5900

[Norfolk N Chance]

For a lot of people in Donny, payday is this week. And I know loads of people who went to the Leger and are skint now.  You could see it in town on Friday night, the annual post-Leger come down with the pubs half empty. I know a fair few who gave this game a miss because of that.

Yes I am so skint but realized that saving bit a month enable me to get a great valued ST ...

[neil grainger]

my last game was the crawley game wich bored me to death. so thats why i stayed at home and watched gillet soccer saturday.

Congratulations.

Why do you post on here if you're not a supporter?

Go do something else - isn't X-Factor on?

[steve@dcfd]

After today's performance the club should be grateful to get 5900 supporters. Results and performance on the field of play will bring back supporters. Today was awful from both teams. If you think different then you are deluding your self. Neither side would have got anywhere the team we had in 2007 in this league. Yes Jones, Spurr and Brown would have got in the squad the rest of the present day team would not have been close. So lets stop blaming marketing and get realism on the field is we're it counts and unless performances improve the club will have to accept this kind of support.

[Donnywolf]

[/quote]
Honestly, I thought with us not playing at home for so long and Stevenage flying high, we would get a decent turnout today.
[/quote]

History may show 5900 WAS a decent turnout

[Jim Dobbin]

I think 5,900 is a decent turnout, what was the average again last time in this division?

[The Beast]

Why did I not receive an e-mail advertising the Stevenage game, as with previous games? Just some waffle about that kid from Donny in a boy band playing at the Keepmoat!

[SoundbiteBarmyArmy]

We were boring to watch yesterday, very boring! I can see there been no more than 3000 vs Chesterfield in JPT and then we may push 4500 vs PNE as I expect them to bring more than 500, then vs Shrewsbury I think we'll be back down to around the 3800 mark!

[Lesonthewest]

I'm sorry but 6000 will drop again if the football on show doesn't improve, because yesterday was absolutely awful. The annoying thing is, having watched two so called top three sides in Crawley & Stevenage, who are mediocre at best, we should be easily challenging at the top, a couple of loan signings (midfielders please) & having a go at sides at home, should see us up there.

[MrFrost]

We were boring to watch yesterday, very boring! I can see there been no more than 3000 vs Chesterfield in JPT and then we may push 4500 vs PNE as I expect them to bring more than 500, then vs Shrewsbury I think we'll be back down to around the 3800 mark!

3800? So several hundred season ticket holders are going to stay away?

[The Red Baron]

I'm sorry but 6000 will drop again if the football on show doesn't improve, because yesterday was absolutely awful. The annoying thing is, having watched two so called top three sides in Crawley & Stevenage, who are mediocre at best, we should be easily challenging at the top, a couple of loan signings (midfielders please) & having a go at sides at home, should see us up there.

Are we seeing the first effects of "Financial Fair Play" here? A drop in the quality of the fare on offer all round.

I'd love to see us bring in a couple of quality midfielders, but I doubt our budget would stretch to it.

[Rupee92]

I've not gone so obviously won't slate the supporters...

...It is a very poor turnout though! We had 8k season ticket holders a couple of years back, we haven't done enough to keep them. It's a failure on the clubs behalf.

Atleast with attendances like that though, we won't sell out of these new, world class pies though

[BillieJA]

Those praising Stevenage's support...

Aren't they a direct train journey away from us? I don't think it was that brilliant for a team who have had successive promotions and just missed out last season!

[Dutch Uncle]

Out of interest here is a comparison with 1987-88 (the last time we played in Tier 3 before the conference days):

Average attendance: 1913
Largest attendance: 2751 vs Rotherham
Lowest attendance: 1306 vs Southend

To paraphrase the famous 3 Yorkshiremen Monty Python sketch:

"5900 for a home game, luxury......in my day we had 1 man and his dog holding up the roof of the popstand with his tail"

[Alonzo Drake]

Thanks for the perspective DU. Frost's gate comments are as stupid mad mick's stats posts.

Stevenage are no draw to us whatsoever -- a more established northern or midlands club yesterday would have bought more home and away fans to give us a 6,500 + gate -- and that's fantastic compared to the late 80s, and compared to the early 70s.

My lowest ever home gate, at BV, was on Tuesday evening, March 22, 1974 v Newport, when the miner's strike power cuts forced a 6 pm kick off (no floodlights allowed) and only had 1,163 turned up.

We won it 2-0 thanks to goals from Peter Higgins and Terry Curran.

In fact earlier in that season a home derby with Barnsley only attracted 3,070.

We had it rough Dutch -- And you try and tell the young people of today that Obadiah .....

[Dutch Uncle]

  Thanks Alonzo-diah

[MrFrost]

We can't afford to be ignorant to falling attendances. It needs addressing. A medicore season this year will only see further decline.

[andysly]

Doesn't seem that long ago people were moaning that we were getting less than 10,000 in Championship.
If memory serves me right we averaged 11,300 ish that first season. Even taking an average of 1,800 away fans leaves 9,500 Rovers fans a drop of nearly half to 5,500 ish yesterday.
Relegation, poor performances, poor opposition + generally poor football has far more to do with this than pure economic reasons.

[MrFrost]

We averaged 11964 in our first Championship season.

Look at Preston. They have adopted a great ticket scheme and market heavily in the town. Result is 11k at this level.

[Dutch Uncle]

But we were down to 9341 last season

Our last season in tier 2 in 1957-8 we averaged 11129 which dropped to 6652 the following season in tier 3.

IMHO dropping from 9341 to say an average of 6500 would be about par for the course. I would expect our largest home attendances against Sheffield Utd, Coventry, Notts Co, Scunthorpe, Preston and possibly Portsmouth. We haven't had any of those matches yet.

Edit: Our average attendances for our last 4 FL1 seasons were: 6886, 6139, 7725 and 7978, which I reckon would also suggest we could reasonably expect 6500 since attendances all round are down in the last 4 years

[MrFrost]

I agree falling attendances is a trend throughout the country. It is just my belief more could be done in terms of attracting fans.

There's going to be 15000 people at the KMS in a few weeks for that charity game. DRFC should be pulling out all the stops to entice people into returning to the stadium.

[Dutch Uncle]

While I certainly agree more can always be done Frosty, I am only saying there is a limit to how many more fans we can expect, and it may well be that 5900 was not so far away from that number for this weekend. We will never know 

[RedJ]

I agree falling attendances is a trend throughout the country. It is just my belief more could be done in terms of attracting fans.

There's going to be 15000 people at the KMS in a few weeks for that charity game. DRFC should be pulling out all the stops to entice people into returning to the stadium.

I wonder how many of them that are going actually like football though. Bet you most will only be there because Louis is playing.

[MrFrost]

I agree falling attendances is a trend throughout the country. It is just my belief more could be done in terms of attracting fans.

There's going to be 15000 people at the KMS in a few weeks for that charity game. DRFC should be pulling out all the stops to entice people into returning to the stadium.

I wonder how many of them that are going actually like football though. Bet you most will only be there because Louis is playing.

Worth a try for nothing isn't it? We practically own the place, and it will be full.

Ultimate answer to it though is to win games. Put us top of the league and I reckon you could add a couple of thousand to the gate.

[RedJ]

Oh yeah, definitely, not writing your idea off, just not sure that there'll be too many there wanting to see a game more than wanting to see some ponce t**t prance around in a pub team kit.

[MachoMadness]

Yep, above anything else, winning games is the only thing that's gonna get the fans back. I remember when we won Division 3, when we went on that insane winning streak after Christmas Belle Vue was heaving towards the end. And that was in a division lower following years in the Conference.

If we look like we're going to be competing for the top 6, then fans will come, and stay for as long as we are competing.

[mattco]

Our gate was still among the higher ones in L1 yesterday.  Coventry got a decent crowd but keep watching as their results drag them down. i fell 8000+ is a reasonable target against bigger clubs and if we can string a few home wins together.

[DonnyBazR0ver]

Before some folk get too shirty about the lack of commitment from some, you need to remember that our fanbase is made up of many individuals who do not necessarily live and breathe Doncaster Rovers FC.

I respect anyone who if they feel they are not being 'entertained' etc. to be able to make a choice. As we can see from the decline in attendances not everyone attends out of duty and many have already expressed that choice.

Criticism from this forum or the club will not bring those people back.  Word of mouth reports about the performances will not bring them back either. 

When and if results do get people back to the stadium, then let's hope we can keep them coming. 

[DRFCSouth]

The fact remains that for many years we have been in the lower leagues and are also surrounded by a number of clubs who have a lot more success over the last 50 years. Outside of London there cant be that many areas where we would have to compete for support in the same way teams in Yorkshire do. Lets be realistic, not everyone in Donny supports Donny. It would be nice if they did but they don't. We are poles apart from where we were 10-15 years ago. We now seem to be on more of a stable footing financially and it will probably take a few years to bring the squad back to where we want it.

[Donnywolf]

We were boring to watch yesterday, very boring! I can see there been no more than 3000 vs Chesterfield in JPT and then we may push 4500 vs PNE as I expect them to bring more than 500, then vs Shrewsbury I think we'll be back down to around the 3800 mark!

3800? So several hundred season ticket holders are going to stay away?

I know 4 that are on Holiday and several more who dont go to "nondescript" competitions like the JPT or even COC  (unless we make the latter stages of either of course)

I cant "speak" for other STH's but faced with a long journey from wherever @ a huge cost by train or car the exiles may give it a miss too

My heart leapt when I saw your reply as I thought it inferred this game was "part of the ST package"

[MrFrost]

We were boring to watch yesterday, very boring! I can see there been no more than 3000 vs Chesterfield in JPT and then we may push 4500 vs PNE as I expect them to bring more than 500, then vs Shrewsbury I think we'll be back down to around the 3800 mark!

3800? So several hundred season ticket holders are going to stay away?

I know 4 that are on Holiday and several more who dont go to "nondescript" competitions like the JPT or even COC  (unless we make the latter stages of either of course)

I cant "speak" for other STH's but faced with a long journey from wherever @ a huge cost by train or car the exiles may give it a miss too

My heart leapt when I saw your reply as I thought it inferred this game was "part of the ST package"

The way I read it is that the poster reckons there will only be 3800 there against Shrewsbury.