Official Plea To Stay-Away Fans

[athleticus]

Rubicon, crossing of; point of no return, reached; tipping point: For the club, all of those things now lie firmly in the past.

 

What do people think Barry Owen's statement the other night was all about?

I see your back. Ah well thought it was too good to be true.

[stebuzz]

why drop the "entertaining" tag?

latics are in the entertainment industry.if people don't think its entertaining (and therefore not value for money)they WON'T turn up!

latics are competing against every form of entertainment and leisure in the world today...tv,cinema,pubs,gigs,etc etc.

if they aren't providing value for money to the potential customer,they will not spend their money there.

spot on. and when you think its what 7 quid to get in the pictures, why would anyone pay 20 quid to sit on a plastic seat in the cold to watch paint dry.

[Yard Dog]

He'll be outed in no time. I grantee it.....

 

Im pritty sure of that

[GeorgeHarveyBone]

I see your back. Ah well thought it was too good to be true.

 

 

You can only see the backs of the people who are sitting right where you are now, my dear fellow.

 

 

[spadam]

you can't really compare football to other businesses. As a football club will always have supports. No matter how bad they are playing. If a business produces rubbish no one will buy it.

Edited January 30, 2010 by spadam

[johnny punkster]

you can't really compare football to other businesses. As a football club will always have supports. No matter how bad they are playing. If a business produces rubbish no one will buy it.

 

and guess what...you just contradicted your own theory.

[BeckfordsLeftFoot]

If a bucket company produced buckets with holes in, nobody would buy the buckets.

[peterjo]

The football club we consider to be ours and the other 71 Football League clubs are different from other forms of entertainment. The clubs are owned and managed by people who come and go, but they only survive on the loyalty of their supporters and the financial assistance from their owners. Success on the pitch comes to only about 11 of the 72 clubs each season and the supporters of the unsuccessful clubs are expected to continue to show their loyalty by putting money in their clubs in the form of STs, match tickets, lottery, merchandise, text services, etc.

 

Yes they are expected to keep on doing it, even when there is little or no prospect of success, because of that loyalty. Not like aloyalty to a supermarket but loyalty that makes being a football supporter different from any other pastime/hobby/recreation/activity.

 

When I first started watching Latics with my Dad, football clubs offered a sense of respite from hard manual labour and a collective celebration of their town. Blokes went straight from work and they all wore flat caps. Women didn't go.

 

Social change is taking place faster than ever these days, but the strong connections football clubs still provide - the ways they offer a sense of rootedness and locality, even for exiles - is important for a lot of supporters who have lost the sort of connections to place provided by their work.

 

Football clubs offer a collective and symbolic focus for a sense of belonging and pride in a local community. Some people have even described following football clubs as a neo-religious form of devotion. I’ve heard Joe Royle and Stitch described as ‘God’ and there is even a thread on here titled 'Diego Cervero = God' (not started by me!).

 

Football offers an opportunity to socialise and share a camaraderie with like-minded people, and also let off steam and release stress which has built up between matches. It is also a good place for people to share adult leisure time with their children.

 

We also know that some supporters may over-identify with their clubs, and they may see clubs as an extension of their self and invest too much, emotionally, in their teams. This can produce negative effects, including depressive behaviour or even violence. Suppoters can also become involved in rather 'addictive' behaviour in relation to their clubs - I plead guilty as charged re OWTB. For some of these supporters, defeat is probably felt too hard, and victory is almost too much of a 'high'. These are the real 'fanatics'. For some of these fans there might be a refusal to accept the role of mere 'supporter' and insist on fighting for the honour of the community, or the club, which they support.

 

Naturally Clubs frown on supporters going as far as the latter, but they want their supporters to continue showing their loyalty in the form of putting money into their Club’s coffers, and supporters can only hope that the money is not wasted.

 

In the case of Latics, it is obvious that there is a shortfall between income and expenditure which, if not met by supporters, has to be met by the owners, whether or not they are seen by supporters to be the right people at the present time.

 

The people who possess the power to keep Latics alive and help it to grow are those who have stoppoed going to BP and/or stopped putting money into their Club. All adults go through phases in their life when income has to be spent on more important things than Latics, but those with income to spare are the ones to which the plea is directed. The Club has a tough job on its hands to convince enough people that the loyalty they once showed in the form of BP attendance can make a difference to the Club’s short-term survival and its long-term future.

 

The Club is not alone in this predicament but we can take solace from the fact that the owners are not following the route marked 'Administration/liquidation'.

 

blimey !! you brainy bugger !!!

 

what a dark horse !!!

 

given as a compliment of course !!