City Fans Leaving Early/Empty seats

I don't know what the crowd was last night - maybe 40k? Brilliant crowd midweek. Nothing to worry about or be ashamed of. At Maine Road we had a hard core of 28-30k maybe peaking at 34k and it has increased 12k in fifteen years. Now get 40k to nearly every game irrespective.
 
When all is said and done, there were still 40,000 there last night and I suspect there will be more for the other 2 group games. Like Marvin said, you probably have 1 in 2 season ticket holders not buying tickets for CL group games. 3 of my mates who have season tickets didn't bother last night - one lives in Sheffield and the other two locally. Does that make them shit fans? Does it fuck. All 3 have been watching City home and away longer than I have and they've more than earned the right to decide which games they wish to attend.

So if 1 out 2 ST holders aren't going to the group games then that means we have 20-odd thousand more tickets to sell than we do for league games, and we simply don't have a gazillion fans to take up the slack like United or Liverpool do so is it really any surprise the crowd is what it was last night? If anything, we did well to sell as many tickets as we did so perhaps we shouldn't beat ourselves up too much about it. Incidentally, if United didn't force all 55,000 season ticket holders to buy tickets for CL games and FA Cup games does anyone seriously believe they'd have capacity crowds for all their CL and FA Cup games? Would they fuck! And that's a club with miles more fans than us. Fucking hell, tens of thousands of those ST holders who actually HAD tickets for their CL game against Cluj in 2012 didn't bother to turn up.

And I'll leave this one here. In Guardiola's first all-conquering season as Barcelona manager in 2008-2009, Barca played Shakhtar in the group stages at the Nou Camp. Attendance? 22,763. As twosips said, there's apathy towards the group stages of the CL all over the place.
 
worsleyweb said:
I don't know what the crowd was last night - maybe 40k? Brilliant crowd midweek. Nothing to worry about or be ashamed of. At Maine Road we had a hard core of 28-30k maybe peaking at 34k and it has increased 12k in fifteen years. Now get 40k to nearly every game irrespective.
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FA Cup games are the ones for me where crowds have rocketed over recent years. We've sold out every home FA Cup tie that has played at a weekend in the past 5 or 6 years. We get 54,000 sell outs for 3rd round matches these days but 10 or 15 years ago there would've been 20,000-25,000 less than that in the ground even if it was a 3pm kick-off on a Saturday.
 
M18CTID said:
When all is said and done, there were still 40,000 there last night and I suspect there will be more for the other 2 group games. Like Marvin said, you probably have 1 in 2 season ticket holders not buying tickets for CL group games. 3 of my mates who have season tickets didn't bother last night - one lives in Sheffield and the other two locally. Does that make them shit fans? Does it fuck. All 3 have been watching City home and away longer than I have and they've more than earned the right to decide which games they wish to attend.

So if 1 out 2 ST holders aren't going to the group games then that means we have 20-odd thousand more tickets to sell than we do for league games, and we simply don't have a gazillion fans to take up the slack like United or Liverpool do so is it really any surprise the crowd is what it was last night? If anything, we did well to sell as many tickets as we did so perhaps we shouldn't beat ourselves up too much about it. Incidentally, if United didn't force all 55,000 season ticket holders to buy tickets for CL games and FA Cup games does anyone seriously believe they'd have capacity crowds for all their CL and FA Cup games? Would they fuck! And that's a club with miles more fans than us. Fucking hell, tens of thousands of those ST holders who actually HAD tickets for their CL game against Cluj in 2012 didn't bother to turn up.

And I'll leave this one here. In Guardiola's first all-conquering season as Barcelona manager in 2008-2009, Barca played Shakhtar in the group stages at the Nou Camp. Attendance? 22,763. As twosips said, there's apathy towards the group stages of the CL all over the place.
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But rather and live with than antipathy and accept it, we need to turn this around and win the Champions League.

At the moment the Daily Mail, UEFA, City haters are winning this. City fans need to respond.

Some maybe happy with 40,000 crowds for midweek games. I am not. Arteta said it should not affect the players but I think it does. We need to support the team otherwise what is it all for? This is the final hurdle
 
TheRemainsOfTheDave said:
I'm one of those ambivalent ones and admit to only going to one, maybe two games in the CL each season. Yet will never miss a PL game.

I can't explain why I feel this way but sense it is something about the struggles we had down the years and the fights to stay in the top flight. Perhaps being a long term supporter has left me with a sense of final achievement of just consolidating our position and I don't feel the need for a competition like this. Very odd, really.

I think the club need to start including CL games within the season card matches, like the rags do, to force people like me to go.
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We dont have the fanbase to be forced to include champions league into season tickets like utd do. I think we should all be honest and accept that our support is just embarrassing.
 
Booing the UEFA anthem is stupid. Puts a negative feel onto the game before it’s started. People still believe that UEFA have nothing better to do than shaft us?!
Attitude of the fans to the competition is ridiculous. Every other club embraces it, we don't and regularly play in front of half empty stadium as a result.
 
M18CTID said:
FA Cup games are the ones for me where crowds have rocketed over recent years. We've sold out every home FA Cup tie that has played at a weekend in the past 5 or 6 years. We get 54,000 sell outs for 3rd round matches these days but 10 or 15 years ago there would've been 20,000-25,000 less than that in the ground even if it was a 3pm kick-off on a Saturday.
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That because thouse tickets are between £5 and £20. Loads of new, young, families can go. And there's the clue. But the club won't do that for the CL.
 
jrb said:
That because thouse tickets are between £5 and £20. Loads of new, young, families can go. And there's the clue. But the club won't do that for the CL.
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My point wasn't really to do with FA Cup attendances vs CL attendances - moreso that for FA Cup games, the crowds have increased exponentially over the past 6 years or so, especially for weekend games.

The prices were decent last night as well though mate in some areas of the ground - not quite as cheap as those early round FA Cup/League Cup games but not far off it but as another poster stated, midweek cup crowds all too often tend to be lower than weekend ones.
 
Include group game tickets with your season card would be the dream, wishful thinking that they implement something like that however.
 
brookes1 said:
Include group game tickets with your season card would be the dream, wishful thinking that they implement something like that however.
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Very dishonest for Man Utd fans to criticise City's Champions League crowds.

This is in their terms and conditions:

"Season Ticket Holders are automatically allocated and required to buy tickets for home cup matches."

They can opt out of League Cup and europa League. Not the Champions League and the FA Cup.

That is the simple reason why Man Utd sell out their Champions League games. Their fans are forced to go. They would say it's a privilege.

Should City do the same? The voluntary CL scheme is a solution only most now have opted out. We need them to opt back in. Perhaps the club should consider re-opening it and appealing for seasoncard holders to join it perhaps offering some incentive
 
Marvin said:
But rather and live with than antipathy and accept it, we need to turn this around and win the Champions League.

At the moment the Daily Mail, UEFA, City haters are winning this. City fans need to respond.

Some maybe happy with 40,000 crowds for midweek games. I am not. Arteta said it should not affect the players but I think it does. We need to support the team otherwise what is it all for? This is the final hurdle
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Seriously Marv, what can you realistically do about it? Demand that those fans who didn't go last night attend in future? Sure, it would be nice if we had sell out crowds for every single CL game but we don't yet have a big enough support base for that, and the club doesn't force 40-odd thousand season ticket holders to buy tickets for CL games unlike a certain other club just down the road. Our hardcore fanbase is no less fickle than pretty much every other club. Don't be fooled by the bullshit spouted by armchair fans on Twitter. There are always going to be match-going fans at every club who decide to give certain games a miss and those who go to every game. I know a fair few match-going United fans - good lads who have put the hard yards in down the years like you and me - who pick and choose their games so they're no different to us lot.
 
I haven't got a voice this morning because I was yelling so loudly to counteract the fact that I was surrounded by Lyon fans and 'tourists'!! I asked the two guys sitting next to me if they were Lyon fans after they applauded (surreptitiously) the first goal. Non, non he said I said come on City................. I said I'm not daft, that wasn't what you were saying. If I'd thought quickly enough I should have said, if that was what you were saying then I was saying Vive la France!! When we scored they sat there until I glared at them and then rather reluctantly got up and very sheepishly clapped!! The row across there was a guy who was almost ejected by a steward and in the row behind it was obvious they weren't City supporters. So I shouted louder and lost my voice!!


p.s. I felt the atmosphere and the singing from the SS was better last night. Was that just my imagination, there were a few renditions of Blue Moon, City best team, We are City, Dzeko song etc.
 
M18CTID said:
My point wasn't really to do with FA Cup attendances vs CL attendances - moreso that for FA Cup games, the crowds have increased exponentially over the past 6 years or so, especially for weekend games.

The prices were decent last night as well though mate in some areas of the ground - not quite as cheap as those early round FA Cup/League Cup games but not far off it but as another poster stated, midweek cup crowds all too often tend to be lower than weekend ones.
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Wasn't having a pop mate. ;-)

They have.

But a big factor is CL games are midweek, so familes with Kids don't bother.

As other's have stated, bolt CL matches on to season tickets, with a cheaper and set price for each round, give fans extra loyalty points, decreasing for each round, more for the group stages, guarantee a QF and SF home ticket, but give the fans an opt out option.
I bet that would put a good few 1000 on to the crowd.
 
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