MikeySmall
Well-known member
Thats crap. My missus works for a school hastings way and both Gully and Marcus Painter have been there in the last 3 months.
In terms of shirts, I see far more people wearing Brighton shirts than I do any other team
My 15 year old lad goes to school in Shoreham.
He has always been the only Albion fan in his class & indeed to his knowledge his year! Most of his friends say and who else do you support & cannot understand that he doesn't support anyone else than Brighton.
Finally, with our success some other kids are watching the Albion whilst still supporting other clubs.
What the Albion are very poor at is going into schools, handing out programmes, goodies, tickets etc. They certainly have not done this in Shoreham nor I suspect anywhere else! Its all well & good having sessions for the kids in the community, however, these are aimed at kids who want to play football, not just to watch the team!
My 15 year old lad goes to school in Shoreham.
He has always been the only Albion fan in his class & indeed to his knowledge his year! Most of his friends say and who else do you support & cannot understand that he doesn't support anyone else than Brighton.
Finally, with our success some other kids are watching the Albion whilst still supporting other clubs.
What the Albion are very poor at is going into schools, handing out programmes, goodies, tickets etc. They certainly have not done this in Shoreham nor I suspect anywhere else! Its all well & good having sessions for the kids in the community, however, these are aimed at kids who want to play football, not just to watch the team!
My 15 year old lad goes to school in Shoreham.
He has always been the only Albion fan in his class & indeed to his knowledge his year! Most of his friends say and who else do you support & cannot understand that he doesn't support anyone else than Brighton.
Finally, with our success some other kids are watching the Albion whilst still supporting other clubs.
What the Albion are very poor at is going into schools, handing out programmes, goodies, tickets etc. They certainly have not done this in Shoreham nor I suspect anywhere else! Its all well & good having sessions for the kids in the community, however, these are aimed at kids who want to play football, not just to watch the team!
Absolute twaddle. The programme for the last game showed a picture of Elliott Bennett in a classroom in Southwick where he goes very regularly to help out. THe Albion players go to schools in all the major Sussex towns to help out. It's been happening for a few years now. My son's school in Brighton has had Tommy Elphick, Gary Dicker and now Glenn Murray there. The Albion run a very successful schools programme and tied in with the free tickets to schools, the Family Stand has rarely been under 90% full in the last year. Bear in mind that these are all primary schools. Get 'em young and they'll be hooked for life.
These conversions from other teams do not happen overnight but they are happening. In my son's school Albion paraphernalia being worn is getting more common and the number of kids that describe Brighton as their team is increasing. In my son's class it has gone from 2 (Him and another boy) to now 9 of them.
And speaking anecdotely I think I've seen a massive increase in people (kids especially) wearing Albion gear around Sussex. Whereas before it was a rarity to see it in Churchill Square on a weekend you will more likely than not spot a fair few Albion hats, scarves and tops worn.
The club have also invested massively in Gully's Gang. It's free and they have 12,000 members that they send free goodie bags and stuff to regularly. Every 7 year old in the gang gets a free kit. That's an investment that will really pay dividends in 15 or 20 years.
Thinking back to my school days, which weren't as long ago as some of yours may have been, Albion were probably the 6th or 7th best supported club - I'm not talking about match goers because they probably would've been 1st or 2nd in that respect - but who people considered themselves fans of, which in my book is pretty bad in any one club city/county.
Spot on apart from not Elliot!
Hence why I'm asking on here TRHK.
What the Albion are very poor at is going into schools, handing out programmes, goodies, tickets etc. They certainly have not done this in Shoreham nor I suspect anywhere else! Its all well & good having sessions for the kids in the community, however, these are aimed at kids who want to play football, not just to watch the team!
My 15 year old lad goes to school in Shoreham.
He has always been the only Albion fan in his class & indeed to his knowledge his year! Most of his friends say and who else do you support & cannot understand that he doesn't support anyone else than Brighton.
Finally, with our success some other kids are watching the Albion whilst still supporting other clubs.
What the Albion are very poor at is going into schools, handing out programmes, goodies, tickets etc. They certainly have not done this in Shoreham nor I suspect anywhere else! Its all well & good having sessions for the kids in the community, however, these are aimed at kids who want to play football, not just to watch the team!