The long, slow, torturous journey to nothing very much at all â opposition focus Fri 08th Mar 2013 00:55 by Clive Whittingham For Sunderland itâs looking very much like a season of lower mid-table mediocrity and itâs too many clubs seeing this as success, as much as spiralling ticket prices, that risks driving fans away from the game. Overview Itâs been a season where QPR, once considered a second team to many, seem to have got up the nose of just about everybody in the footballing world for one reason or another and this week itâs Sunderland finding reason to complain about the beleaguered West London outfit. The cause of their ire - and theyâre certainly not the first club to moan about this - is the fairly extortionate £45 Rangers have charged the travelling fans to sit in one of the divisionâs least well equipped away ends this Saturday. Sunderland fans have written to the CEO at Loftus Road Philip Beard to protest, pointing out that even Chelsea â notorious for outrageous charges to away fans - knock £16.50 more off their OAP tickets for visitors than QPR do. Read more here............... http://www.fansnetwork.co.uk/football/queensparkrangers/fb_news.php?storyid=31602
Have to confess I haven't read the article BUT for my tuppence worth away fans (and teams) get a real 'home' advantage experience for their money at LR. Watching from the Ellerslie wings, you sometimes have to pinch yourself to remember we're s'posed to be the home side. A complete end full of baying, chanting Saints, United etc. fans creates a real 12th man effect for our opponents - while our occasionally noisy choristers occupy a rather sad little corner of the ground. Should be the other way round... then maybe I'd have some sympathy with the rip off rates.
As a non-ST holder, I and many others get the worst of all worlds. The rump end of what is available at extortionate prices plus a booking fee. I'm caught between a rock and hard place for watching my club, I can't get to all our Saturday home games and none of any mid-week games so a ST isn't worth it as well as not being able to afford a ST since we went up and the Goons decided to squeeze our pips till they squeaked. Often, a late chance to catch a home match results in more frustration like this week when the match has sold-out and the only viable alternative is Viagogo and their even bigger rip-off. When I first started going to football in the late 60s you just turned up, paid your 1/6d and watched, THAT was the game of the people, now we're cannon-fodder for every conceivable rip-off they can think of. Sunderland fans should count their blessings they only get ripped-off when the come to London...
one has a choice, if you can afford to travel from almost Scotland to London then you could probably afford to pay admission prices
