of weekends now so no longer have a season ticket) and I have only seen 2 wins Southend 1 -0 backs to the wall (similar to many away performances it would seem) and the FA cup win over Scunthorpe when we played well, other than that I have seen a couple of draws and 3 defeats, none of which were particularly inspiring, I then watched the Wycombe game on the tele and thought we our lucky to score nil that night. I will celebrate as loud as anyone if we get promoted and as I follow matches on the internet / radio, with Radio Kent only commentating on away games I feel as I know more about our away performances than the home ones and more often than not the games have had me biting my nails desperate for the final whistle, so they must be much the same for those of you who actually go away. I totally agree that home form is key to overall success of a club, but for some reason we are not the only team with this issue, Port Vale and Exeter have very similar records, I think that it will be very close come May, everyone else in the division would swap places with us now, we still need to win over half of our remaining matches, we have 5 at home and 7 away 6 wins and 2 draws will give us 85 pts and that should be enough! I have tried to remain positive, but defeat on Saturday could see the gap close considerably, I would certainly rather be in Burton shoes than ours right now
i think there's an element of frustration to the home form as well as the larger number of people watching. It's traditionally seen as being harder to win away games and we're doing that most weeks but can't do the supposedly "easier" job at home.
It's all a plot. I think that everyone agrees that we'll go up (although possibly not as champions, which would be a shame), so I reckon MA's told the team to back off a bit so as to lower expectations for next year.
