City Fans Leaving Early/Empty seats

[blue b4 the moon]

In the past couple of seasons it was noticeable there were a lot of “foreign” City fans for the CL matches (can only comment on the CB), most stayed until the end and helped towards a good atmosphere. Against Lyon I didn’t see many, don’t know why but probably contributed to a lower crowd than usual. Has anyone got the official attendance?

Lack of foreign fans could be to do with university dates?

 

[hammocity]

Lack of foreign fans could be to do with university dates?

Possibly but there was a fair contingent of older ones previously, perhaps they will return for the Shakhtar game.

 

[davymcfc]

Great to see our club being dragged through the mud again. Fuck the twitter key board warriors. When these fans dragged this club out of the mire and back to the premier league we didn’t give a fuck what they said then and we aren’t going to start now.

 

[squirtyflower]

I think the 36 years of oblivion not only damaged the numbers of people deciding City was their team, it also mentally changed those already supporting. I'm 50 and as I look around me this makes up a huge proportion of the demographic that currently attends. For me personally, much of that 36 years was about wanting to be proud of my team, the chance to be credible and not be an embarrassment. I measured everything we did against United's success and to be honest it was an awful time and my whole footballing mentality was not necessarily to win a trophy, as that just seemed too far fetched, but to beat United if our paths ever crossed. My desire for success was more an ambition rather than an obsession. That semi in 2011, the 6-1, Kompany's header and that moment in 2012 was only so good because ultimately it was in those moments the demons of United were finally slayed. With the success of 2014 and last year's 100 points, it feels to me we have finally washed away the stain of United and in effect for many of us realised our ambition. It's only natural I suppose that some fans support starts to drift slightly because as I previously stated, our success was always more an ambition than obsession and once achieved many will feel they can walk away and redemption has finally been achieved. I know that sounds sad but it's the hard facts. I travel for 2 hours 30 minutes to home games and each game probably costs me 8 hours of my day and £80. Justifying the commitment is further undermined in that when I arrive home some of my friends have streamed the game, spent no money and have saved 6 hours time doing other things. As you can imagine, every time I find myself stuck in traffic I find the continuation of my attendance a real point for consideration.

My final point is the CL lack of interest and it's kind of linked to my original point. I don't believe any City fan has genuinely dreamt or indeed ever been obsessed with being the best team in Europe. I know I haven't and as sad as it seems I believe that many of us would readily accept beating United home and away each year rather than winning a European trophy if that was at the expense of being the top dogs in our own city first and country second.

Unfortunately I suppose what we see now in empty seats is the harvest of decades of failure and its impact on new younger fans, coupled with the TV/Streaming services offering the once sacred product without the cost or need to travel. If I'm honest I don't see a ready made solution as I'm fairly certain the core match day fan will be continued to be partially replaced by a latter day tourist coming to occasional games. The real disappointment here is that City seem happy how it's going so little will change.

As to your final point City almost seem complicit in alienating the core support

 

[hammocity]

40,111

Still more than Chelsea got when they regularly didn’t fill their ground for group stage games but dissapointing nonetheless. Think the price of League tickets affects the CL with supporters prioritising games. At least our Club gives the fans the option to go or not, other Clubs force them to buy within the Season Ticket structure, hope we don’t go down that route.

 

[squirtyflower]

Lack of foreign fans could be to do with university dates?

Exactly what it is

 

[Marvin]

Lack of foreign fans could be to do with university dates?

What has foreign got to do with it? It's also a total misrepresentation of what's going on. It's the regulars not going to the CL games and large numbers of occasional fans taking their place but not enough to sell the games out.

It was freshers week last week, and teaching starts next week. That is irrelevant. Students are skint. What matters is that the number of seasoncard holders no longer in the Cup scheme have grown and less than half our regular support goes to these games now.

Old Trafford is full for these games because all their regular season ticket holders are obliged to go. Anfield is full because the CL is their big thing. Etihad is 1/3rd empty because 1/2 our regular support can't be bothered. This is a problem. It destroys the atmosphere for those that do go and directly impacts on the team. The irony is that CL nights are potentially the most atmospheric because of the away fans and the KO nature of the games - it's half KO half league. Give me Lyon at home with a full crowd any day over Fulham at home.

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

I have a theory that's it's largely a generation thing. I've seen and heard a lot of our younger fans and more recent, foreign ones saying that they see the CL as their top priority whereas it's many of the older ones who don't seem to like it.

I reckon that us older fans still associate the CL with the old G14 cartel like Liverpool, Utd & Arsenal and UEFA's attempts to maintain them as the wealthiest clubs which enabled them to spend more money & have better players. We're not suddenly going to fall in love with it just because we're in it.

 

[Exeter Blue I am here]

I think the 36 years of oblivion not only damaged the numbers of people deciding City was their team, it also mentally changed those already supporting. I'm 50 and as I look around me this makes up a huge proportion of the demographic that currently attends. For me personally, much of that 36 years was about wanting to be proud of my team, the chance to be credible and not be an embarrassment. I measured everything we did against United's success and to be honest it was an awful time and my whole footballing mentality was not necessarily to win a trophy, as that just seemed too far fetched, but to beat United if our paths ever crossed. My desire for success was more an ambition rather than an obsession. That semi in 2011, the 6-1, Kompany's header and that moment in 2012 was only so good because ultimately it was in those moments the demons of United were finally slayed. With the success of 2014 and last year's 100 points, it feels to me we have finally washed away the stain of United and in effect for many of us realised our ambition. It's only natural I suppose that some fans support starts to drift slightly because as I previously stated, our success was always more an ambition than obsession and once achieved many will feel they can walk away and redemption has finally been achieved. I know that sounds sad but it's the hard facts. I travel for 2 hours 30 minutes to home games and each game probably costs me 8 hours of my day and £80. Justifying the commitment is further undermined in that when I arrive home some of my friends have streamed the game, spent no money and have saved 6 hours time doing other things. As you can imagine, every time I find myself stuck in traffic I find the continuation of my attendance a real point for consideration.

My final point is the CL lack of interest and it's kind of linked to my original point. I don't believe any City fan has genuinely dreamt or indeed ever been obsessed with being the best team in Europe. I know I haven't and as sad as it seems I believe that many of us would readily accept beating United home and away each year rather than winning a European trophy if that was at the expense of being the top dogs in our own city first and country second.

Unfortunately I suppose what we see now in empty seats is the harvest of decades of failure and its impact on new younger fans, coupled with the TV/Streaming services offering the once sacred product without the cost or need to travel. If I'm honest I don't see a ready made solution as I'm fairly certain the core match day fan will be continued to be partially replaced by a latter day tourist coming to occasional games. The real disappointment here is that City seem happy how it's going so little will change.

It's also due to City having one of the poorest (in terms of disposable income) fanbases in the country. In the Premier League in 2013 we were second only to Wigan in this regard, so no money plus austerity plus increased prices and its no wonder we've got empty seats. The club has to accept some responsibility for this, because it has unquestionably priced an element of City's core support out of going to games. The stadium was full every week when we first moved in to it, so we have the numbers

 

[Prophet of Doom]

I have a theory that's it's largely a generation thing. I've seen and heard a lot of our younger fans and more recent, foreign ones saying that they see the CL as their top priority whereas it's many of the older ones who don't seem to like it.

I reckon that us older fans still associate the CL with the old G14 cartel like Liverpool, Utd & Arsenal and UEFA's attempts to maintain them as the wealthiest clubs which enabled them to spend more money & have better players. We're not suddenly going to fall in love with it just because we're in it.

This is spot on PB. I heard Marcotti on Talksport the other night mentioning that City fans need to get over the FFP fine, but he is completely missing the point re the feeling against UEFA.

Even in 2018 alone we have had the bent decisions in the 2 x Liverpool games inc the actual refs appointed and the Pep suspension, Liverpool being allowed to smash up the City team bus and get a fine less that we got for getting on the pitch 60 seconds late, and a bent new coefficient introduced rewarding the cartel G14 teams.

I went to the Lyon game and would estimate that in my small block of about 80 supporters, every fan present bar maybe 4 were not the regular season card holders.

Like others have commented above, there is a big problem with this at City and the club should be appointing somebody with a remit to try and resolve ( and include the early leavers and empty seats for league games ).

Its been a PR week from hell for the club and somebody needs to pull their finger out and try and do something about it.