Attendances; why do you care?

[Squirrelhumper]

8 minutes ago, Crawford Bridge said:

It must be embarrassing to be the third biggest support in your own one club town. Thank f**k I'm not from the west of Scotland.

2nd biggest in a 4 club city any better?

 

[BoydiesBelly]

11 minutes ago, Crawford Bridge said:

It must be embarrassing to be the third biggest support in your own one club town. Thank f**k I'm not from the west of Scotland.

Nah, it just makes it all the sweeter when you beat one of them and see their 'travelling' fans slink off to houses in your area. 

[Crawford Bridge]

Had a feeling Killie fans would bite first.

To be fair to BoydiesBelly, aye, I can see the appeal in that.

[coprolite]

1 hour ago, Sergeant Wilson said:

Crowds are a fair indicator of income and consequently, commercial potential. 

If clubs with small supports overcome this and play at a high level it presents the question, where is the money coming from to maintain this? It can't all be attributable to "good management".

It's because we're all millionaires, what with the oil and being the centre of the global rowie industry.

[Squirrelhumper]

16 minutes ago, BoydiesBelly said:

Nah, it just makes it all the sweeter when you beat one of them and see their 'travelling' fans slink off to houses in your area. 

It's even better when you see the c***s in your local after the game.

[Squirrelhumper]

6 minutes ago, coprolite said:

It's because we're all millionaires, what with the oil and being the centre of the global rowie industry.

What the f**k is a rowie?

[Aim Here]

9 minutes ago, Squirrelhumper said:

What the f**k is a rowie?

A rowie, or buttery, is a glorious piece of Doric cuisine. The closest equivalent I can think of is a croissant, being a sort of funny-shaped folded-up bread roll thing, except that it's harder and heavier, and, being Scottish, about half a pound of butter goes into the making of each one. When they come out of the toaster, the fat content ensures that they're so hot that butter audibly sizzles when you try spreading it, but they soften up marvellously when in there, and they are rather good.

They're rare enough here in Edinburgh and probably completely unavailable in Ayrshire. It's probably for the best, for the sake of everyone's arteries. Medical advice is to not eat more than about one of them in an average calendar year.

 

[Guest JTS98]

Scottish football is in a funny place with crowds.

People often seem to aim very high when it comes to attendances. For example, how many people should second-tier clubs (Hearts, Aberdeen, Hibs) be able to attract in a country of five million with two hugely successful clubs within pretty easy travelling distance of most of the country? We're talking about clubs that almost never win anything in a low-profile league with poor resources. What do we expect? I think these clubs do not too badly in the circumstances.

It's ever harder for smaller clubs from places like Motherwell, Kilmarnock etc to attract fans considering that in many countries towns like theirs would essentially be considered to be part of Glasgow. Their fanbases just get hoovered up.

I think one thing which has caused us problems in terms of image over the years (I mean image internally, nobody outside Scotland could give a monkey's either way) is that we rarely get a semi-final line-up containing four of our 'big' teams for either competition. Hearts and Aberdeen are probably the two 'biggest' clubs outwith the Old Firm, yet we've met twice at Hampden in the last 32 years, and not at all for 22 years. Likewise, Hearts and Hibs have only met twice at Hampden in that period. We've had Aberdeen against Hibs recently, and that pulled in over 30,000. We were penalty kicks away from a Hearts v Aberdeen League Cup final in 2013, that would have been a great occasion.

But these meetings in semi-finals or finals between our second-tier clubs are very rare. That means that usually our semi-finals or finals contain one of the smaller clubs, who haven't  a hope of selling a 50/50 allocation at Hampden and it leads to small crowds, swathes of empty seats, and gnashing of teeth. Dundee v Gretna, anyone?

I'm not saying it's a bad thing when small clubs are successful. I believe quite the opposite. But I think it would be good for Scottish football if our 'bigger' clubs other than Rangers and Celtic played each other in big games a bit more often than they have in recent years.

[BoydiesBelly]

9 minutes ago, Aim Here said:

A rowie, or buttery, is a glorious piece of Doric cuisine. The closest equivalent I can think of is a croissant, being a sort of funny-shaped folded-up bread roll thing, except that it's harder and heavier, and, being Scottish, about half a pound of butter goes into the making of each one. When they come out of the toaster, the fat content ensures that they're so hot that butter audibly sizzles when you try spreading it, but they soften up marvellously when in there, and they are rather good.

They're rare enough here in Edinburgh and probably completely unavailable in Ayrshire. It's probably for the best, for the sake of everyone's arteries. Medical advice is to not eat more than about one of them in an average calendar year.

 

Got one from Thaines after a messy night out a number of years back. Certainly soaked up the alcohol.

[Monkey Tennis]

1 hour ago, JTS98 said:

Scottish football is in a funny place with crowds.

People often seem to aim very high when it comes to attendances. For example, how many people should second-tier clubs (Hearts, Aberdeen, Hibs) be able to attract in a country of five million with two hugely successful clubs within pretty easy travelling distance of most of the country? We're talking about clubs that almost never win anything in a low-profile league with poor resources. What do we expect? I think these clubs do not too badly in the circumstances.

It's ever harder for smaller clubs from places like Motherwell, Kilmarnock etc to attract fans considering that in many countries towns like theirs would essentially be considered to be part of Glasgow. Their fanbases just get hoovered up.

I think one thing which has caused us problems in terms of image over the years (I mean image internally, nobody outside Scotland could give a monkey's either way) is that we rarely get a semi-final line-up containing four of our 'big' teams for either competition. Hearts and Aberdeen are probably the two 'biggest' clubs outwith the Old Firm, yet we've met twice at Hampden in the last 32 years, and not at all for 22 years. Likewise, Hearts and Hibs have only met twice at Hampden in that period. We've had Aberdeen against Hibs recently, and that pulled in over 30,000. We were penalty kicks away from a Hearts v Aberdeen League Cup final in 2013, that would have been a great occasion.

But these meetings in semi-finals or finals between our second-tier clubs are very rare. That means that usually our semi-finals or finals contain one of the smaller clubs, who haven't  a hope of selling a 50/50 allocation at Hampden and it leads to small crowds, swathes of empty seats, and gnashing of teeth. Dundee v Gretna, anyone?

I'm not saying it's a bad thing when small clubs are successful. I believe quite the opposite. But I think it would be good for Scottish football if our 'bigger' clubs other than Rangers and Celtic played each other in big games a bit more often than they have in recent years.

A more sensible choice of semi final venue would cure the 'ill' you've identified, such as it is.

[Guest JTS98]

2 minutes ago, Monkey Tennis said:

A more sensible choice of semi final venue would cure the 'ill' you've identified, such as it is.

That's true. But it's not just about the 'ill', it's about the lack of the positive, if you see what I mean.

A full Hampden for the Hearts - Hibs cup final was a strong look for our game. Internally, even. It was good to see a full 50/50 Hampden outwith the Old Firm. It would be good to have more days like that.

I've got nothing against smaller teams winning. It's not like Hearts are a trophy machine in a position to patronise.

[RandomGuy.]

3 hours ago, accies1874 said:

Away games with fewer than 100 folk are miles better than away games with a (relatively) decent number.

 

2 hours ago, Green Day said:

Dont know why, but that put me in mind of good old Terry Butchers classic "losing an early goal takes away the fear of losing an early goal" as he took us toward that playoff with you boys 

He's not wrong. The atmosphere at the Scottish Cup Semi, when we had 2000 if you were lucky, was far, far better than the Final when we had 15000. 

[Guest JTS98]

Just now, ali_91 said:

We’ve had 2 non OF Scottish Cup finals since then.

Dundee United 0-2 St Johnstone 47,000

Falkirk1-2 Inverness 37,000. 

Hardly shite crowds, and no Billy Boys being belted from the stands. Much better image for our game. 

I think you're getting the wrong end of the stick.

I'm not questioning anybody's right to be in the cup final, or decrying anybody's success.

I'm just saying that it's a shame that our bigger clubs hardly ever meet each other in cup semi-finals or finals as it would result in big crowds and lots of interest.

37,000 is a good crowd, but it's also 15,000 empty seats for a Cup Final. I enjoyed that final and was glad to see it, but it would be good to see more 50,000+ finals (like 2012) that don't involve the Old Firm. For that, we're really looking at Hearts, Hibs, Aberdeen, Dundee United. I don't mean every year, it would just be nice to see it happen more often.

[Guest JTS98]

Just now, ali_91 said:

Agree that the more non Old Firm finals the better, but apart from that you’re havering a load of shite. 

Think you're chip-on-the-shouldering this a bit, myself.

Carry on.

[RandomGuy.]

5 minutes ago, ali_91 said:

That’s not what he’s saying though, he’s saying under 100 is better than high hundreds, which is obviously nonsense. Cup Finals are obviously a misnomer because then you have everyone with a connection to the club, but run of the mill league games are always much more fun, at the game at least, in a bigger away support. 

I dunno, it depends entirely on the fans who go and the stadium you're in.

[gannonball]

Butteries are shite. I would say they taste meh but given how bad they are for you they should taste a hole lot better

[cowboy]

6 hours ago, DA Baracus said:

Let's be clear, this is about crowdwanking and trying to use the size of a club's support to 'get one over' opposition fans, as well as the seeming obsession some folk on here have over the issue. At times it seems like a wind up, but other times it seems like it's quite serious indeed.

I'm all for the signing of 'what a shitty home support' at games, but on here folk go mental over attendances. Also folk in the media seem to be obsessed about it, especially the fannies on Sportsound, and especially Willie Miller who thinks league membership should be decided on crowd size alone.

So why do you (and you know who you are) care so much about crowd sizes? Why do you give a shit what Hamilton get? Why do you care that one season your club had a couple hundred more on the average attendance than another club? Why do you do research to try and prove that historically your club had more fans going to games than another club?

Etc.

you could also ask why clubs like Dunfermline care enough to fake their attendance figures. I was watching a pars match on alba the other week, attendance was tiny, looked at the match report and it said 4700. you'd need to be cross eyed and counted everyone twice to see 4700 there. are they just trying to pretend they're bigger than Falkirk? same with the old firm, we've all been to their stadiums, seen swathes of empty seats and then read a near capacity attendance

[Juantwothree]

Surprised by the lack of dabs posted here, they love a good crowdwank 

[Monkey Tennis]

1 hour ago, JTS98 said:

I think you're getting the wrong end of the stick.

I'm not questioning anybody's right to be in the cup final, or decrying anybody's success.

I'm just saying that it's a shame that our bigger clubs hardly ever meet each other in cup semi-finals or finals as it would result in big crowds and lots of interest.

37,000 is a good crowd, but it's also 15,000 empty seats for a Cup Final. I enjoyed that final and was glad to see it, but it would be good to see more 50,000+ finals (like 2012) that don't involve the Old Firm. For that, we're really looking at Hearts, Hibs, Aberdeen, Dundee United. I don't mean every year, it would just be nice to see it happen more often.

Forgive me, but this sounds alarmingly Willie Milleresque.

You've already said (entirely correctly) that in terms of image, nothing external and largely imaginary, matters.  Surely then we want clubs to win things on merit and should absolutely welcome when smaller clubs go far in our tournaments.  

I certainly find it far more interesting when clubs get their names on trophies for the first time in decades or even ever.  If others worry that it might look a bit crap, I'll live with it - I genuinely don't care.

[Guest JTS98]

1 minute ago, Monkey Tennis said:

Forgive me, but this sounds alarmingly Willie Milleresque.

You've already said (entirely correctly) that in terms of image, nothing external and largely imaginary, matters.  Surely then we want clubs to win things on merit and should absolutely welcome when smaller clubs go far in our tournaments.  

I certainly find it far more interesting when clubs get their names on trophies for the first time in decades or even ever.  If others worry that it might look a bit crap, I'll live with it - I genuinely don't care.

I've never said anything to hint that I disagree with this. People seem to automatically assuming that I'm Willie Miller, when all I'm saying is that it's a shame that Scotland doesn't get many high profile cup semis and finals.

We've had plenty of variety of cup winners recently, which is a good thing. The second-tier of well-supported clubs in Scotland aren't exactly hoarding trophies, and I think what we've missed over the years is a few more cup semis and finals between them.

I don't see what is objectionable about that. I think 52,000 at Hampden with a 50/50 split for a cup final without the old firm would be great. We've only had that once that I can recall, in 2012.  And I think that was a good thing for Scottish football in general. The interest in that final was huge. I'd like more like it. I don't see how this makes me Willie Miller.

You seem to think I'm somehow advocating giving teams a bye to the semis or something.