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 Poojah |
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That number of league 1 clubs was 5 when covid struck. With 2 NL clubs having more than us. There were 3 L2 clubs with well over 7500, a number we haven't bettered since 1983/84. Our support would go up a bit with more success and more away fans, but it's not going to add 2000 onto the gate, which would have put us 15th in league 1. In 97/98 we averaged 5271 supporters in what was a very successful season with all of the things that you're claiming would put us higher up the standings if we had them.
It's all well and good dreaming that we can bring numbers through the gate, but we're a club in an isolated area with low income jobs and a history of success not driving attendances.
I think quite easily the better standard of football that would ensue were we to find ourselves in League One, and substantially larger away followings would add around 1,000 to our average gate. We averaged 5,259 in League Two in 2016/17 which after the initial excitement of being back in the league was a fairly poor season - 5,500 to 6,000 is eminently achievable in League One. Still, this is a purely hypothetical argument for now as the only league we'll be playing in next season is the National League. |
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Whiskey Drinker  Posts: 3,971
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My thoughts are that like a lot of small northern towns, we haven't had a mega rich owner to gift us money and facilities that would allow us to compete with the sugar daddies and influx of primarily southern clubs with growing support bases as local football has become more popular in the south. That combined with the big clubs being able to take away any player with a modicum of talent for peanuts has led to our stature in the footballing world falling and being unable to punch above our weight anymore.
Bollox, in 20 years we've been left behind as clubs around us flourished, it lays firmly at the door mat of one man's pure incompetence at running a football club successfully. |
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| grimps |
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balderdashWhiskey Drinker
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I don't. Our average attendance doesn't put us in that league, it puts us in league 2. Football has changed a lot in the last 20 years and past performance is not relevant to the fact that lots of clubs who had more potential fans have managed to attract those fans yet we couldn't even when we were 'good'.
If you look at attendances from the 80s and early 90s they was just as bad or worse at clubs similar for even a lot bigger than us now , Bolton , Bradford , Huddersfield and Hull ect got crowds as bad or even worse then ours . They got new grounds showed ambition and pushed on , we accepted failure . Our crowds now are league two because we’ve been at the bottom of it or non league for 12 years |
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| SomeSanity |
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My thoughts are that like a lot of small northern towns, we haven't had a mega rich owner to gift us money and facilities that would allow us to compete with the sugar daddies and influx of primarily southern clubs with growing support bases as local football has become more popular in the south. That combined with the big clubs being able to take away any player with a modicum of talent for peanuts has led to our stature in the footballing world falling and being unable to punch above our weight anymore.
Sorry but I don't buy that. Look at FGR, 20 years ago they were nobody. Yes, their Ecotricity guy has come in, but they have something GTFC hasn't had in the last two decades. A real brand proposition. Look at the big names the club counts amongst its sponsors. They haven't done that by idly watching the clouds go by the office window. They brought in people who knew what they were doing. Got the branding and proposition right off the pitch and gained positive media attention from it. In recent years the only positive media coverage the club has had is Op Pro, a fan initiate and the shirt amnesty which I'm sure JS would have come up with. |
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| Zmariner |
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I don't. Our average attendance doesn't put us in that league, it puts us in league 2. Football has changed a lot in the last 20 years and past performance is not relevant to the fact that lots of clubs who had more potential fans have managed to attract those fans yet we couldn't even when we were 'good'.
Although, it must be noted that as a match day experience Blundell park is big dump as you are ever going to find. We simply have not moved with the times |
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| BobbyCummingsTackle |
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One of the challenges with calling out the things that are wrong is that the Principle Funder ran the club as a closed shop and we, the fans, had no sight of many things that were happening. The first we knew of something was when it was done and dusted. Often accompanied by the incoherent ramblings of el presidente on the club website blaming anybody but himself for why actions had to be taken or were not taken.
It will not be hard for 1878 to be more open.
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| Miss Scunthorpe. Not a beauty pageant, just sound advice. |
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| BobbyCummingsTackle |
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Although, it must be noted that as a match day experience Blundell park is big dump as you are ever going to find. We simply have not moved with the times
I genuinely find BP depressing and embarrassing. I often think 'what must visiting fans think of this sh*thole?' |
| Miss Scunthorpe. Not a beauty pageant, just sound advice. |
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| TownSNAFU5 |
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Even worse is that last time we were in NL (how I hate that fact) some away fans thought that, by comparison with their own grounds, Blundell Park was like Wembley to them.
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| Kris2 |
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You say we accept failure but I would also argue that during our time in the Championship, we didn't actually appreciate how good we had it? How embarrassing were the 'Carr Out' protests after we got relegated from the Championship with hindsight?
Unfortunately a vocal minority are more interested in who they can get removed from the club than about enjoying success. There were plenty of people complaining and asking for Buckley's head just a couple of seasons out from a double Wembley promotion season. We'd kill to be getting promoted from League One to the Championship these days and be lasting like 5 seasons in the Championship. Even when things are good the moaning will be about something. |
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| diehardmariner |
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In recent years the only positive media coverage the club has had is Op Pro, a fan initiate and the shirt amnesty which I'm sure JS would have come up with.
I don't want Stockwood to come up with these ideas. I want him to harvest a culture where people within the club feel they can come up with these ideas. Your point is absolutely right though. FGR, as much of a pantomime villain as they and Vince are, have got a strong business model. A direction that they all work towards. We've had an idiot dictating that things are done on his terms and his terms only, based not on his knowledge of the product or market but because he struck gold with his fish business 20 years previously. |
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