Pep: 'The players deserve a full stadium, we need our fans!'

[Metalartin]

Mate, after an 8 hour round trip on Tuesday for nothing, I think some of us can be forgiven for taking the comments to heart.

(having said that I had a lovely Chicken Madras in Timperley on the way back, so every cloud - pun intended)..

Yeah I can see how it must have felt when you could have been at the game to witness a performance like last night if not for that thunderstorm(tempted to make a joke that it was probably the rags doing but I will leave that), I'd be more gutted about missing the game I would have been at which was a belter than anything else personally, his comments were more general than specific to last night and just poorly timed.

 

[Pam]

Because he didn't say it on Tuesday night, he said it last night when there were exceptional circumstances. I'd rather he said it after the 1-0 bore fest against Bucharest and not taken the focus off what was the best 90 minutes of football I've seen us produce.
It's done now and hopefully it'll have an affect. You can be sure though that everyone's eyes will be even more focused on our attendances than what they already were.

Because he didn't say it on Tuesday night, he said it last night when there were exceptional circumstances. I'd rather he said it after the 1-0 bore fest against Bucharest and not taken the focus off what was the best 90 minutes of football I've seen us produce.
It's done now and hopefully it'll have an affect. You can be sure though that everyone's eyes will be even more focused on our attendances than what they already were.

They were anyway. We need to get to a position where they can't say it. We need to fully embrace the CL now.

 

[middleton___blue]

I personally agree with Pep; theres no excuses. Just look at spurs...80k sellout against a "lesser" side too albeit its london but still we cant use our location or the cancelletion as an excuse cause I highly doubt itd have been sold out just like the qualifier.

Personally think the only way we can get city fans as interested in the CL as the PL is to either literally give the tickets away or make a lot of progress like getting to the final in it.

Till then it doesnt look good for a full house at least.

 

[Chris in London]

Fair enough, I just feel the 'way they've treated us' is melodramatically blown out of proportion. I had a gripe with FFP, but that's dead now anyway and the man who introduced it is banned from the organisation. Is that not enough to move on? As for the CL being unfair, etc...it always has been, since it's inception, but that's due to UEFA pandering to the 'G14' clubs who threaten to break away.

Anyway, boo or not...whatever makes you feel better, although you're naïve if you think it has any affect on UEFA or their brand.

I'm guessing that you aren't one of those blues who forked out for visas flights and match tickets, only then to be banned from attending the game and offered no compensation either by UEFA or by CSKA - only to see plenty of CSKA fans admitted to the stadium in a game that was supposed to be being played behind closed doors. I didn't go either, but I suppose if you think it is melodramatic to sympathise and show solidarity with the blues who did, then that is up to you.

As to voicing my dissent by booing their anthem, again it is up to you whether you view that as naive, just as it is up to me whether I view it as apathetic or spineless to decline to do so.

As it happens I live in a constituency which is solidly Tory, and has been for ages. If I vote tory at the election, the majority will be 15,001. If I vote labour the majority will be 14,999. My vote therefore counts, in the grand scheme of things, for diddly squat. I still vote, because I wish to register my approval (or lack of it) of the government of the day. I will continue to boo the UEFA anthem for much the same reason. I have only one voice, but I intend to use it, whether or not vocalising my displeasure has any practical impact. Do you genuinely not understand this?

You may or may not be right that it won't have a significant effect, but you are wrong to say it will have no effect whatsoever - it already has. The official report to UEFA for a game last season included reference to the anthem being booed. Such a reference is usually the precursor to a disciplinary charge, and I personally incline to the Mark Halsey line in terms of whether authorities like UEFA or the FA sometimes seek to influence the content of the match report with a view to bringing a charge in relation to something they are not happy about. The resultant outcry against the possibility of the club being fined because we voiced our dissent appears to have made them back down. They wanted to stifle it, they quickly realised that to do so would be worse than to do nothing. It also worked against them in the sense that it is now more widely understood why we City fans feel that we, and our club, have been badly treated by UEFA.

These are small victories, but they are victories nonetheless. It will be a sad day if legitimate dissent is stifled because it is not likely to achieve anything.

 

[Manchester_lalala]

I wish our fans could be as passionate about making as much noise during a game as they do booing UEFA's anthem. It's usually the peak of the atmosphere (last night being a rare exception).

Maybe they could randomly play the CL music over the speaker system at points during the game so we make some actual noise.

Wouldn't not going to the game make a bigger statement? After all, you're just helping fill UEFA's coffers, the organisation that's out to get us.

You're beginning to bore me.

 

[Metalartin]

I'm guessing that you aren't one of those blues who forked out for visas flights and match tickets, only then to be banned from attending the game and offered no compensation either by UEFA or by CSKA - only to see plenty of CSKA fans admitted to the stadium in a game that was supposed to be being played behind closed doors. I didn't go either, but I suppose if you think it is melodramatic to sympathise and show solidarity with the blues who did, then that is up to you.

As to voicing my dissent by booing their anthem, again it is up to you whether you view that as naive, just as it is up to me whether I view it as apathetic or spineless to decline to do so.

As it happens I live in a constituency which is solidly Tory, and has been for ages. If I vote tory at the election, the majority will be 15,001. If I vote labour the majority will be 14,999. My vote therefore counts, in the grand scheme of things, for diddly squat. I still vote, because I wish to register my approval (or lack of it) of the government of the day. I will continue to boo the UEFA anthem for much the same reason. I have only one voice, but I intend to use it, whether or not vocalising my displeasure has any practical impact. Do you genuinely not understand this?

You may or may not be right that it won't have a significant effect, but you are wrong to say it will have no effect whatsoever - it already has. The official report to UEFA for a game last season included reference to the anthem being booed. Such a reference is usually the precursor to a disciplinary charge, and I personally incline to the Mark Halsey line in terms of whether authorities like UEFA or the FA sometimes seek to influence the content of the match report with a view to bringing a charge in relation to something they are not happy about. The resultant outcry against the possibility of the club being fined because we voiced our dissent appears to have made them back down. They wanted to stifle it, they quickly realised that to do so would be worse than to do nothing. It also worked against them in the sense that it is now more widely understood why we City fans feel that we, and our club, have been badly treated by UEFA.

These are small victories, but they are victories nonetheless. It will be a sad day if legitimate dissent is stifled because it is not likely to achieve anything.

Do you not understand that people are saying when you have already got the message across but still keep on at something you are flogging a dead horse... people are now grasping at straw after conceding the message was heard, using things that UEFA haven't even approved as the reason for the booing to continue? Would you rather City not bother with the CL? UEFA aren't going away they run the competition.

 

[worsleyweb]

Why are the timing of the remarks wrong when there would have been 10,000 empty seats on Tuesday night?

Is 44,000 people attending a football match bad? I don't think it is.

 

[Chris in London]

Do you not understand that people are saying when you have already got the message across but still keep on at something you are flogging a dead horse... people are now grasping at straws, things that UEFA haven't even approved as the reason for the booing to continue? Would you rather City not bother with the CL?

So I can understand what you are saying, are those who boo the anthem flogging a dead horse, or are they complaining about things that haven't happened yet?

You seem to be saying its both, but those two seem to me to be mutually exclusive.

 

[AustinBlue]

Not sure why we are being so sensitive. The manager used a fan publication to ask fans to show up and sing- Can't blame him, because it helps the team performance. We don't pack the stadium every match - hard to argue with it, because we don't. We draw fewer fans than United et al- true, although a smaller percentage of ours are plastic wankers. We have a loyal core of fans, substantially from the Manchester area. But we didn't build a huge out of town following during the pre takeover decade when we had mediocre results. Kids on the playground in Manchester during that decade were far more likely to choose United, because it was way easier. Over time, and with more success, we'll build more fans. But right now, we don't have that many. So Pep is asking the fans we do have to show up and be supportive because he wants every edge he can to win.

That said, we are a Football Club, and we are playing the best football in Britain. So, for all those lurkers from other football clubs, suck it. Celebrate your seat sales. We'll celebrate great football. We know who we are. We showed up when we were crap. We show up now. And our numbers are growing.

 

[inbetween]

I don't understand why people get so bothered about attendances, we weren't playing Barcelona we were playing the 3rd best team in Germany the day after the game had been cancelled. Many have work, many can't afford it, many could attend Tuesday and then couldn't last night. Many probably wanted to buy tickets after the change who couldn't attend Tuesday and these went unsold because UEFA saw to it we weren't allowed to start selling them again. I could attend either night because my work allows the flexibility to do so, without that I couldn't go at all because of the time I finish.

A low attendance on a weekday is pretty inevitable and the only exception would be for a league game where season ticket holders are more obliged to attend because they have paid to be there in advance. Pep is a purist, he wants a big atmosphere to boost the players and that is completely right to ask of us, he won't comment more though or judge because why would he, it isn't his money. His comment I think was misconstrued in the sense that he was asked about the booing and general negativity to the anthem/competition, not about the attendances.

Just to compare the huge teams, Barcelona attendance on Tuesday night - 72,000 out of 100,000, Real Madrid had 72,000 out of 80,000. The exception I guess is Spurs last night but then that game is in one of the largest cities in the world. For them it was the first game in their 2nd time in the competition, first time ever at Wembley, it was hardly a straight forward run out against a 3rd rate German team in the 5/6th year of their participation in the competition.

Consider this, say we got 35/40,000 on last night, that is about 60/65% capacity which is pretty similar to the other teams above and we aren't a capital city like Madrid or a huge centre like Barcelona... It really is a pointless thing to be bothered about to be honest because nowhere else was rammed to capacity with some mega atmosphere. Looking at the highlights it looks to me like we enjoyed a better atmosphere than the one at Wembley.

Lets see what United's attendance is against Zorya in a couple of weeks and we'll see what happens.