North corners

[Guy Fawkes]

Which they share with Villa, Birmingham, West Brom and Walsall, plus maybe even a few Coventry/Forest/Leicester fans.

We have NO clubs anywhere near us. We have the bigger/better catchment area in my opinion.

Your wrong,we have hardly any competition and south kent is also in our catchment area like south surrey.Massive catchment area which is better than the birmingham area,loads of clubs round there and lots more ethnics that are not that common at footy matches.

Have you both discounted clubs from London? Arsenal, Chelsea, Tottenham, Fulham, QPR and all the other clubs in the area which will attract football spectators away from Sussex to watch a game?

It is very easy to travel there for games by train and they have an established fan base which will include people from Sussex (long term supporters or those who we lost during the bad old days) - we are trying to build up our fan base again after years of financial difficulties and playing in a run down Goldstone Ground, Gillingham and then Withdean but fan loyalty may mean we are unable to convert them.

 

[Guy Fawkes]

We're getting close to 30k already without playing any big games,wait til the 2nd half of the season when we chase the playoffs and when we play palace etc,most crowds are smaller this time of the year and we're averaging 25k already.

If we get to the prem 40k would be spot on

How much of that is the new ground effect though? How long until some fans start to get bored watching live games every time and start to drift away when the novelty wears off?

Also how many teams get to the Premiership, have large crowds for a season or two and then find they drop because the novelty has worn off and the high prices puts them off or simply the excitement win winning lots of games has gone becasue its a struggle every season to win games to stay up.

Last time we were promoted to the top flight, didn't our average gate fall?

 

[seagullsovergrimsby]

30k is about the right size

 

[B.W.]

Chichester is Pompey and always will be.

Are you sure? Will Pompey even exist much longer?

 

[TheBigUnit]

Chichester is Pompey and always will be.

Are you sure? Will Pompey even exist much longer?

..it is still GOSBTS!

 

[severnside gull]

Apart from a dozen or so singles which are staff returns it has.

Hmmm..........500 or more available for Saturday and after Ipswich who I expect to have an even lower following our average will probably fall. It really isn't a criticism but I think we are getting a bit carried away. Our fan numbers are extremely bouyant but away fan numbers at the Amex are less so and probably reflect the general picture more accurately. Great to get close to a full house every week but expecting to maintain numbers is going to be challenging. Let's just enjoy that we are currently punching above our weight. Stepping up still further? Not in the forseeable future for me at least.

 

[Questions]

Are you sure? Will Pompey even exist much longer?

If Pompey went then maybe we would attract youngsters who want to watch football and have no allegiance but old Pompey fans would never come here. Would you have gone to them if we went tits up in the 90s ? Anyway they would reform and make their way back somehow. Far too big a city not to have a football team.

 

[B.W.]

i would MUCH prefer us to have a stadium that was always FULL at 30k, than having swathes of atmosphere-killing empty seats if we had 35k in a 40k seater. IF we ever hit a bad run and get relegated into league one, having a 40k stadium will look very silly indeed.

Tony and Paul Barber may disagree with you; we need to maximise our revenue streams, this means that if demand means we can sell 35k tickets, we should provide the opportunity to meet that demand.

 

[B.W.]

It's a very valid point. What if we don't get promoted, Gus fucks off, we get relegated and find ourselves back in Lg1 struggling to come back up? Last time around (under McGhee) the fans got bored very quickly and this was the really shit crowds at Withdean rival fans love to dig us about....... 30 thousand seater gonna look pretty daft 1/3 full

Ever the optimist...

 

[Puppet Master]

Ever the optimist...

But it could happen, no?

 

[B.W.]

Have you both discounted clubs from London? Arsenal, Chelsea, Tottenham, Fulham, QPR and all the other clubs in the area which will attract football spectators away from Sussex to watch a game?

It is very easy to travel there for games by train and they have an established fan base which will include people from Sussex (long term supporters or those who we lost during the bad old days) - we are trying to build up our fan base again after years of financial difficulties and playing in a run down Goldstone Ground, Gillingham and then Withdean but fan loyalty may mean we are unable to convert them.

I would imagine that is a relatively small group / mainly confined to the north of our catchment area...

 

[B.W.]

How much of that is the new ground effect though? How long until some fans start to get bored watching live games every time and start to drift away when the novelty wears off?

Also how many teams get to the Premiership, have large crowds for a season or two and then find they drop because the novelty has worn off and the high prices puts them off or simply the excitement win winning lots of games has gone becasue its a struggle every season to win games to stay up.

Last time we were promoted to the top flight, didn't our average gate fall?

Not sure about the last point - can't remember the stats, but I agree with most of that...

 

[B.W.]

Hmmm..........500 or more available for Saturday and after Ipswich who I expect to have an even lower following our average will probably fall. It really isn't a criticism but I think we are getting a bit carried away. Our fan numbers are extremely bouyant but away fan numbers at the Amex are less so and probably reflect the general picture more accurately. Great to get close to a full house every week but expecting to maintain numbers is going to be challenging. Let's just enjoy that we are currently punching above our weight. Stepping up still further? Not in the forseeable future for me at least.

Punching at our correct weight more like. We have been constrained by playing at the P1ssfield and Withdean for many, many years, and far too long.

 

[B.W.]

If Pompey went then maybe we would attract youngsters who want to watch football and have no allegiance but old Pompey fans would never come here. Would you have gone to them if we went tits up in the 90s ? Anyway they would reform and make their way back somehow. Far too big a city not to have a football team.

And in the meantime, they would seep fans to us.

 

[B.W.]

But it could happen, no?

Sure, but so could us playing in Europe!

 

[Puppet Master]

Sure, but so could us playing in Europe!

Best to prepare for every eventuality then, it's a funny old game as they say

 

[severnside gull]

Punching at our correct weight more like.

Wouldn't disagree with that.

 

[fire&skill]

 

[brightn'ove]

Tony and Paul Barber may disagree with you; we need to maximise our revenue streams, this means that if demand means we can sell 35k tickets, we should provide the opportunity to meet that demand.

but we would have to maintain 35k crowds for years for it to even break even with the amount it would cost to expand to that capacity.

 

[8ace]

30k stadium: full 75% of the time and 2/3rds full 25% of the time

or

40k stadium: full 25% of the time, 3/4 full 50% of the time and half full 25% of the time.

It all depends how you want to juggle these numbers, taking into account good seasons and shit seasons.
I'd rather we aimed to be closer to the former than the latter.