Etihad Atmosphere - 2021/22

[Marvin]

Genuinely curious, as I might have a small chance of relaying this to someone at the club...what does everyone think all the problems are currently re the matchday experience, the issues around attendance/atmosphere etc are and what would you do about them? All suggestions welcome.

I saw you on the big screen at half-time doing a half-time show but I couldn't hear what you were saying...the noise through the speakers is loud but indistinct. Not really too bothered about that!

Well done on your personal success. My thoughts:

• I was very annoyed with the comment by Kevin Parker who I think let the fans and Pep down by providing an open goal for the media. They don't need a 2nd invitation. I think City fans have become a bit complacent and we just sit back and soak the goals up, and can be quiet. The hunger and nervous clamour for success has gone. There is little to be done about that.
  
  
• I enjoy very much going to City and love going to the game, the build-up during the week, and the day itself. I love it. I have always loved it.
  
  
• I think small away numbers damage the atmosphere but what can you do about that?
  
  
• I think fans can sense already that this is not going to be our season and hence some optimism has faded. Key players out injured and a car crash of a transfer window didn't help (we had loads of money, and didn't spend it on areas of the team that were weak, so fans sense that we're going to struggle a little).
  
  
• I would like to know what's happening with ground development. It's exciting when new developments are happening and it creates a good vibe of a growing club.
  
  
• My match-day experience is partly online. Discussing the game online. It has got very frustrating reading the absolute nonsense from other fans and journalists about City. I don't engage with them any more as I refuse to give them my money but it upsets me when I see my club disparaged in the media. I would like to know what the executive of City think about the media coverage. I don't like the way that City just seem to take this all the time. I am an Arab, and I like that City are owned by Sheikh Mansour but it hurts when the Arab world is continually attacked in the media. it's hard to accept. Why do we have to just sit in silence and accept racist assumptions all the time? This is probably a very personal view, and not common?
  
  
• I would like City to bring the web-site in house. If City incorporated a message board and fan activity including videos, I'd use that rather than this City. They should learn to engage fans more. It's two way not one way. They should also realise that many fans are very creative and they should harness the fans more rather than see them as customers from whom they can take money.
  
  
• You could get reporting of the women's team, and academy sides from fans a bit like what Cheesy does but let City fans make the content and it can be controlled by an editor. Basically the material that you do, and City Xtra but do it under the banner of the club with some freedom.

 

[Marvin]

City fans all around the stadium in 40.5 blocks but the 1.5 blocks for away fans kills the atmosphere? Not a chance.

Cheapest seats are on level 3 will never be heard.

Fans too bothered about watching the game they paid to see.

The fans who are really worried about how it looks on TV not going to the game themselves.

Burton away showed it isn't standing that is the problem, that was the worst atmosphere ever, with away fans in the seats making more noise.

Digital tickets forced on the fanbase at the worst possible time is the final straw for some people, and the club not being contactable to sort out any issues.

These are your views and completely valid as such. I had to move my seat at the start of the season and so I have met new fans. The one thing we all talked about was the mobile ticketing. It was perceived negatively and yet everyone got in and no one had any problems themselves.

IMO the mobile ticketing is far from the disaster that some fans think it is. Perhaps they could do a better job in communicating through the Summer what is going to happen and what this potential service can do. What you can do with Google Pay etc. Instead it comes out of the blue and it feels a bit panicky.

 

[Marvin]

Pay on the gate, at least electronically and sit where you want, ideally be able to sit with your mates/family, not been able to do so puts a lot of people off attending.


A lot of people simply don't have time to be searching for tickets etc.

Wednesday night pay on the gate and I think you would have had a lot of causal fans turning up to attend.

That's a good point. Problem with seating as opposed to standing is that you can't just find a place together. I don't think anyone has ever found a solution to getting fans together. Once you sell 90% of the tickets you are left with single seats.

 

[Keeper!]

That's a good point. Problem with seating as opposed to standing is that you can't just find a place together. I don't think anyone has ever found a solution to getting fans together. Once you sell 90% of the tickets you are left with single seats.

Games like Wednesday and it's not an issue, have areas of the ground available for pay on the gate for the times when we struggle to sell.

 

[Man_City_Loyal]

Before this takeover our club was universally accepted as having a huge, loyal and humorous support base, so why does the media and even our very own club find it ok to now attack it at every opportunity?

Yep, many saw us a team to check on.

Now because of a few empty seats (they can't attack us for our recent success) that's all now forgotten what we were thought of as fans back in the day.

Even funnier coming from fans of clubs we would outnumber in past games

 

[Corky]

These are your views and completely valid as such. I had to move my seat at the start of the season and so I have met new fans. The one thing we all talked about was the mobile ticketing. It was perceived negatively and yet everyone got in and no one had any problems themselves.

IMO the mobile ticketing is far from the disaster that some fans think it is. Perhaps they could do a better job in communicating through the Summer what is going to happen and what this potential service can do. What you can do with Google Pay etc. Instead it comes out of the blue and it feels a bit panicky.

I was asked about getting tickets for a relative and kids for tomorrow, I said I could buy them but had no means of getting them to them as they default to mobile tickets and not paper. I offered them my login details to do it themselves and they decline. Not sure how many other people don't bother with one more hurdle?

 

[pace89]

Genuinely curious, as I might have a small chance of relaying this to someone at the club...what does everyone think all the problems are currently re the matchday experience, the issues around attendance/atmosphere etc are and what would you do about them? All suggestions welcome.

IMHO, fundamentally it comes down to two things:

1. Price of tickets
2. Ease of purchasing

Pricing across the board is fundamentally too expensive for a club with a working class fan base based in City which has some of the poorest local authority areas in the EU+UK. We don't have generations of supporters from all over the UK/world to take up the slack but the pricing doesn't recognise this at all. It needs to be significantly cheaper which requires a fundamental change in concept from the club.

The way tickets are sold is akin to booking a holiday. Even the terminology they use is 'booking' rather than buying. It's just another indication that they club think they are selling an 'experience' to a mythical consumer invented by marketing consultants rather than selling tickets to their supporters. The club have created an approach designed to cater to the supporter they wish they had and not the ones they do have.

Watching City should be cheap and easy but's expensive and complicated.

In combination selling an expensive product in a complicated and convoluted way changes the experience of watching City. Instead of participating in City's success we are simply an audience in receipt of light entertainment. The passion is diluted, and having parted with so much cash we expect to be entertained to the same standard every week.

There are multiple other reasons you could look to. The architecture of the stadium, the layout of supporters, the lack of a single end, poor transport, complacency amongst an ageing fanbase that has a sense of entitlements having put up with the 80s 90s and 2000s, but all these things would be mitigated (if not resolved) by cheap tickets made easily available.

The reason the Hamburg game was so memorable wasn't just that the tickets cost £5, it was because they were sold on a first come first served basis - no City card of whatever it's called these days, just pay £5 and watch the game.

 

[Marvin]

I was asked about getting tickets for a relative and kids for tomorrow, I said I could buy them but had no means of getting them to them as they default to mobile tickets and not paper. I offered them my login details to do it themselves and they decline. Not sure how many other people don't bother with one more hurdle?

without trying it for myself, it feels like mobile / electronic tickets should be easier and much quicker than paper tickets. You can transfer files electronically but paper you need to go with it.

Long term this will surely get a lot easier and better.

 

[ONTHERUNWITHTHAKSIN]

Genuinely curious, as I might have a small chance of relaying this to someone at the club...what does everyone think all the problems are currently re the matchday experience, the issues around attendance/atmosphere etc are and what would you do about them? All suggestions welcome.

Sit in SS2 and had to constantly ask the stewards to move or sit down as they were constantly blocking the view.

They even told me that if i didn't sit down i would be reported!!!!

Getting away from the stadium is a massive issue, I live about 30min away and it took me 1hour 45min to get home in car.

Maybe if they had Park and ride South of the City centre it would relieve the bottle neck of traffic or more carriages on the Metro

The speaker system in the ground is too loud and to generate an atmosphere you need the crowd to generate their own chants not some over the top music.

 

[Keeper!]

Genuinely curious, as I might have a small chance of relaying this to someone at the club...what does everyone think all the problems are currently re the matchday experience, the issues around attendance/atmosphere etc are and what would you do about them? All suggestions welcome.

Tell the club to put a stop to the lies and anti propaganda in the UK media.

The club are looking increasingly weak , valid criticism I have no problem with at all, but lies, slander and libel need addressing by MCFC, it's long overdue.

It's long over due that the genuine fans of this club heard from the CEO, tickets, pricing, ground expansion, media, supporter services all need some sort of modification and don't get me started on blue shorts ;)