v Watford (h) 23/12/23

[Mattyblue]

Not that old chestnut. More of our support is based outside of Blackburn than it. Using council areas as ‘catchment area’ is old hat.

Bolton have never had substantially higher gates than us when playing at a similar level of football in 150 years. Very evenly matched clubs when it comes to support. £219 STs is the start and end of it.

Edited December 22, 2023 by Mattyblue

[martonrover]

12 minutes ago, Gav said:

300k catchment area 👍

In United and City’s backyard.

[simongarnerisgod]

great chance to go above north end tommorow,they sadly lost in the last minute tonight😂

Edited December 22, 2023 by simongarnerisgod
grammar

[Gav]

19 minutes ago, Mattyblue said:

Not that old chestnut. More of our support is based outside of Blackburn than it. Using council areas as ‘catchment area’ is old hat.

You can call it as old hat as you like but the facts are the facts and I would dispute more of our fan base is from outside the borough, do you have a link? 

Bolton Met 300k

Blackburn with Darwen 150k

 

[Mattyblue]

A ‘link’ to what? The club’s ST holder spreadsheet? 

Yep, you’re right it is a fact that Bolton borough is bigger than BwD, case closed then, support, of course, ends at arbitrary local council borders. So we obviously can’t compare ourselves with Bolton Wanderers.

Edited December 22, 2023 by Mattyblue

[Gav]

5 minutes ago, Mattyblue said:

A ‘link’ to what? The club’s ST holder spreadsheet? 

Yep, you’re right it is a fact that Bolton borough is bigger than BwD, case closed then, thanks for the Wilki search  - we can’t compare ourselves with Bolton Wanderers.

Is that where you’ve seen this information? You made the statement, I’m interested. 

Edited December 22, 2023 by Gav

[Mattyblue]

It’s my view, it’s an estimate. 

If you honestly think the majority of our support still resides in Blackburn you’ve been away from the place longer than you think.

*Though through the work the Trust is doing I would wager the likes of Mike Graham would know for sure if he’s privy to share it.

Edited December 22, 2023 by Mattyblue

[Gav]

22 minutes ago, Mattyblue said:

If you honestly think the majority of our support still resides in Blackburn you’ve been away from the place longer than you think.

I remember seeing something a while back that stated the majority of our season ticket holders lived within a 10 miles radius of the ground, that was a while back now though. 

 

Edited December 22, 2023 by Gav

[Exiled in Toronto Mk2]

1 hour ago, Mattyblue said:

Not that old chestnut. More of our support is based outside of Blackburn than it. Using council areas as ‘catchment area’ is old hat.

Bolton have never had substantially higher gates than us when playing at a similar level of football in 150 years. Very evenly matched clubs when it comes to support. £219 STs is the start and end of it.

Nonsense. When we were both in Div 2 in the mid-late 70s, their crowds were double ours. Look it up.

[Mattyblue]

Fair dos EiT.

Hoisted by my own petard there I did miss the late 70s. But ok, generally speaking. If you look when in the same division in the 60s, similar, 2000s and 2010s, similar - so you get the point that it is recent pricing policy (half the price of ours) that has seen them leave us for dead as it just wouldn’t have happened otherwise.

Us, Burnley, PNE, Bolton are very comparable as clubs and should be used as a benchmark whenever possible, I.e what attractive ticketing can achieve.

Edited December 22, 2023 by Mattyblue

[tomphil]

2 hours ago, martonrover said:

Agreed, but that is still great support for League One .

A key factor is that Bolton’s supporters clearly have faith in their club’s direction and level of ambition.

Tremendous support the club was reborn a few years ago and of course a winning team in any division is an easier sell to a reasonable sized fanbase.

Had some banter with a Bolton lad i know when he was having a dig i just flashed up their crowd stats from their Championship years and stopped him right in his tracks.  Not many clubs grow their fanbase from relegation to league 1 one but they did as their Championship and Prem gates were almost the same as ours.

A real lesson there but it would never be acknowledged by our suits they are far more comfortable with having an 8/9k hardcore ad fleecing them. 

 

 

 

[tomphil]

31 minutes ago, Exiled in Toronto Mk2 said:

Nonsense. When we were both in Div 2 in the mid-late 70s, their crowds were double ours. Look it up.

Swings and roundabouts if they were more successful then they'd obviously have a bigger active fanbase, didnt they have top flight spells in the 70's and 80's unlike us ?

Where did they all fook off to when they were struggling later on ?

[JHRover]

We have enough problems to deal with under horrendous owners and their stooges. The last thing we need is for our own fans to start believing that what they have done / are doing is natural or organic. 

It certainly isn't. They've dragged the club back decades and will at best keep it held back.

We can all dig around for statistics to suit a particular narrative.

One of the classics is that our 'natural level' is being an impoverished 2nd tier club with low gates, of course taken from the decade before Jack Walker got involved. I'll never understand why so many people wish to select that particular era, one when every club going was struggling for fans and money, and ignore everything before and since then (140 other years with healthier numbers). 

It's all irrelevant of course except believing that the likes of Bolton and Preston are somehow 'bound' to get better gates than us due to 'metro' populations is precisely the sort of claptrap that isn't backed up by the realities on the ground and is exactly the sort of thing that makes Waggott's life easier, convincing people 'we've done all we can' when actually it is his policies depriving us of far healthier gates, not the population or catchment area.

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

Just around 200 tickets left in the whole of the JW and BBE Lower...an excellent response by our fans.

[Hannoverover]

Does that mean 5k in BBE + 12k in JW? It'll look great seeing packed stands again

[WacoRover]

3 hours ago, Hannoverover said:

Does that mean 5k in BBE + 12k in JW? It'll look great seeing packed stands again

 It sounds like Rovers supporters are still out there in good numbers- if reduced pricing is enough for them. I must wonder if they will be back on New Years vs Rotherham, when prices go back up? 

[matt83]

7 hours ago, Mattyblue said:

It’s my view, it’s an estimate. 

If you honestly think the majority of our support still resides in Blackburn you’ve been away from the place longer than you think.

*Though through the work the Trust is doing I would wager the likes of Mike Graham would know for sure if he’s privy to share it.

I can’t say what percent of the fanbase do and don’t live in the Blackburn with Darwen catchment area or what the radius of it would be. But I had a think about people I know who go to at least 5 home games and out of 20 none live in the immediate area. The closest balderstone/whalley which is still about 10 miles. Mostly in Ribble valley to be fair. A few in manc, West Yorkshire and a few down south. 

Although I appreciate my experience is skewed having never lived in a bb2 postcode. 

Edited December 23, 2023 by matt83

[Herbie6590]

https://www.brfcs.com/magazine/articles/they-played-for-both-rovers-and-the-hornets/360

[Dontfuckwithcats]

8 hours ago, Mattyblue said:

It’s my view, it’s an estimate. 

If you honestly think the majority of our support still resides in Blackburn you’ve been away from the place longer than you think.

*Though through the work the Trust is doing I would wager the likes of Mike Graham would know for sure if he’s privy to share it.

I live in Blackburn and I tend to agree with this, majority of these people most certainly do not live within our perimeter.

Blackburn is a dead town.

[chaddyrovers]

10 hours ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

Leonard ? I’m sorry but that’s like playing with 10 players.

Rubbish. Doing very well in his first year of being first team player. 

[ossyian]

20 minutes ago, Dontfuckwithcats said:

I live in Blackburn and I tend to agree with this, majority of these people most certainly do not live within our perimeter.

Blackburn is a dead town.

I think you need to use our local fan base as East Lancs instead of just Blackburn as do Burnley and Stanley. Then you’re talking around 550000 population. Most Burnley fans live in Nelson, Colne and Padiham. Hardly any in the town itself

[Uddersfelt Blue]

Lots of fans like me live some distance away from Blackburn. It would be interesting if the club published some demographics as they clearly have this information.

Another wet and windy drive over the Pennines today. Ugh

[Mike Graham]

9 hours ago, Mattyblue said:

It’s my view, it’s an estimate. 

If you honestly think the majority of our support still resides in Blackburn you’ve been away from the place longer than you think.

*Though through the work the Trust is doing I would wager the likes of Mike Graham would know for sure if he’s privy to share it.

Just over 50% of our ST holders are from outside of BwD.  Try driving away from the game today along Livesey Branch Rd and up Moulden Brow in the direction of Hoghton and Wheelton; it will be chocker.

Edited December 23, 2023 by Mike Graham

[Mattyblue]

8 minutes ago, Mike Graham said:

Just over 50% of our ST holders are from outside of BwD

Thanks for confirming.

And that under 50% figure incudes Darwen, of course. So the town of Blackburn itself must be at historically low numbers as a percentage of the ST base… something that seems to be lost on the club as it is still very Blackburn focused in its outreach, school engagement, advertising etc. 

 

Edited December 23, 2023 by Mattyblue

[Blueandwhitemike]

I was flying in from Shanghai for the game today, really excited and looking forward to it a great deal, especially after being there for the first fan takeover versus Girona, but unfortunately last night my plane got stuck on the runway for three hours and I missed my connecting flight to Manchester in Dubai.  I have the ticket PDF and I would think anyone could use it so if you want it PM me 

Gutted