Away fans / tourists in home sections

Why are you arsed, it's not a City thing, happens at every PL game.

The UK is a tourist destination, football has become a check list for visitors.

Not for me, the last thing I would do on holiday is watch a footy match but then again, we are blessed with having one of the best teams playing in the most popular league in the world. That's why we have tourists.

Can't have it both ways, if the PL wasn't so successful then no one would want to watch it.
The price of success I suppose but nobody in their right mind would go back to the dark days of the 80's surely.

I do me and they can do what the fuck they want.
They have to be prepared for a slap if they celebrate a goal against City though.
This wasn’t even a massively noticeable thing as recently as about 2019, never mind the 80s.

There were a few you’d notice here and there, but it’s swathes of them now. And very rarely would they be idiotic enough to jump up for goals or stay behind after the game to film the away fans singing.

Since Covid we’ve lost around 6,000 season ticket holders and they aren’t being replaced with new season ticket holders. And you can really feel it around the stands. How many more are the club going to reduce it to? Are they going to phase them out completely?
 
You only have to go back a few years and this wasn’t really an issue. Under Mancini in particular.

The main issues are ticket prices and where there tickets are ending up - ticket agency websites
We weren’t as successful under Mancini and therefore had not become a global brand hence there was not the same desire to attend games. Yesterdays game was a meeting of 2 global brands so the appetite to attend would have been heightened to above the normal level of other games.

How are tickets ending up with agencies though?
 
Fair enough. The Brentford stewards did seem a weird bunch this season. They went through a mate’s wallet during a search on the way into the ground both this season and last season. That appeared to over step the mark.

I got into a silly altercation with BTP at Preston in the Cup in 2007. I got lifted but managed to get away with it not being classed as football related maybe because it was about 10 hours after the match had finished.
 
This wasn’t even a massively noticeable thing as recently as about 2019, never mind the 80s.

There were a few you’d notice here and there, but it’s swathes of them now. And very rarely would they be idiotic enough to jump up for goals or stay behind after the game to film the away fans singing.

Since Covid we’ve lost around 6,000 season ticket holders and they aren’t being replaced with new season ticket holders. And you can really feel it around the stands. How many more are the club going to reduce it to? Are they going to phase them out completely?
probably. I thing ST'S were invented to get some money up front and in the pot early season...don't need to do this anymore, so , every seat, highest bidder every match is the ideal.
 
I will and that's exactly why I'm asking for seat numbers. Where we are able to have specific examples, we are able to ask what the outcome was.

Fair enough. The Brentford stewards did seem a weird bunch this season. They went through a mate’s wallet during a search on the way into the ground both this season and last season. That appeared to over step the mark.

I got into a silly altercation with BTP at Preston in the Cup in 2007. I got lifted but managed to get away with it not being classed as football related maybe because it was about 10 hours after the match had finished.
Yeah, insisted on searching my wallet last season too. No sign of anything incriminating or valuable…
 
Then we're screwed for attracting those who were priced out, as I said elsewhere. The odd lapsed fan might return I suppose but if the majority can't be arsed with the FA Cup just because it's Plymouth and it's on telly then we've no chance of filling the expanded stand more than five or six times a season and even then it will be full of tourists and/or away fans. - Though I still think there aren't enough tourists to fill it for most games.
If the stand is open for the second half of next season and proves difficult to fill, then we may see some interesting price changes for the start of the following season. But will that be too late to attract lapsed Blues?

Humans are creatures of habit and once the habit is broken then something else takes its place.
Years ago a group of friends would go to the pub then onto the match, often going straight out afterwards. It was a Saturday ritual. As it's now harder to all be together and people drop out for various reasons the enthusiasm wanes. Then prices rise to ridiculous levels, you need memberships, there are no season tickets available and so on. It just turns what used to be an enjoyable occasion into a fucking chore.

So the group of friends find a pub that shows the games. The beer is cheap and they don't have to pay £60+ to get in. Nobody tells them not to stand up, searches them, asks them to.mind their language etcetera. They have a great crack for a fraction of the price and afterwards they aren't stuck in traffic or waiting for trams that take forever to turn up and if they do they are rammed like sardines on them. They can carry on drinking and are near to places they might want to go too later. Win win. If the game isn't on at the pub they will go to a mates house that has the channel it is on, or watch it on a snide app.

So the Plymouth game comes around and somebody says, "Hey fancy going to City against Plymouth? It's only £25 a ticket and there are loads available." There is a pause then someone answers, "Nah fuck that. It's on in the pub and I can get five pints for that. Fucking Plymouth?? Fuck that!"

That my friend is how it happens.
 
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I have been attending games since the 80s and I understand this situation is a trade off for being incredibly successful. It’s a double edged sword, a deal with the devil, that success brings hangers on. I saw it OT and at Anfield 20+ years ago and used to laugh my head off, and now here we are.

I was sat next to an older couple (I’m 50) on the concourse yesterday and I heard the chap bemoaning the half and half scarfers and I struck up a conversation. His take, as a season card holder, was that other SC holders were selling their tickets on resale sites. Whatever the issue is with more and more overseas fans and non City fans getting tickets it is damaging the atmosphere and eroding football as we know it.

Looking around at the derby game, Madrid home and yesterday’s game there are masses of tourist fans who are so unaware of how to behave at a match. If you are going to come and sit in the home end at least pretend to support City, ditch the half and half scarfs and wear blue!
Exactly! Back in the day there was a code as a football fan when you sat in the away end. You put all the badges away, zip up your jacket, keep your hands down, mumble "come on lads" under your breath and basically don't act a wanker. Dippers ? well they're a strange species all together and live under a different set of rules.
 
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I not sure why some are saying when we go shit we will lose fans

We have just invested in Haaland on a 10 year dead, new 8000 stand soon to be ready, infrastructure around the club being built to cater for more fans, it is not going to end.

I think we all should be a little careful also about what this could also become. Are genuine tourist fans that much of a problem, the club obviously has spare tickets and a global audience to cater to these days.

Opposing fans in our end is a bigger issue if they know what they are doing, i not sure the tourist away fan is fully aware.
 
Mmm!

I reckon this has always gone on. How many of us have been to games not involving City, all or most of us I bet.

The only difference is the advent of phones and social media.

Best to ignore em but give em a bit of stick, it ain't changing.

I saw 3 Chinese blokes get out of a Taxi yesterday with Rag merchandise bags!

I said wtf, but not in Chinese so they probably didn't understand me.
They most likely spoke better English than half the English folk in the ground!
 
First time I went away with the Eagles was to the Redskins, on a mini van I was respectfully Stone islanded up, everyone else in full eagles gear, the whole game ballooning in their end along with 10,000 other away fans, it would never happen back home I told them
 
Sat in The Edinburgh Castle at 4pm yesterday 6th Guinness just finished and seriously thought fuck it I’m staying in town
My match day experience has become City being the excuse to get into town and have a load to drink in great pubs with old mates until last train home
The only thing stopping me sacking the match is I need to get my steps in the walk to the ground and back from town justifies the excesses
 
Exactly! Back in the day theres a code as a football fan when you sit in the away end. You put all the badges away, zip up your jacket, keep your hands down, mumble "come on lads" under your breath and basically don't act a wanker. Dippers ? well they're a strange species all together and live under a different set of rules.
They were Chelsea fans pretending to be Scousers
 
I have been attending games since the 80s and I understand this situation is a trade off for being incredibly successful. It’s a double edged sword, a deal with the devil, that success brings hangers on. I saw it OT and at Anfield 20+ years ago and used to laugh my head off, and now here we are.

I was sat next to an older couple (I’m 50) on the concourse yesterday and I heard the chap bemoaning the half and half scarfers and I struck up a conversation. His take, as a season card holder, was that other SC holders were selling their tickets on resale sites. Whatever the issue is with more and more overseas fans and non City fans getting tickets it is damaging the atmosphere and eroding football as we know it.

Looking around at the derby game, Madrid home and yesterday’s game there are masses of tourist fans who are so unaware of how to behave at a match. If you are going to come and sit in the home end at least pretend to support City, ditch the half and half scarfs and wear blue!
I had to go to town yesterday to take my lazy as fuck step daughter her laptop as she left it at home when she visited from uni. I went via the fly over so passed the stadium, this is around 12pm - 4.5 hours before kick off.

There were loads, and I mean loads of half and half scarf wearers just milling around the stadium and the streets.
 
We weren’t as successful under Mancini and therefore had not become a global brand hence there was not the same desire to attend games. Yesterdays game was a meeting of 2 global brands so the appetite to attend would have been heightened to above the normal level of other games.

How are tickets ending up with agencies though?
I agree, but if tickets were more affordable and accessible it wouldn’t be an issue as everyone would have a chance of attending

You only have to look at all the sold out fa cup games - barely any tourists at all
 

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