Pay what you want for a football match. Why not?
In a month when the cost of football has been high on the agenda of fans with Liverpool fans voting to walk out of a game in protest against a potential £77 ticket cost for next season, and some championship clubs such as Sheffield Wednesday charging away fans £36, it is good to see a non league initiative to pay what you want. Building a fan base takes time but one has to start somewhere and Didcot Town are starting this saturday.
Empty Grounds. Walton and Hersham
Football is an exciting sport generally and live matches bear no comparison with sanitised TV games. Many fans would consider going to games weekly but there is little incentive or collaboration between teams to make this happen. A few non league teams in recent years have given discounted entry to season ticket holders of league clubs, Hampton and Richmond are one example.
Looking at some of the crowds in the lower echelons of the Ryman league for example. On March 8th at a midweek game Haringey Borough attracted a crowd of 22 which was lower than their crowd of 35 last saturday, and last saturday in Ryman North 6 of the 8 games with reported crowds had under 100 spectators. In Ryman South a few crowds were also fairly dire with Chipstead attracting 48 spectators and a similar number at Molesey.
There is clearly room to increase the fan base at many of these clubs. Didcot v Bashley deserves a decent crowd.
Who is at fault here? Should Dean Smith be sacked already? There is a case for the defence that he only has the players he has. There is a better case for the prosecution that he is neither trying to change things with the players he has, for example bring in youngsters like Jan Halldack, or change the system if his players cannot perform in this system. He also appears unable to motivate his side to perform the kind of work rate that all successful sides do and which we were doing under Lee Carsley. And this is the man in indictment against him. Many of these players were involved in Brentford wins last autumn. The role of the co-directors needs also some discussion. What we can say with certainty is that they are not visible. That is not always a crime and in many cases a cloak of invisibility is a good thing, however when things are going horrifically wrong then some explanation is needed. At the very least a Fans Forum seems a sensible option to at least explain the direction of the club in the next 6 months. Most of the players brought in last summer are not good enough and lack basic technique. My own view is that even given time and opportunity , Hoffmann, Vibe, Djuricin, Kerschbaumer and Gogia, will not become championship standard. The jury is also out on Ryan Woods who increasingly is muscled off the ball and needs a strategy to become more involved in the game. Increasingly Marco Djuricin is looking out of his depth and I remain underwhelmed by his goal scoring rate and his work rate.
chris1957
Arcticterntalk.org 