[Archived] Poll - Falling Attendances.

[bob fleming]

Surely they'll get the entire Darren End this year due to demand? They'll also have fans in other areas as well I'd suggest. "OwenMania" or something. They're crazy, best supporters in the whole of Newcastle without a shadow of a doubt that lot.

[Dan Furness]

I can't recall what they did have but if it's as you say that would be 5500. Top tier is 3000 and bottom is 5000.

344297[/snapback]

segregation matey

[Alan75]

The economics of watching football no longer stand up for the supporter on an average salary, let alone the working class family with children to bring up.

Ticket for next week's away game at Bolton are thirty-two pounds and thirty-two pounds again for a ticket to watch Rovers at Merchandise United.

Admittedly there are cheap seats at Ewood for home supporters, (£22 in the Riverside outer stand) but these are in limited supply, when the local rivals comes to town. The costs behind the goals, Darwen End and Blackburn End for home and away supporters when Bolton and United visit Ewood will be in the region of £30.

Clubs like Rovers were built up as the bastion of entertainment for the working class, where they relaxed from the toil of hard graft in the mills, factories and mines, when watching the team cost no more than a pint of beer and players were on a maximum wage, not much more than the man on the terrace. Even in the sixties and seventies, it was known for players to live in the same street as the supporters, in properties of similar size, to do their weekly shopping in the local store and drink in the same pub as the supporters.

These days you wouldn't get into a conference game for the price of a pint and players live a completely different lifestyle, so different to the supporters that it is unimaginable, to a point that fans queue to get their autographs, should a player deem to visit a local club or bar. With sponsorship and TV money, even the average player has become a superstar. There is no affinity or loyalty to the club, let alone the fans. How many players these days get a testimonial for ten years service; not that they need the money if they've invested correctly. Yet the average fan, who will spend a lifetime paying off his mortgage, is every season being asked to pay more for the privilege of being herded like cattle, by over enthusiastic stewards, into stadiums to watch these mercenaries.

Attendances for away games have been declining for some time, and now that trend is starting for home games. Admittedly over the last couple of seasons the entertainment factor at Ewood has declined, however the increased costs must have a big impact, especially when the game can be viewed in the comfort of ones own home or warm local bar. For the average working class family with a couple of kids, it will cost them for a Class A game, in the region of £100, for tickets and travel cost, let alone the cost of refreshments and a programme. With a the minimum wage of approximately £5.50 the joint earnings of working couple could earn on a 40 hour week in the region of £440, before any deductions, such as tax, rent, food, clothing, transport, so how can they justify paying a quarter of their earnings on 90 minutes of football.

When you can take the whole family to see a film for £20 to £30, football is no longer the entertainment release of the working man, but the fashionable hobby of the middle to upper classes. Clubs outside the top six are currently relying on the loyalty of the core supporters, but there will come a time when even those die hard fans will say enough is enough. When that happens and tv sponsorship dries up, clubs who have spent heavily in the transfer market and negotiated superstar wages to their players will be in financial disarray.

I can see the logic behind the Rovers recent transfer dealings, despite my misgivings of not adding another striker, Rovers have strengthened the squad, sufficiently to maintain premiership status, without making a major capital outlay. We no longer have a financial benefactor the last thing any Rovers supporter would want to see is the club following in the route of Leeds. or Leicester. The main way for the club or any other club of similar standing, to finance new players is through fans paying at the turnstyles, however this will only happen if the entrance fee is set at a realistic level and the product on display is of an acceptable standard.

[CAPT KAYOS]

Alan75

That has to be without doubt one of the best and of most common sense postings ever on this board and deserves gold status.

Think you should mail it to a couple of the footy mags editors and websites.

Edited September 4, 2005 by CAPT KAYOS

[roversmum]

I was just about to make the same suggestion as the Capt. Think it deserves an airing in the newspapers as well.

About time someone spelt it out. Well done, Alan.

[Alan75]

Thanks Captn and Roversmum.

Unfortunately I cant send the posting as it stands to newspapers etc as it is copyrighted to another web site.

Fortunately they do allow me to a duplicate my correspondent reports on this site.

[cletus]

Excellent post Alan75

A copy should be sent to the boardroom at Ewood Park.

It probably wouldn`t make any difference, but at least they`d know the feelings of the fans.

[broadsword]

You could always send the link?

[Alan75]

You could always send the link?

344706[/snapback]

LINK

[Paul]

Following on from Alan's excellent post, much of which I fully agree with, I feel the erratic fixture lists also play a significant part in the attendance problem. Most of the summer I was pretty fed up with football, hardly read anything or took any interest in the game. Went to the Fulham game and that was OK, Spurs next and I came out feeling really enthusiastic. Great when's the next game? - 25 days later, nearly a month. Oh right, internationals is it? Who are they playing? I didn't know until someone told me, really interesting stuff.

August - 2 games in four days

September - 1 game, football when? Oh have we started again?

October - 2 games - 3 weeks apart

November - 1 game, whoops nearly forgot, football this month

December - 4 home games in 4 weeks (including January 2nd) - excuse me everyone is skint at Christmas? - oh and the small matter of Wigan away, so that's 5 games really

January - 2 games, every other week, yep that's OK

February - 2 games - 24 days apart, yep nearly a month again

March - 2 games in 7 days, Oh! best start saving now, that's £200 we have to find in a week

April - 3 games - quite well spaced, attractive fixtures, might go to all of those

Now I realise we have to accomodate that nice Mr Erikson, who has to "prepare" his team, but the above is ludicrous. I can't compare this with other seasons but surely the brains who run the PL can look at the situation. In the months of September and November we have ONE home match then come December hey, let's really sting them with FOUR - don't worry evrybody is on holiday, they'll be happy to shell out around £500, for a family, on football. Wake up guys, reality time is here.

I turned down FREE tickets to the Reebok last night, we had made other plans. Never done that before.

[AggyBlue]

Well said , I thought the same myself. with a family it's not easy to budget for:angry:

Just drop the freebies for Breezeblok off in Aggy

[FourLaneBlue]

The only way the authorities are going to change their meddling is if the fans hit them in the pocket. A few thousand and some clubs not renewing their season tickets is nothing compared to the millions generated by Sky money. Football is big business and it's hard to see how it can ever return to being a 3.00pm on a saturday afternoon with entrance for a few quid affair. Not at the level we currently compete at anyway. The Premiership is where people want to be, yet not only do the club have to spend more money to be there, the fans do too.

Alan75 - Excellent post. Unfortunately...that's life now in football. I'm not sure why so many people spend so much money on following the game but, for now, they do.

Edited September 6, 2005 by FourLaneBlue

[thenodrog]

I turned down FREE tickets to the Reebok last night, we had made other plans. Never done that before.

344931[/snapback]

For the row behind Wes and his mates were they Paul?

[roversmum]

Absolutely agree with Paul. I'm getting really fed up with all the gaps, you go to a match, get fired up and then..........................

The fixtures are all over the place this season, two home games, two away games, two weeks between here, a month or more between two home games. People will find other things to do, get out of the habit.

Although I'm unable to go to Bolton at the moment (I live in hope), I can't wait for the match, our boys back together again and another set of internationals out of the way thank goodness.

[den]

These gaps must have some bearing on the attendances. Your average part time supporter wont know when the next match is, where a few years ago you didn't need a fixture list - if rovers were away last Saturday, they are at home this Saturday. There you go, problem solved.

But wait, --- in those days we were only getting 5000 supporters at Ewood.

[Guest Vinjay]

Still can't see why loss of multi million budget is yet to be added. I suppose its due to vindictive bias against me but it is one of the main factors. Its hard for some people to get the motivation. Rovers were second in the league at the beginning of 1998. Finishing below sides such as Bolton and Charlton was unthinkable. Average attendance 97-98 was 25,000+. Seeing as the club couldn't sell out then its hardly surprising attendances have dropped.

[Glenn]

Still can't see why loss of multi million budget is yet to be added. I suppose its due to vindictive bias against me but it is one of the main factors. Its hard for some people to get the motivation. Rovers were second in the league at the beginning of 1998. Finishing below sides such as Bolton and Charlton was unthinkable. Average attendance 97-98 was 25,000+. Seeing as the club couldn't sell out then its hardly surprising attendances have dropped.

345075[/snapback]

No, it's because adding an entry to poll part way through generates dozens of "Hey, I want to vote differently" posts, which is nearly impossible to do, it's easier just to do another poll.

I actually think this would have been a good one to include (personally, I feel it may have helped you realise what a minority you are in, but I could be wrong), but sadly it wasn't thought of when the poll was created.

[Cheshireblue]

If you speak to any board director at Rovers or at any club outside the big 4, they will agree with every word that Alan wrote.

Clubs are aware that they are pricing fans out of the market, that there are far too many games on the TV and that the salaries players are commanding are absolutely outrageous.

The problem is that they can do nothing about it. You have to match the salaries, or else you don't get the players. So you pay the money and buy the players you need. You can't afford to get relegated because you lose the sky money which pays the players. Sky only pay you the money if you appear on sky and so if you want to keep the sky money, you have to appear to sky.

That drives down attendences because there is too much football on sky. It also drives ticket prices up beacuse they need to generate more money to pay the players wages, because the sky money doesn't cover everything. Attendences drop further due to price increases, so you become even more dependent on sky money.

It is a vicious circle and nobody can break out of it. As long as there are side like the Scum, Chelski and Arsenal that have more money than the rest, there is nothing you can do to break the cycle. Relegation means you go bust, so you just hang on in there and perpetuate the problem.

If anyone knows how to break it, then please feel free to write to Robert Coar, because I'm sure he would like to know.

Edited September 6, 2005 by Cheshireblue

[Presty On Tour]

the thing is blackburn at home isn't on tv that often??

and when they are it is on p.p.v i.e. newcastle home!!

i think the cost of that is £7, a couple more ££ depending where you live you can go and experience the game in the flesh with the atmo and the buzz which is miles better than watching it on tv!!

[CAPT KAYOS]

Clubs are aware that they are pricing fans out of the market, that there are far too many games on the TV and that the salaries players are commanding are absolutely outrageous.

The problem is that they can do nothing about it.

345083[/snapback]

Wrong answer Chesh - they can do something its just nobody wants to stick their neck out first or are just plain blind and oblivious to what is happening.

Put it another way - if they don't do something - it will be sorted out for them anyway by supply and demand (the fans)

They elected to go down this road - if some't clubs are not willing to take stock, eg the Arses /Chelskis and Urinals - the other clubs should have enough power as a collective to start their own breakaway or something.

[Presty On Tour]

more and more teams now are having their own tv channel too.

don't really know how successful they are though??

[Paul]

If you speak to any board director at Rovers or at any club outside the big 4, they will agree with every word that Alan wrote.

Clubs are aware that they are pricing fans out of the market, that there are far too many games on the TV and that the salaries players are commanding are absolutely outrageous.

The problem is that they can do nothing about it.

345083[/snapback]

Sorry Chesh I can't agree with that the clubs can and should do something about it. We all know the PL is a cartel, everything is agreed quietly, privately and then goes through on the nod. If Arsenal, Chelsea, Utd, and I suppose Liverpool, don't want to play ball let them go there own way. The remaing clubs simply sit down in a quiet room, agree to slash the outrageous wages, of every player. The players who don't like it can simply leave, where else are the going to work? The big four only need so many players and have already taken everyone they want out of Ewood and the rest of PL clubs. Those players who accept the wage cuts can be paid by performance, attendance, results etc. I haven't even thought of the maths but every time Ewood is full the players get a % etc,etc,

[Paul]

For the row behind Wes and his mates were they Paul?

344945[/snapback]

This was a major concern

[thenodrog]

Relegation means you go bust,

That is the crux of the issue and is completely out of order Chesh.

If anyone knows how to break it, then please feel free to write to Robert Coar, because I'm sure he would like to know.

Rob's no longer chairman Chesh.... unless you mean in his other postition. 

345083[/snapback]

[thenodrog]

Not mentioned as yet but the current trend of working 4x12 hour days on and 4 days off must be having some effect. I've 2 brothers-in-law who have chosen not to renew their ST's because of having to miss matches. They both intend to go to the home games that they can but history tells us that when the team is playing badly these supporters soon drop away. And the only thing that gets em back is the presence of an Uncle Jack............ and we only get one of those every hundred years or so.