] I have already discussed this with Frank.
]
] We will be starting up a 'Socceroo Supporters' Club' which, inter
] alia, will
] mean we can block off some seats in return for VOCAL supporters for the
] Australian team. You may have to audition to be a member ... :) (just a
] joke).
]
] Once the dust is settled on these games, it will be within my capacity to
] get seats put aside for this.
]
] There are other plans too related to the SSC, but we'll take it a bit
] softly-softly otherwise the marketing people will get hold of it
] and take it
] (probably) in an inaccurate direction.
]
] Bonnie
Bonnie this would be a good start.It happened officially (via SBS) about 10 years ago at the SFS where we could book the bay 23 section. Eventually it collapsed but with unnumbered seats the trend was set and for 10 years bay 23 was the place to be. In that sized stadium, with the accoustics, you only needed 100-200 core supporters singing - this encouraged the remainder to join in.
Obviously marketing, contracts with stadia, economies of scale are all issues that will dictate where games are played. But I am still confused by the mathematics all of the promoters are applying. IMG, as with the other promoters, still don't seem to realise that charging less per ticket, but selling more tickets, is a better bet than charging a bucketload and selling only half the number. Or am I too simple?
I am a member of Stadium Australia and therefore get a "free" ticket for all events there (after membership). But for soccer I would rather be back in the good ol' days behind the goal at the SFS, except for the big WC qualifier where an 80,000+ crowd could be expected.
As an interesting comparison, my membership allows me to take paid visitors. The guest tickets for the Bledisloe Cup and the NRL Grand Final were $80, the Brazil game $120 and Man Utd $105. Did the promotors of the soccer events really think their events were of greater worth to Joe Public?
Aiming for the top (ie Brazil), but getting Brazil Mark II, with no atmosphere, in my view is less soul inspiring than getting a cracking no-love-lost game against NZ in front of 20,000, in an appropriate stadium.
What else can we do? Well, the real problem is the lack of truly competitive games, a point we have to concede to that armhole Chesterton. We tried to get into Asia, to allow regular local Asian competition, but when David Hill took it to the FIFA vote, Dempsey had it gerrymandered and defeated, if I recall correctly. So here we are, 12,000 miles from the action, no competition 3.8 years out of 4, etc etc etc (oh God, don't start me off....)
A currently depressed Mark Bowman
written by Mark Bowman