Much has been said on this board and elsewhere about the under achievement of City - many think City should be, as a minimum, near the top of League 1 and perhaps challenging for the Premiership. But realistically can we expect to do that given our resources? Ultimately in the long run a club is only as good as it's fan base. This is something that will be even truer when the full impact of Financial Fair Play is felt. So it would not be unreasonable to use an average attendance statistic to see where City would be: City's average attendance this season is 11,568 which puts us 4th behind Wolves (19.7k), Sheffield Utd (17.1k) and Bradford (14.4k) and just ahead of Preston (10.8k) There are 5 Championship teams who have average attendances lower than ours - Barnsley (by 100), Millwall, Bournemouth, Doncaster and Yeovil (Brighton have the highest for anyone interested). In League 2 Portsmouth average 15.4k. So there are 43 teams that get higher gates than us - putting us as the bottom team of the Championship. Therefore using attendance as a yardstick we should be a yo-yo team between the Championship and League 1.
http://www.football-league.co.uk/page/DivisionalAttendance/0,,10794~201325,00.html a thread for anyone who wants to see the numbers
The findings mirror reality then, at least until this season. Any measure of success will bring in additional fans and also convinces the 'maybe's' to go along more frequently. Given the money that has been given to various managers over the last few years (with the exception of SOD and SC) then we should probably be an established Championship side. With that comes the additional television rights, more away visiting fans and from bigger clubs spending money at the ground and in the city before/after games and the greater amount of other media exposure. Of course we have no God given right to be in any particular division, but as a club we have been very poorly run and organised from the owner down, and thats why we are now in great danger of a second successive relegation. Getting 16,000 - 18,000 regularly is achievable and sustainable but only in the Championship. We would probably get similar crowds in L1 or even in L2 towards the end of a season if we were going to be promoted.
Bristol Citys gates and income can sustain championship level football. Other clubs achieve that on less. Citys current position is transition, but if it becomes long term it is failure..
This season I expected 15th in the league, I also expected us to be up to 10th next year, And at least 7th and pushing for the playoffs a year after this, And the next year or 2 after that getting promoted to the championship.
Don't know if we can finance ourselves in the Championship as the gates stat proves. We have a poor following compared to a lot in that division. I'm trying to remember when we've topped the attendance league in any division. And bastard Portsmouth will ruin it next year as well.
I've always thought, taking history and potential into account, that City SHOULD be a comfortable Championship side, occasionally flirting with promotion or hovering dangerously near the relegation zone; and Rovers SHOULD be a comfortable L1 side frequently challenging for promotion.
It's not rocket science.......If we had continued success our gates would triple with the size of our City.......IMO we should be in the Premiership. Why can't our crowds compete with the likes of Norwich, Hull, Southampton, Palace, etc? That's the trouble with most of our fans, no shouting from the roof tops where we should be. The potential for our club is astronomical.
Given our facilities, and our reputation in the city, I think League 1 is where we should be. There are a number of teams that I think are better than us in the Championship in terms of facilities, and the more we see new teams going into the Premier League, and more top teams going down to the Championship the gap between us and them is widening. League 2 is too low for a club like Bristol City, but with our hire and fire attitude, and a lack of responsibility for failure from the board, I think League 2 is probably deserved.
Southampton - many years in the old first div and now the Prem + FA cup winners and appearances in Europe Norwich - many years in the old first div and now the Prem + appearances in Europe Palace - seasons in both old div 1 and the Prem, plus several high profile cup runs + finalists 1990 Hull - less to shout about, but a new ground, 2 season in the Prem, Cup semis 1930 (!) and from an area rich in football tradition. You could add Ipswich who have won things, or Coventry who were regulars in the old div 1 for most of the 70s and 80s, plus won the FA Cup, the FA Youth Cup and league cup semis I think you can see where this is going. We had 4 years in the old div 1 in the 70s, before the bottom fell out and we plummeted. We have a couple of league cup semi finals and an FA cup quarter final. Other than that, you need to go back to 1908 for anything bigger, when football was still a curiosity. Leeds were not that much to write home about before Revie got hold of them, Ipswich were like Norwich, in La-La land before the great Ramsey came along. Liverpool were an average 2nd div side with reasonable gates before Shankly. Bristol City have much to thank Dicks for, for showing us the promised land albeit momentarily. It just takes one man of vision, one man of means and courage, and about 40,000 who will eat sleep and bleed the club to create a dynasty. Until such time as we have those ingredients I'm afraid what we must settle for is what we have - not very much We are exactly where we deserve to be
Looking at the attendance stats for the Championship and League 1 -the highest averages especially in league 1 are more determined by a combination of -- catchment area and tradition and historical success, and not current form .....perhaps no coincidence that Wolves, Sheffield Utd, Bradford and Bristol City are top of the averages, yet only Wolves are in the current top half.
Your completly right pirate, that is the status of our clubs through our history...we should join together as one, the only chance we have to make it in the football world...not Bristol United but Bristol City Rovers!!! of course this will never happen, but it should.
On paper given the size and the population mass of Bristol we should be a yo-yo team between the Prem and the Championship, however the reality is we are no more than a yo-yo team between the 2nd & 3rd tier of English football with a fan base that matches that. So to be starring relegation to the 4th tier is a massive underachievement and some heads should roll, but they won't!
Swansea started off in the lower divisions, but worked their way up the leagues into sustainable premiership football.
Only up until recently swansea and cardiff got smaller gates than us, Bradford did a very cheap season ticket deal which has added a few k onto there average gates in our championship seasons i think the average gates for the first two seasons were 16k and 17k then dropping to about 14k which to me suggests average championship club support wise
