I think we all recognise that the attendances for the two local clubs are well below what we would like to see. I suppose it's not surprising considering what's put on view! Perhaps we sould take advice from Alfreton. Last nights Blue Square Prem game against Grimsby attracted 11,000 according to Teletext. Alfreton are 18th, Grimsby 6th. I think most people have heard of Bristol, but where the hell is Alfreton??????????
Midlands area I believe Sapphire. It is sad that our average attendances have dropped to barely 5,000 but this is expected. We have been a complete shambles on and off the pitch for years now and people are either getting frustrated with it all or cant be arsed anymore. If the club are not careful those regular fans could become hard to get back.
Yet when either go to Wembley or Millinium 30k upwards. As the fool says both clubs have been in a dip for the past few years, hopefully it will change soon for us at least
I have looked up the Alfreton O/S. Last nites game pulled 1192, so bit of a cock-up by teletext. Even so that was about one in sixteen of the population. By that calculation Bristol gates should be around 50 to 60k each week. Oh Dear!!
when teams play well and do well more fans will come. when teams play poor and lose games fans will stay away. but those who stay away moaning will damage the club as less income means less revenue. meaning lowered budget next season so cant build a decent side so performances and results worsen and then those who stayed away will moan more.
Look in the mirror and ask yourself honestly - do you go down the Mem to see a good game of exciting football, played in the spirit, with lots of goalmouth incidents etc etc ... OR cos you are a Rovers fan?? Over the years lots of diehard fans have been put off by underachieving, broken promises and lacklustre performances to name a few, and to get even a small minority of those back would need a massive turn around both on and off the pitch. However as long as there are problems at the top of the ladder (KS - and everything he aspired to for the club - to name but one!!), and we as supporters are kept in the dark and treated as if we are just a small part of the jig-saw puzzle, then I don't hold out much hope of it changing in the near future. Hopefully IF the UWE goes ahead it will give us as a club an imputus to at least get out of this division and attract new fans, and this could be carried on and snowball us all the way to the Championship!! However I am now 56 years old, and I have supported Rovers since about 1966ish, and our years in the second tier of English football have been few and far between ... and IF we ever reached the Prem ... ooh - heart attack territory!!! There I go again ... Mrs - where's my cocao!
Down the Mem probably not Rhinestone, but back at Eastville in the days when they played attacking football, most of the game was played in the opposition half and you could change ends to get closer to the action at half time. I assume, as you are still only a youngster that you were taken to the games by your Daddy in the sixties. Did you appreciate the likes of Alfie, Peter Hooper and Bobby Jones at that time. Paddy Hales' sliding tackles; man and ball into the terraces!! Did you go to the game at Eastville played on a water logged pitch where the ball landed like a golf ball in soggy ground. I think a chap called Brown played at inside forward in that game. The whole surface was a sheet of water. Nowadays they wouldn't play because they would get wet feet!! Balls as heavy as lead. Ah! Memories..............
Not my Dad - he was from Southend!! We lived in Lockleaze in the early 60's and my 2 older brothers started going down Eastville then. Barry still goes on about two shillings got him - entrance to the boys enclosure, a programme, an ice lolly etc etc ... I can't quite remember those days when we beat Liverpool 5 - 4 (I think) and Man U at home. But Alfie Biggs, Ray Mabbutt, Larry LLoyd .. waterlogged pitches, frozen pitches, pitches covered in snow, no substitues, changing ends. Away games to Halifax, Mansfield and the like, running battles at the tote end - no I was to young to participate thank God! Also I think alot of people are getting dissillusioned with modern day footballers - more money than sense, diving, cheating etc - just get on with it and stop your whinging - in the old days if you headed the ball on saturday you still had lace marks on your forehead on Wednesday .... oh dear - ther I go again!!!
All - Sorry to interupt, but for me, whether it's the Mem. Eastville, Ashton Gate or any other ground bar the very top clubs in the Prem that sell out every week, the reasons behind the real football fan being generally disillusioned with modern football in my opinion are Players Wages - no one is worth (or needs) more than £10k a week. Why then are even Championship clubs paying their players £30k or more aside from the fact they can ? How can someone who is unemployed relate to a professional footballer earning £200k a week ? Sky/ESPN - We are now at total saturation point for televised football, and even the neutrals dont watch as much as they used to. Plus there are also the stupid kick off times and days of the week that the real fans have to put up with Clubs Identity - Too many clubs are selling out to the coporates - Cardiff and Newcastle being prime examples Squad Members - Fewer and fewer local lads playing for the home town teams Cost - Going to a football match used to be the working mans bit of R&R on a Saturday afternoon. It's simply too expensive, generally and the standard at our level can be poor Foreigners - Too many cheap imports that are no better than kids here, and too many bad habits like diving in the English game which has also resulted in the Failure Of England (or any of the home countries) - To ever do anything worthwhile for the foreseeable future, and the FA for literally doing FA to stop the rot when they had the chance to over and over Gone are the days of the Home Internationals and the FA Cup final being the only live football. When Sky started I used to literally watch every game at every level, but as they now show less L1/L2/Conference games I've even become bored with the same old teams on week after week. Rant over !
Angelic, Couldn't agree more with what you have said. As far as Sky goes, you may recall, Pay TV failed several times before Sky came on the scene. As long as Pay TV was kept out of the equation the local ITV Broadcasters took the games from the Big Five; Yorkshire, Granada (Manchester), ATV (Midlands), London Weekend and Thames and opted out to cover the local matches between Rovers, City, Swindon and Cardiff when they played each other. BBC provided Match of the day. That is not to say that the local games always went down too well. TWW and HTV getting the blame when more often then not the games covered just weren't of adequate quality. Satellite and digital TV played into SKY's hands. Nowadays as most everyone has sold their soul to SKY, choice isn't available anymore at local level.
All very good points. On a smaller and more local scale we used to get decent crowds in the Gloucester cup when I was a nipper.
Yes me and my father were having a chat about the gas and city games the other day when he pointed out he would watch a reserve game at Eastville with crowds of over 10k! We don't even get that for our more important league/cup games these days. I agree with a lot of your points Angelic. The game has been sold to the devil and he has ****ed it up something rotten. Gone are the days when the players actually gave a crap and played for the shirt, which ties in with your "no local players" point. Its a shame, and whilst we may get players who are technically better than those locals, there is no passion from them so they dont feel the pain of losing games!
I dont know if its still the case, but one of the problems here always use to be that there are so many teams playing in local amateur football. At Eastville the crowds, if a game was played on a Friday evening, were almost twice those on a Saturday.
Everyone needs money, but footballers at certain levels have way too much. We will be behind Spain and other nations for decades to come internationally as we are our own worst enemies.
Larger than average crowds seem to have been a problem at the Mem for sometime now, we pull in 7000 +, instead of putting on a show to make sure we encourage as many back as possible, we serve up complete dross, we are around 2300 down on the home crowd now compared to the first game of the season, think of the extra revenue that could have been generated if the preparation had been right in pre season, a better start achieved and an extra 750-1000 had come through the gates?
