Etihad Atmosphere - 2021/22

We need a song....not blue moon with the naff rushed second chorus that no one can keep up with.....na na na nana na na city seems to get most in, but always thought with oasis connection we would have claimed one of theirs....Hibernians sunshine on leth is spine tingling, but as has been said, getting Senior age people in seats singing is a difficult thing.im from the sixties and seventies era with mostly standing and big noise and great atmosphere. Don’t know the answer, everyone loves watching the amazing football but it’s up to the young uns now to solve the problem and make the noise.
 
Cheadle_hulmeBlue said:
“The Etihad inside had areas with safe standing and although the atmosphere was not electric it was very loud when they got going.”

there’s a lot of rubbish on this forum about us, but some nice comments as well. Maybe we aren’t really that bad

The Etihad reminded me of what football has become.

Arriving at the Etihad I just yearned for a an old stadium with history, quirks, memories, atmosphere, character and personality. From the outside the Etihad is not particularly attractive, although inside is better. Even the flawed Maine Road would have held so much more appeal. But since the mo...
forum.pinkun.com
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One Norwich fan from there:


NWI.jpg
 
The atmosphere was exactly how I expected it to be. Quite good at the start. As the game became a formality and the pace slowed down, so did the atmosphere.

We often compare ourselves to our rivals based on first-hand experience of away games. People who went to Spurs last week think it's like that every week. It's not. We're the best team in the league and have dominated English football for 5 years. We're a cup final (like when Liverpool or Arsenal used to come to our ground back in the day). Spurs atmosphere vs Norwich will be absolute crap.
 
LongsightM13 said:
Yesterday was always going to end like that, great at the start but tailing off into a formality.
I expect this Saturday to be much better. The Tarquins absolutely despise us and blame us for all their problems rather than looking for answers closer to home, going back to Adebayor.
Tbf to them they should fill the full away end, loads of Home Counties (ex) students live in Didsbury and Chorlton and they have always brought good numbers to our place anyway
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Looking forward to it. Should be good where I am in SS3.

Love the fact they hate us!
 
Cheadle_hulmeBlue said:
we as fans need to push the club on this. Surveys, fan groups, regular fans - we need to show the club the benefits of creating a home end. Obviously it’s easier said then done, but somethings got to change
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Definitely. We’ve missed and missed and missed opportunity after opportunity.

The opportunities we’ve had include:

When it was the Commonwealth Games stadium, we could have built a big one tier’d stand for vocal fans at the North Stand end that was an open end for the Games.

08CC5550-4B51-472D-864F-38A9CA45BC80.jpeg

From Day 1, we could have plonked the away fans around the bit where they keep old goalposts and the sun lamps for the grass to split the away section up and have them out of sight of the cameras at the stadium, and had the away coach car park where the coaches line up next to the Squash Centre.

A0E0E02F-E1D6-49C7-8C5E-0951A985C712.jpeg

then we could have had the whole of the South Stand for ourselves, especially when the South Stand was extended. What other club shares their vocal stand with away fans? Could you imagine Liverpool deciding to give ⅓ of the Kop over to away fans?

When we built the South Stand Level 3, we could have made that our vocal section like at the San Siro:




But we gave a third of it to away fans and ,worse, for Cup games we have to give them the majority of our end which dwarfs out vocal section

3E0BAF60-940F-4280-97E2-385BA02C8644.jpeg

We introduce rail seating but we could have switched around the Family Stand and the vocal section and had the whole of North Stand Level 1 as our vocal safe standing area

84E9AA82-ADE2-4507-9654-933BD19F4A26.jpeg

But we’ve not done a single one of these things. We’ve done everything but…
We’ve developed corporate areas, we’ve stopped people putting flags up to put digital advertising boards in, we’ve expanded the seats down three rows then taken them away again to put digital advertising boards in, we’ve given away a whole stand to families which has only been full a handful of times, we’ve put a stage up outside for bands pre-game, we’ve built a pub inside the ground, we’ve put in new bars outside and in, we’ve changed the food and drinks options half a dozen times, we’ve built a new big third tier with an overhang of a roof that helps project noise and given a third of it to away fans, we’ve put in rail seats with a fifth of them given to away fans… some good and some bad changes.

But we’ve kept the vocal section in the same place trapped between the away fans to one side, a corporate section above and the Colin Bell Stand to the other side.

The vocal section is what a football stadium is all about. That should be the Number 1 priority and everything else should be built around that.

We’ve got another opportunity coming up with the expansion of the North Stand which will happen in the next 5-10 years. Will we get it right for the vocal section? Because it will be one of the last opportunities we have to finally get it right before there’s nothing else that can be done in our stadium.
 
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Shirley said:
Building the SS 3rd tier allowed affordable tickets for thousands of City fans.
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Although we are well supported we have a hard core of approx 40-45 thousand.If u go back to maine road in the 70s when we were challenging we averaged about this the place was choca against Utd,Dippers,Everton or big cup games.Even under Pearce we averaged just under 40,000 watching that tactical genius.Give it another 10 yrs and we may have attracted the next generation of supporters.
 
Psychedelic Casual said:
Definitely. We’ve missed and missed and missed opportunity after opportunity.

The opportunities we’ve had include:

When it was the Commonwealth Games stadium, we could have built a big one tier’d stand for vocal fans at the North Stand end that was an open end for the Games.

View attachment 24476

From Day 1, we could have plonked the away fans around the bit where they keep old goalposts and the sun lamps for the grass to split the away section up and have them out of sight of the cameras at the stadium, and had the away coach car park where the coaches line up next to the Squash Centre.

View attachment 24478

then we could have had the whole of the South Stand for ourselves, especially when the South Stand was extended. What other club shares their vocal stand with away fans? Could you imagine Liverpool deciding to give ⅓ of the Kop over to away fans?

When we built the South Stand Level 3, we could have made that our vocal section like at the San Siro:




But we gave a third of it to away fans and ,worse, for Cup games we have to give them the majority of our end which dwarfs out vocal section

View attachment 24486

We introduce rail seating but we could have switched around the Family Stand and the vocal section and had the whole of North Stand Level 1 as our vocal safe standing area

View attachment 24483

But we’ve not done a single one of these things. We’ve done everything but…
We’ve developed corporate areas, we’ve stopped people putting flags up to put digital advertising boards in, we’ve expanded the seats down three rows then taken them away again to put digital advertising boards in, we’ve given away a whole stand to families which has only been full a handful of times, we’ve put a stage up outside for bands pre-game, we’ve built a pub inside the ground, we’ve put in new bars outside and in, we’ve changed the food and drinks options half a dozen times, we’ve built a new big third tier with an overhang of a roof that helps project noise and given a third of it to away fans, we’ve put in rail seats with a fifth of them given to away fans… some good and some bad changes.

But we’ve kept the vocal section in the same place trapped between the away fans to one side, a corporate section above and the Colin Bell Stand to the other side.

The vocal section is what a football stadium is all about. That should be the Number 1 priority and everything else should be built around that.

We’ve got another opportunity coming up with the expansion of the North Stand which will happen in the next 5-10 years. Will we get it right for the vocal section? Because it will be one of the last opportunities we have to finally get it right before there’s nothing else that can be done in our stadium.
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great post mate. You’ve summed up all the chances the club have had. They prioritised building corporate sections instead though.

as you say, this is our last chance to do something about it. I think most fans would like to see something done, whether it’s a two tiered singing end (north stand) or a single tier.

We need groups like the 1894 group to push this or the wider fanbase (me and you + everyone) to start pushing the club on it.

if people don’t agree we need to show them and explain why it is, as you’ve done brilliantly above.
 
Psychedelic Casual said:
Definitely. We’ve missed and missed and missed opportunity after opportunity.

The opportunities we’ve had include:

When it was the Commonwealth Games stadium, we could have built a big one tier’d stand for vocal fans at the North Stand end that was an open end for the Games.

View attachment 24476

From Day 1, we could have plonked the away fans around the bit where they keep old goalposts and the sun lamps for the grass to split the away section up and have them out of sight of the cameras at the stadium, and had the away coach car park where the coaches line up next to the Squash Centre.

View attachment 24478

then we could have had the whole of the South Stand for ourselves, especially when the South Stand was extended. What other club shares their vocal stand with away fans? Could you imagine Liverpool deciding to give ⅓ of the Kop over to away fans?

When we built the South Stand Level 3, we could have made that our vocal section like at the San Siro:




But we gave a third of it to away fans and ,worse, for Cup games we have to give them the majority of our end which dwarfs out vocal section

View attachment 24486

We introduce rail seating but we could have switched around the Family Stand and the vocal section and had the whole of North Stand Level 1 as our vocal safe standing area

View attachment 24483

But we’ve not done a single one of these things. We’ve done everything but…
We’ve developed corporate areas, we’ve stopped people putting flags up to put digital advertising boards in, we’ve expanded the seats down three rows then taken them away again to put digital advertising boards in, we’ve given away a whole stand to families which has only been full a handful of times, we’ve put a stage up outside for bands pre-game, we’ve built a pub inside the ground, we’ve put in new bars outside and in, we’ve changed the food and drinks options half a dozen times, we’ve built a new big third tier with an overhang of a roof that helps project noise and given a third of it to away fans, we’ve put in rail seats with a fifth of them given to away fans… some good and some bad changes.

But we’ve kept the vocal section in the same place trapped between the away fans to one side, a corporate section above and the Colin Bell Stand to the other side.

The vocal section is what a football stadium is all about. That should be the Number 1 priority and everything else should be built around that.

We’ve got another opportunity coming up with the expansion of the North Stand which will happen in the next 5-10 years. Will we get it right for the vocal section? Because it will be one of the last opportunities we have to finally get it right before there’s nothing else that can be done in our stadium.
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Absolutely fuck all to with the stadium configuration.

This is a people problem. In order to get the insane atmosphere shown in the San Siro we need a change of mindset. A certain amount of boisterous behaviour would need to be tolerated.

I seem to remember that when we were greeting the team bus at Mary D's at the end of last season you posted that you hoped we didn't drop any litter! It's this kind of priggish disapproval from theorists like yourself that's lead to the sanitised atmosphere at English football grounds.
 
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Psychedelic Casual said:
Definitely. We’ve missed and missed and missed opportunity after opportunity.

The opportunities we’ve had include:

When it was the Commonwealth Games stadium, we could have built a big one tier’d stand for vocal fans at the North Stand end that was an open end for the Games.

View attachment 24476

From Day 1, we could have plonked the away fans around the bit where they keep old goalposts and the sun lamps for the grass to split the away section up and have them out of sight of the cameras at the stadium, and had the away coach car park where the coaches line up next to the Squash Centre.

View attachment 24478

then we could have had the whole of the South Stand for ourselves, especially when the South Stand was extended. What other club shares their vocal stand with away fans? Could you imagine Liverpool deciding to give ⅓ of the Kop over to away fans?

When we built the South Stand Level 3, we could have made that our vocal section like at the San Siro:




But we gave a third of it to away fans and ,worse, for Cup games we have to give them the majority of our end which dwarfs out vocal section

View attachment 24486

We introduce rail seating but we could have switched around the Family Stand and the vocal section and had the whole of North Stand Level 1 as our vocal safe standing area

View attachment 24483

But we’ve not done a single one of these things. We’ve done everything but…
We’ve developed corporate areas, we’ve stopped people putting flags up to put digital advertising boards in, we’ve expanded the seats down three rows then taken them away again to put digital advertising boards in, we’ve given away a whole stand to families which has only been full a handful of times, we’ve put a stage up outside for bands pre-game, we’ve built a pub inside the ground, we’ve put in new bars outside and in, we’ve changed the food and drinks options half a dozen times, we’ve built a new big third tier with an overhang of a roof that helps project noise and given a third of it to away fans, we’ve put in rail seats with a fifth of them given to away fans… some good and some bad changes.

But we’ve kept the vocal section in the same place trapped between the away fans to one side, a corporate section above and the Colin Bell Stand to the other side.

The vocal section is what a football stadium is all about. That should be the Number 1 priority and everything else should be built around that.

We’ve got another opportunity coming up with the expansion of the North Stand which will happen in the next 5-10 years. Will we get it right for the vocal section? Because it will be one of the last opportunities we have to finally get it right before there’s nothing else that can be done in our stadium.
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Really interesting post mate and you make some great points. The consistent failure to address the positioning of the away supporters is baffling. I fail to see how the club can expand a stand and make numerous other adjustments to to the stadium, but are unable to provide a solution to this.
 
I was begrudgingly very impressed with Spurs stadium last week. For a new stadium the noise created was fantastic. The big one tiered stand looks awesome and the noise from it really echo's around the ground.

Made me extremely jealous and a little annoyed as we could've done so much more with what we have to help enhance the atmosphere. Saturday just felt like a standard game even after all this time away.
 
Psychedelic Casual said:
I think so yeah. I think the match attending support has changed massively at City.
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It has changed, but overall I don’t think it’s that different from other clubs. Yes we’ve got more families going and older fans, but we still have a core of about 45,000. Made up of greater Manchester fans

this image is mainly males, with lots of people in their 20s/ 30s. A reflection of the south stand. Our match day support is nothing like United or Liverpool for example who have way more tourists and glory hunters
 
from where i was Vs Norwich at the back of 115 the atmosphere was very good, went home sore hands and lost voice almost. Laporte love was great. There is always a dip in the second half while people chat and have a pint on the concourse then come back in to the stands 10 mins in to the game.

We need a few new chants that can repeat repeat, like the laporte song. When our singing fails it is when we sing short 20 second bursts. The song gets going and by that time people stop singing it, also by the time middle % front have heard the back of 115 singing, the song has died. The laporte for example carried on and on so people kept going on joined in.

Same thing saturday, concourse sang, yet in the stands not as much. I think a lot is due to fans face and see each other on the concourse so can start off the song better.

The singing doesnt carry, so fans in tier 2 or 3 wouldnt hear us. But again if more people sang in 115 / 116 / 117 you would hear it all over.

The video clip of AC Milan is brilliant, would love that every game. But a lot of our fans wont allow it, there would be so many complaints about flags and banners for starters. Also we would have a fight on against security. But who knows one day.

The away fan situation was worse until we did the SS3 expansion years ago, we used to give away fans prime seats and split our own fans up. Now we have a better prime spot behind the goals. Away fans will never move due to away fans having to have a certain percentage of pitch viewing ( where possible hence some clubs dont like newcastle ). Plus Police want away fans in that exact location so it is an easy day for them to get fans from coach car park to the stadium. It wont change. The only way city fans will ever get a full end is if we expand north stand.

There are still vacant positions for SS level one behind goal, if you want to make a difference join in. Being in tier 2 or 3 is never going to be lively. Some new guys have moved to 115 / 116 this season, they said it is better than away games.
 
Psychedelic Casual said:
Definitely. We’ve missed and missed and missed opportunity after opportunity.

The opportunities we’ve had include:

When it was the Commonwealth Games stadium, we could have built a big one tier’d stand for vocal fans at the North Stand end that was an open end for the Games.

View attachment 24476

From Day 1, we could have plonked the away fans around the bit where they keep old goalposts and the sun lamps for the grass to split the away section up and have them out of sight of the cameras at the stadium, and had the away coach car park where the coaches line up next to the Squash Centre.

View attachment 24478

then we could have had the whole of the South Stand for ourselves, especially when the South Stand was extended. What other club shares their vocal stand with away fans? Could you imagine Liverpool deciding to give ⅓ of the Kop over to away fans?

When we built the South Stand Level 3, we could have made that our vocal section like at the San Siro:




But we gave a third of it to away fans and ,worse, for Cup games we have to give them the majority of our end which dwarfs out vocal section

View attachment 24486

We introduce rail seating but we could have switched around the Family Stand and the vocal section and had the whole of North Stand Level 1 as our vocal safe standing area

View attachment 24483

But we’ve not done a single one of these things. We’ve done everything but…
We’ve developed corporate areas, we’ve stopped people putting flags up to put digital advertising boards in, we’ve expanded the seats down three rows then taken them away again to put digital advertising boards in, we’ve given away a whole stand to families which has only been full a handful of times, we’ve put a stage up outside for bands pre-game, we’ve built a pub inside the ground, we’ve put in new bars outside and in, we’ve changed the food and drinks options half a dozen times, we’ve built a new big third tier with an overhang of a roof that helps project noise and given a third of it to away fans, we’ve put in rail seats with a fifth of them given to away fans… some good and some bad changes.

But we’ve kept the vocal section in the same place trapped between the away fans to one side, a corporate section above and the Colin Bell Stand to the other side.

The vocal section is what a football stadium is all about. That should be the Number 1 priority and everything else should be built around that.

We’ve got another opportunity coming up with the expansion of the North Stand which will happen in the next 5-10 years. Will we get it right for the vocal section? Because it will be one of the last opportunities we have to finally get it right before there’s nothing else that can be done in our stadium.
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Agree with every word on that. It's been like a (im)perfect storm ever since we moved to the stadium and no thought was given whatsoever to atmosphere as the signers dispersed all around the stadium.
 
Lots of missed opportunities over the years, but just like on the pitch momentum is a massive part of it, imagine last season with full houses, taking our title back & getting to the CL final, some of the atmospheres would of been incredible, but even that would of had to grow organically with the twenty odd wins on the spin, PSG/Dortmund in the CL being a huge contributor. There’s been a bit of a malaise with the hangover of last season & the start of this, but as a club & more importantly it’s support we have the opportunity & hunger to go again, don’t let a few errors in the past get in the way of creating more historic moments
 
trevorriley said:
from where i was Vs Norwich at the back of 115 the atmosphere was very good, went home sore hands and lost voice almost. Laporte love was great. There is always a dip in the second half while people chat and have a pint on the concourse then come back in to the stands 10 mins in to the game.

We need a few new chants that can repeat repeat, like the laporte song. When our singing fails it is when we sing short 20 second bursts. The song gets going and by that time people stop singing it, also by the time middle % front have heard the back of 115 singing, the song has died. The laporte for example carried on and on so people kept going on joined in.

Same thing saturday, concourse sang, yet in the stands not as much. I think a lot is due to fans face and see each other on the concourse so can start off the song better.

The singing doesnt carry, so fans in tier 2 or 3 wouldnt hear us. But again if more people sang in 115 / 116 / 117 you would hear it all over.

The video clip of AC Milan is brilliant, would love that every game. But a lot of our fans wont allow it, there would be so many complaints about flags and banners for starters. Also we would have a fight on against security. But who knows one day.

The away fan situation was worse until we did the SS3 expansion years ago, we used to give away fans prime seats and split our own fans up. Now we have a better prime spot behind the goals. Away fans will never move due to away fans having to have a certain percentage of pitch viewing ( where possible hence some clubs dont like newcastle ). Plus Police want away fans in that exact location so it is an easy day for them to get fans from coach car park to the stadium. It wont change. The only way city fans will ever get a full end is if we expand north stand.

There are still vacant positions for SS level one behind goal, if you want to make a difference join in. Being in tier 2 or 3 is never going to be lively. Some new guys have moved to 115 / 116 this season, they said it is better than away games.
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The San Siro clip was meant as an example of where in their stadium both Milan and Inter house their vocal fans. Both high up behind the goal, like where we could have housed ours when we opened SSL3. What their fans do with flags or flares was neither here nor there really mate.

It’s not necessarily where I want our vocal section, just that there was a chance for us in 2015 to put it there when it opened, much like there were other opportunities we missed at other times to put our vocal section in other areas.

And I agree there are only so many places to put the away fans because of the Police requirements, but if we’d put them where the vehicle access is from the start in 2003 and had their coach park by the Squash centre, it would have been ideal.
 
jrb said:
There were plenty of empty seats at most of the PL grounds this weekend. Arsenal played Chelsea yesterday. A top London derby. There were empty seats all over the ground, especially in the upper tiers. And the atmosphere was sh*te, apart from the Chelsea end. A couple of Arsenal, Arsenal, chants, and that was it.

Villa Park was the same. After Danny Ings scored his bicycle kick goal, he ran to the corner (flag), only to be met by loads of empty seats.
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I agree that empty seats aren’t exclusive to City although you would think they were. However, when Norwich returned all them tickets last weekend in SSL3 City whacked them on sale at £30 and they started flying out. It just goes to show that we have got the fan base to fill the stadium if it’s priced correctly but in the same area of the stadium for the Arsenal game it’s £63 adults and £40 for kids. What were they smoking when when they came up with those prices? I’ve got a season ticket up there so it doesn’t affect me but I just try and look at the bigger picture.
 
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