Where Have They Gone and...

[spanishfly]

...when will they return?

 

Lowest home attendance of the season so far yesterday. Compared to last season we are around 1300 fans down, each home game, on average.

 

That's a worrying number of missing fans almost overnight. Not sure what the solution is but BP looked quite empty yesterday and it's not good for atmosphere etc.

[LightDN123]

Prices and poor home form. Simple as that really. 
 

Win games and being at the top end of the table whilst offering a good price, they will return. 
 

Price also includes much discussed kiosk prices. 

[Guy Branston Pickle]

5 1/2 thousand at this level is still impressive, especially considering recent form. The crowds we were getting early on last season were never sustainable unless we were near/top of the league. We only averaged about 6 1/2 thousand in our last playoff season, our fanbase just isn't as bit as some people think it is

 

https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/oldham-athletic/besucherzahlenentwicklung/verein/1078

 

We're pretty much on par for most of our seasons in L1, and above our seasons in L2

Edited September 22, 2024 by Guy Branston Pickle

[latics22]

Win and they come back simple 

[GlossopLatic]

Still the biggest crowd in the national league yesterday and bigger than a few in league 2.

 

Don't worry about it too much just concentrate on winning games consistently over a long period of time and they will slowly come back.

[AndyB2]

The additional fans are there. There needs to be a buzz and sense of something happening to get the lost fans back. Frank had that effect. Now over to Micky and the players to take it on 

[daniel]

Personally doesn’t look too much difference in terms of looking at it on the eye compared to much of last season. RRE maybe looks a little bit less but I don’t believe we have 1300 less fans in compared to the 2nd half of last season…. 

[yarddog73]

30 minutes ago, daniel said:

Personally doesn’t look too much difference in terms of looking at it on the eye compared to much of last season. RRE maybe looks a little bit less but I don’t believe we have 1300 less fans in compared to the 2nd half of last season…. 

RRE is half empty compared to last season.

[daniel]

3 hours ago, yarddog73 said:

RRE is half empty compared to last season.

300-400 max. 

[Londonboy]

On 9/22/2024 at 12:29 PM, Guy Branston Pickle said:

5 1/2 thousand at this level is still impressive, especially considering recent form. The crowds we were getting early on last season were never sustainable unless we were near/top of the league. We only averaged about 6 1/2 thousand in our last playoff season, our fanbase just isn't as bit as some people think it is

 

https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/oldham-athletic/besucherzahlenentwicklung/verein/1078

 

We're pretty much on par for most of our seasons in L1, and above our seasons in L2

That's not the issue.

The issue is as correctly stated is that crowds are well down in LAST SEASON when the football was actually worse than this season and we're out of the play off positions for most of it!

It's a fair question why such a drop off and one the club should be and hopefully are addressing....

[Guy Branston Pickle]

10 minutes ago, Londonboy said:

That's not the issue.

The issue is as correctly stated is that crowds are well down in LAST SEASON when the football was actually worse than this season and we're out of the play off positions for most of it!

It's a fair question why such a drop off and one the club should be and hopefully are addressing....

It's exactly the issue. There was a post-takeover rise in attendances which continued last season when people expected us to be challenging for the title. The season turned out to be a disappointment and the football was poor so the crowds have dropped. If the team starts winning consistently, those fans will return. 

[yarddog73]

It's easy to lose fans, it's a damn site harder to get them back - unless you are regularly winning football matches.

[Londonboy]

5 hours ago, Guy Branston Pickle said:

It's exactly the issue. There was a post-takeover rise in attendances which continued last season when people expected us to be challenging for the title. The season turned out to be a disappointment and the football was poor so the crowds have dropped. If the team starts winning consistently, those fans will return. 

But this season the football IS better, we ARE challenging at the top (4 points off) and have lost only 1 in 10, so I'd expect some of the lost 1300 to be giving it another go sometime soon if this was the case.

However I'm pretty sure tonight will be our lowest league crowd whilst a NL club and we are playing the joint top of the table....

I don't know the answer but it's not because the catering is crap as someone pointed out. That's not a reason not to watch a football match... 

Maybe we should be doing more to reduce ticket prices to attract the younger fans? Didn't we hike up teen tickets last season? Can't quite remember.... 

[GlossopLatic]

18 minutes ago, Londonboy said:

But this season the football IS better, we ARE challenging at the top (4 points off) and have lost only 1 in 10, so I'd expect some of the lost 1300 to be giving it another go sometime soon if this was the case.

However I'm pretty sure tonight will be our lowest league crowd whilst a NL club and we are playing the joint top of the table....

I don't know the answer but it's not because the catering is crap as someone pointed out. That's not a reason not to watch a football match... 

Maybe we should be doing more to reduce ticket prices to attract the younger fans? Didn't we hike up teen tickets last season? Can't quite remember.... 

 

The football is better but it's only 10 games, if we keep winning the crowds will come back it might take until new year but if we keep showing good form and just take a few more chances in games then they will come back it's about building momentum something this club hasn't done for too long.

[nzlatic]

1 hour ago, Londonboy said:

But this season the football IS better, we ARE challenging at the top (4 points off) and have lost only 1 in 10, so I'd expect some of the lost 1300 to be giving it another go sometime soon if this was the case.

However I'm pretty sure tonight will be our lowest league crowd whilst a NL club and we are playing the joint top of the table....

I don't know the answer but it's not because the catering is crap as someone pointed out. That's not a reason not to watch a football match... 

Maybe we should be doing more to reduce ticket prices to attract the younger fans? Didn't we hike up teen tickets last season? Can't quite remember.... 

We've had 5 home games. 2 wins, 3 draws but haven't scored more than 1 goal in a game since the first day of the season. It'll take a long period of consistent performances and results before the crowd starts slowly going up. Even if we're competing at the top I wouldn't expect us to average much more than 6k this season. 

[Yard Dog]

Noticeably less youngsters at the games from what I can see.

 

My lads are teenagers and a lot of their mates seem to have dropped off.

[Londonboy]

7 hours ago, nzlatic said:

We've had 5 home games. 2 wins, 3 draws but haven't scored more than 1 goal in a game since the first day of the season. It'll take a long period of consistent performances and results before the crowd starts slowly going up. Even if we're competing at the top I wouldn't expect us to average much more than 6k this season. 

Don't disagreei in the main.

It's just a big drop off when you compare where we were this time last year.

Less than 5k home fans tonight

[daniel]

12 minutes ago, Londonboy said:

Don't disagreei in the main.

It's just a big drop off when you compare where we were this time last year.

Less than 5k home fans tonight

What was the attendance tonight? Missed it.

[Simpo]

2 minutes ago, daniel said:

What was the attendance tonight? Missed it.

"Today's matchday attendance is 5,034 with 77 Forest Green supporters.

 

Thank you for your support this evening."

 

Down on the last two seasons, but still the biggest ever crowd to watch a game between these two teams

[Londonboy]

12 minutes ago, Simpo said:

"Today's matchday attendance is 5,034 with 77 Forest Green supporters.

 

Thank you for your support this evening."

 

Down on the last two seasons, but still the biggest ever crowd to watch a game between these two teams

To be fair we played Maidenhead at home last season on Tuesday 3/10 and had only 5386 there so only 300 or so down on that. 

The problem is the 2 Saturdays before and after against Oxford and D and R there were over 6400 there, with jack shit away fans so it's these Saturday day trippers...over 1000 of them we have lost and need to get back into BP.

Hopefully after another win on Saturday, we can get closer to 6k for the next home game v Solihull.

[sjk2008]

Keep doing what we’re doing and they’ll come back 

[Boyyou]

17 minutes ago, sjk2008 said:

Keep doing what we’re doing and they’ll come back 

If you are POD then 2 home games in a few days is a fair old chunk. Plus some of our fans have to travel  a fair distance and midweeks aren't great. But agree, keep winning and they'll turn up.

And 5,000 for the National  League ain't bad. There's plenty of clubs in this league and the one above would die for that.

[thetramfixer]

So many aspects to take into consideration. However, I believe the funding of a season card via several payments would help a lot of people. Whatever the club needs to do to get this ability back must be done ASAP.