What a wonderful read to conclude a wonderful day.

And she was right.

 

I must have misinterpreted what you posted. I thought you said going to a 26,000 capacity from 30,000 at the Dell was not progressive, hence me wondering about another plan i didn't know of; I thought the move was when the Dell only had the 15,000 you just mentioned.

 

Yes it was, but Southampton was a 30,000 plus City, in terms of support, even back in the 80 and 90's. It's all about difficulty getting a ticket. After a while you stop trying. I have personal experience of this. When I returned to the UK in the mid 90's, I lived in Kent [down the road was a Saints season ticket holder but I didn't know that until about 1 month before I left the area - bad timing]. Every opportunity I had, I would phone for a ticket. Sold Out here, sold out there. After about 6 months of this I stopped trying. It was only when I came back to Southampton in 2001 that I started going regularly again. I missed most of Matty's career [but not all] LIVE because of that bloody 15,575. Thing is, if it was happening to me, you can bet your bottom dollar it was happening to loads of other people who couldn't get there every other week. They stop trying. Eventually you don't even fill the meagre capacity every other week.

A club needs a stadium with spare capacity to grow into. Stoneham Lane was too small, imo. St.Mary's is also too small, imo. It's a very nice stadium, but it may limit the club eventually. There's no room to attract more younger fans, to sell cheaper tickets, it's very restrictive. People say, we can't fill it. True. We can't fill TODAY. But it's too small to make any big investments into getting more people to come because another 2,000 or so people will fill it. Catch 22 sort of thing. It needed to be 40,000 and then Saints could really have tried to attract them in. Once they start coming they bring their friends. This is all in hindsight, of course. Then again I thought St.Marys was too small from day one when the announcement was made. It's waaay better than 15K though, so I'm not complaining.

In a sort of way, much as I hate to say it, I'm grateful to Lowe for actually organising a half-decent new stadium, when Board members before him sat on their wallets and did nothing. And I'm 90% sure it was the asset of St.Marys that made Nicola phone Markus and say... you know that fun thing you wanted to invest in..?

 

Forget about the size of the original proposal, it was all about the location. Close to two motorways, a railway station and an airport with masses of room for expansion. Perhaps Eastleigh FC can take it when they become the South's third biggest side

 

I agree with TSS. I bought 2 season tickets at the Dell when capacity was reduced because it was so hard to get seats. We may not sell out SMS, but it is very close. It is hard to get other than the odd scattered ticket round the ground...a few weeks before a match and you won't get a pair of seats on the sides (my preferred viewpoint). OK for adults (though not ideal), but if you are trying for 2 seats (including a 13-14 year old) you may give up. There is also no opportunity for handing out freebies or reduced tickets to try and encourage the next generation. Extension of the ground must be seriously considered (as soon as finances have recovered from Staplewood).

 

If you stand still these days then you are going backwards.

 

They could fix the leaky roof at the same time.

 

Right now St Mary's has the third lowest attandance in the EPL in terms of percentage of total (90.2%) so i don't think they will or should move for expansion any time soon. As Ralph said i think the club are going to want to see some serious, sustained periods excess demand like at the Dell before they seriously consider an expansion. I'm sure the last thing anyone wants is a remodeled, half filled stadium like the SoL up in Sunderland.

Attendance stat: http://www.soccerstats.com/attendance.asp?league=england

 

It is catch 22. We are at home to Leicester and it is sold out. As TSS said, it is the need to have more 'occasionals' attending. So if we had another 15,000 people who wanted to go to every third game, we'd have another 5,000 regulars. We'd need to have the capacity to be able to allow those people to do it, and risk the empty seats until it becomes regular. It is a tough call.

From the age of 15, I played Saturday's and so gave up my season ticket at the Dell and getting tickets after that was hard. Then at 29/30 I moved to the NW and had to watch away games as home tickets were just a "no chance"

It will be interesting to see what happens for league games during the rest of this season, the FA Cuo if we get drawn at home to League One FC and if we get into Europe, what the gate will be for a group stage Europa Cup game against Latvia's second best team.

I am dreading the next year or so as my lad is getting older and may have conflicts. He has started a Saturday morning job, is about to take up another sport and so I'm dreading him stopping going as I did at a similar age

 

I'm an occasional. I don't mind the 2 hour drive to Southampton or the horrendous traffic after the match, but the main thing that puts me off attending more often is the price of tickets. Even a £5 reduction would probably mean I would come to more games, and there are probably thousands like me scattered around the South of England.

The crowds are there, they just need to be persuaded to attend more often. One of the financial wizards on the Saints back room staff should devise a pricing structure that would guarantee a higher percentage attendance, which would then justify a future stadium expansion.

 

Selling out for Leicester suggests a few more sell outs from now on.

 

Is that league only or does it include cup games?

 

Thank you FLT [and You others]. You've got it exactly. You don't know how many people don't get it, simply because they see a thousand or so seats have not been sold in half the games. People I have spoken to, re: St.Mary's, always talk about NOW. They often have no concept of future demands.

Building a stadium isn't about tacking on a few extra thousand seats when you need them. You can't just put out a few extra chairs. Yet I have spoken to intelligent people who simply don't get the idea that if you are within a small percentage of selling out much of the time [I'm sure there are stats on where the tipping point into expansion is advisable], then you are limiting the growth of the club. The argument is that because 32,683 is not seen in the figures every game then the club doesn't need to expand the stadium or build a new one. Well, I've seen hundreds of sell outs at The Dell and St Mary's, over the years [especially St.M] and in not one of those times have I seen a figure which says 32,683. Even Coventry wasn't absolute capacity [32,363], yet it was the sell out of sell outs. So I repeat. There is no reserve capacity to grow into, and that's what Saints need to encourage new fans to attend.

 

League only.