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Double Winning St Johnstone FC Thread


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It's the same issue for most clubs after a cup win.

Look at Aberdeen, they took what 35-40k? to a final against Inverness yet they hardly ever sell out Pittodrie.

Same with StMirren, Killie, ICT, County. We all had our big day in the sun yet you don't really see a bounce effect with the crowds or season ticket sales.

In my opinion these big cup final crowds are filled with your local Old Firm fans clinging on for a bit of glory and will never buy a ST anyway/friends and family members who never go to games and don't have any appetite to return until the next cup final/general hangers on. Add in your hardcore fans/day trippers/fans who have moved all over the world and you get your 15,000.

Not sure what the way forward for clubs are with regards to fan ownership. Excited for StMirren but there are so many different ways to do it.




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Our average home attendance went up by 700 the season after the cup win, about 20%.  And as Kyle said, the football was really poor that season.

There's no doubt we could have done more and it was a missed opportunity. But as a club we weren't prepared for it. I think everything was geared towards the big day and probably nobody even thought what comes next.  The limited number of staff had probably worked like mad for weeks and then as soon as it was over everything shut down to get a break.  A missed opportunity for sure, but we'd never been in that situation before.  I like to think it would be different if it happened again.

 

Anyway, we've got a huge game on Sunday that nobody seems to be giving a f**k about going by the match thread, and instead everyone is posting here going on about how badly the club is run.  Is this not exactly what Brown's interview is being criticised for; wallowing in negativity when we should be trying to get a bit of a buzz going and more Saints fans along on Sunday?

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4 minutes ago, PauloPerth said:

Anyway, we've got a huge game on Sunday that nobody seems to be giving a f**k about going by the match thread, and instead everyone is posting here going on about how badly the club is run.  Is this not exactly what Brown's interview is being criticised for; wallowing in negativity when we should be trying to get a bit of a buzz going and more Saints fans along on Sunday?

And what's caused that?

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Surely it's no surprise there's been a negative response from our support after that badly time interview last Sunday? For the first time in a year, more even, I'm actually looking forward to going to St Johnstone games. We have a good young squad, full of our own youth products and the best manager we've ever had in our history. Pretty much everyone you'd be worried about losing is tied down on a long term contract and the football on display every week is full of energy, tempo and is easy on the eye.

Why the chairman chose now to come out with that interview is completely beyond me. The team have fallen below budget expectations of top 6 (still possible but improbable) and a cup run (we're literally 2 games away from a final and have just drawn the biggest cash cow in Scottish football). He could have said all of this at the same time as being positive about the team/squad/management rather than going for a scorched earth approach and completely demoralising a support base who were finally right behind the team.

Did anyone honestly expect that we'd maintain the budget as it is right now in the summer? He could've gotten away with letting the high earners who aren't involved go and replacing them with much cheaper, younger and more hungry players and not saying anything at all. Given the success of the side since October, everyone I'm sure would be right up for more of these kinds of guys coming into the club.

 

Edited by Kyle
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The summer of 2014 was the one where the manager wasn't allowed to sign any additional players until after we sold Stevie May. An extra 5,000 (or even 1,000) season tickets probably means that we either extend May's contract quicker or we are able to sign players who are better than Brian Graham, Simon Lappin and Adam Morgan who were the best of what was left when we were actually able to enter the transfer market in mid-August. Still, we finished 4th that season even though it was a pretty awful watch for the vast majority of the time. I don't think we scored more than 2 goals in any single game and the most goals we had in any of our games was 3. The first game of the next season we lost 4-3 away at Hearts, so both those ducks were broken immediately the following season. [emoji38] 
It's all academic anyway - we'll never know how much of an affect the delay in season tickets being available that summer had on the final numbers sold. That was one of a number of things that was frustrating that summer though, David Goodwillie training with us for a couple of weeks whilst he waited on the chairman sanctioning his signing, only for Aberdeen to nab him away being another example.
 
Do you honestly believe that we could have sold an extra 1000 season tickets though? RandomGuy also mentioned 1000 in one of his posts. That would be an increase of 60-70%. I don't think that's anywhere near realistic.
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Surely it's no surprise there's been a negative response from our support after that badly time interview last Sunday? For the first time in a year, more even, I'm actually looking forward to going to St Johnstone games. We have a good young squad, full of our own youth products and the best manager we've ever had in our history. Pretty much everyone you'd be worried about losing is tied down on a long term contract and the football on display every week is full of energy, tempo and is easy on the eye.
Why the chairman chose now to come out with that interview is completely beyond me. The team have fallen below budget expectations of top 6 (still possible but improbable) and a cup run (we're literally 2 games away from a final and have just drawn the biggest cash cow in Scottish football). He could have said all of this at the same time as being positive about the team/squad/management rather than going for a scorched earth approach and completely demoralising a support base who were finally right behind the team.
Did anyone honestly expect that we'd maintain the budget as it is right now in the summer? He could've gotten away with letting the high earners who aren't involved go and replacing them with much cheaper, younger and more hungry players and not saying anything at all. Given the success of the side since October, everyone I'm sure would be right up for more of these kinds of guys coming into the club.
 
I agree that the timing and content of his interview is awful. That doesn't mean that everything the Browns do and have done is bad
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40 minutes ago, The Marly said:

Do you honestly believe that we could have sold an extra 1000 season tickets though? RandomGuy also mentioned 1000 in one of his posts. That would be an increase of 60-70%. I don't think that's anywhere near realistic.

Geoff Brown says we dont even have 1500 season ticket holders. Do you think 2500 season ticket holders is a pipe dream?

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3 hours ago, sergie's no1 fan said:

In my opinion these big cup final crowds are filled with your local Old Firm fans clinging on for a bit of glory and will never buy a ST anyway/friends and family members who never go to games and don't have any appetite to return until the next cup final/general hangers on. Add in your hardcore fans/day trippers/fans who have moved all over the world and you get your 15,000.

Thanks for clearing that up for us.

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28 minutes ago, The Marly said:

Do you honestly believe that we could have sold an extra 1000 season tickets though? RandomGuy also mentioned 1000 in one of his posts. That would be an increase of 60-70%. I don't think that's anywhere near realistic.

Don't you wonder where all these people came from though?? And where they've gone? 

Surely the club should have been better placed to do something to attract just some of them to become regulars/season ticket holders. Alas, it doesn't look like they did. Now it's too late. Until we win it again ;) 

 

 

 

:eusa_pray:

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50 minutes ago, The Marly said:
4 hours ago, Kyle said:
 

Do you honestly believe that we could have sold an extra 1000 season tickets though? RandomGuy also mentioned 1000 in one of his posts. That would be an increase of 60-70%. I don't think that's anywhere near realistic.

I honestly have no idea but I do think we would've sold some more if we'd been better prepared. It was just something we hadn't experienced for and we weren't prepared for the aftermath. The staff at the club did an incredible job with the logistical stuff before the final and I'm sure they were working tonnes of extra hours in the build up to the final so maybe it was unavoidable but it still sticks in the craw when we get interviews like the one given out on Sunday. It's the best example of the club dropping the ball in my opinion

48 minutes ago, The Marly said:
1 hour ago, Kyle said:
 

I agree that the timing and content of his interview is awful. That doesn't mean that everything the Browns do and have done is bad

Absolutely not - I completely agree. They've done an amazing job over 34 years. I haven't known any other owners in my lifetime and I hope they're about in some capacity or other for many years to come yet.

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4 minutes ago, The Marly said:

Possibly. It's certainly not something that's going to be achieved as easily as you think.

I never said it would? I just said it would make a huge difference.

Does anyone know how many we sell, season by season, over the past decade?

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Absolutely not - I completely agree. They've done an amazing job over 34 years. I haven't known any other owners in my lifetime and I hope they're about in some capacity or other for many years to come yet.
That's a massive part of it, we had no experience of the situation and were probably caught on the hop. Opportunities were probably missed and mistakes made which is a real shame.For people to still be banging on about it six years later is getting boring though.
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It's still relevant to the interview he gave though, whether it's 6 years ago or 30 odd years ago. I tend to think with a bit more effort and engagement that summer a difference would have made. Not just on ST sales as I've said before the likely additional take up would probably have been fairly minimal - but even an additional 100-200 ST holders could be the difference between maybe getting a certain player or otherwise. They should have set up camp somewhere in the middle of town in the weeks after it, pushed hard for ST sales, merchandise sales, lotto etc etc. It all makes a difference.

We'll never know for sure, but it was an opportunity missed. One of a few unfortunately.

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1 hour ago, The Marly said:
3 hours ago, Kyle said:
Absolutely not - I completely agree. They've done an amazing job over 34 years. I haven't known any other owners in my lifetime and I hope they're about in some capacity or other for many years to come yet.

That's a massive part of it, we had no experience of the situation and were probably caught on the hop. Opportunities were probably missed and mistakes made which is a real shame.For people to still be banging on about it six years later is getting boring though.

Geoff brought up a share issue from 34 years ago as a reason not to explore fan ownership further in fairness. It's all as relevant as each other.

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13 minutes ago, Kyle said:

Geoff brought up a share issue from 34 years ago as a reason not to explore fan ownership further in fairness. It's all as relevant as each other.

That's a dreadful reason though. That share issue took place  at a time (1985 or 1986)  when it wasn't clear that Saints were a going concern – the share issue basically was to keep the club alive – when football was in the doldrums, when people didn't particularly trust Geoff Brown and at a time when private share ownership was unusual. A share issue nowadays would likely be much more popular for any number of reasons (for a start it would be far much easier to manage and invest in, and the club would have access to a much wider international support base).

I suspect Geoff just doesn't fancy it. He could easily dilute his own shareholding – I'm sure there would be interest among Saints' support – but he's done the opposite over the years: buying back small tranches from supporters who invested in that 1980s share issue.

(Not that want fan ownership. I'd rather have the Browns in charge. They may be negative, but they're competent.)

Edited by Mr Heliums
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