Thetownend.com

Now, because the amuse you thread is closed.... check out this mug.

Has anyone looked at the teams that we are likely to be facing?

Bournemouth
Brentford
Bury
Carlisle
Colchester
Hartlepool
Leyton Orient
Franchise
Notts County
Oldham
Preston
Scunthorpe
Stevenage
Tranmere
Wycombe (maybe)
Yeovil
And probably Swindon, Shrewsbury, Crawley, maybe Torquay.

Apart from Preston and whoever bottles it out of Sheff Utd/Sheff Wed/Huddersfield, the division is filled with absolute dross, mostly from up north. There will be virtually nothing worth getting exicited about, and there arent even any new grounds to visit apart from Stevenage (woopee doo). It will be nothing but identikit stadiums, hoofball, 200 away fans in the east end every game, and Swindon taking pot shots at us, delighted that we've been dragged down to their level.

I'm genuinly dreading it.

The poor fellow.

That's what five years in Tier 2 does.

They should know all about dross  :Ride On Fatbury's Lovestick:

Nice to see they've got themselves relegated already.

If they are not careful They may only have to wait till the season after to be playing the blue half of the city, Even more dross  :)

To be fair he's right though, it does look pretty uninspiring, lets hope we dont make a dogs bollock of it like last season.

we still owe them for that relegation at Ashton Gate....

They were poor in the League cup and it doesn't look as if they have improved much.

didn't show much when leeds rolled them over months back.

Pot shots??  ???

It does show the danger of the clubs who push for the Premier League and fail.

Both Bristol City and Preston are 2 clubs that got to the Championship Play-Off final and failed and the descent has now started.

Preston are looking poor in League 1 and City look destined to end up there as well.

Be careful what you wish for, guys!

Small clubs eventually find their way back to Div 3 or 4.....it's difficult to make the transition from small to medium...Reading have managed it, so not impossible.

It's a gamble though, isn't it.  Sometimes it pays off, and sometimes it doesn't.  The other side of that coin is probably Reading, who have exceeded expectations this season and now look like going back to the Prem.  We can deride them for being 'plastic', but there's so much that club has got right in the last 15 years or so.

The list at the top does not have a full division of sides, by the way - and omits Pompey.  If we do go up, possible games vs Pompey and Bristol City would be well worth waiting for.  Both would attract bigger crowds, home and away, than Bristol Rovers or Oxford.

The key is getting your infrastructure right...new ground, or at least an upgrade of facilitities, to give 365 income streams, youth academy status and a training complex to go with it, and some sort of financial stability.

City have as yet failed on the new ground.  

We'll go nowhere, until we see a significant redevelopment at the CG...

Agree with all of that.  But we have been saying all that (about widening revenue streams and getting the County Ground to work for us on non-match days) as far back as the mid 1990s when Reading were planning their big move.  And what have we done in the interim?  Nothing.  The redevelopment is now long overdue.  We need to get it done, and we need to get it done right.  (A botched job, like at Oxford, will achieve nothing.)

Absolutely right on all points...we've had numerous windows of opportunity in the 50 years I've been going. I suppose the closest we came was in the early 70's when the North Stand was built, and for a while it was an impressive facility, hence we'd get U'21 internationals etc.

Part of the reason for doing nothing, of course, is the CG isn't that bad..clubs such as Reading, really had little option but to move.

As much as I appreciate the efforts of the present set up, they've shown no more desire to sort this out, than any of the previous incumbents of the boardroom.

I think you are writing off the current incumbents a bit soon.

Financing redevelopment now is probably the most difficult time in the last 30 years.

The level at which we are being subsidised by the owners can't go indefinitely, and will likely increase the further we climb the leagues. This makes a workable financial solution vital.

They say they are working on a plan. Lets see what happens

I must have put my point across badly...sorry.  I did not mean to criticise the present Board at all.  In fact (bar one or two small niggles), I have nothing but praise for them.  Best we've had in all the time I've been a fan.

When I said we had done 'nothing', I was making a much longer term comparison with Reading.  Up until the early/mid 1990s, we were similar clubs in many respects.  But while we were talking about improving our infrastructure at that point, they went and did it.  The respective paths the two clubs have taken in the last 15 years tells a story.  (And there's a parallel, sadly, with how the towns themselves have fared in the same period.)

And just to pad the point out further, I have also made the point a few times previously that we have to get the timing of our redevelopment right as well.  There was press talk about plans being put forward about 12 months ago which, thankfully, were put on the back burner following relegation.  Exactly the right thing to have done in my view, because we need to be planning longer term infrastructure development while we're on the front foot.  Try it when you're about to drop in to the 4th tier, and pessimism would affect the plans and saddle us with a 12,000 seater...cementing in lower aspirations for the club for the next 50 years or more.

So I'm fully supportive that little has been done by the Board up until now.  But - I hope things start moving forward soon, now that we seem to be heading in the right direction again on the pitch.

I was responding to Reg :)

Don't agree with most of this...the redevelopment should have next to nothing to do with where we are in the pyramid, tat's just an excuse for the fact that there's no viable business plan for what to put into the new CG.  That is because the local economy is particularly screwed, so there really is no good economic reason for change.

The trend is fairly obvious

Wigan- new ground moved up the leagues. Premier League regulars
Reading-  new ground. 2 seasons in Prem, look set to make it back
Swansea- new ground. Prem
Cardiff- new ground, challenging for Premier League
Blackpool- redeveloped ground, up there
Brighton- new ground timed perfectly with promotion to Championship

10 years ago we were playing these clubs every season

Franchise,
Huddersfield...

Chesterfield
Shrewsbury....

Darlington
Oxford

The theme doesn't work for everyone.

The fan base may have a bearing on that, amongst other things, like choosing the right management to run the team and the right players to play in said team.

franchise- different case

chesterfield- shit little ground
shrewbury- shit little ground
pox- shit little ground

darlington- ridiculous ground development, ruined the club

huddersfield- agreed,  doesnt fit the trend. same way qpr doesnt...they havent spent money on loftus road, just thrown money at managers!

apologies to chesterfield and shrewbury. what i meant is the aim there isnt for the top flight

We can't fill the ground we have got, so why would the board prioritise ground development.

Personally, I love the CG, and would hate to see it knocked down for a "bowl"

I know what you'll all say, why don't you visit it more often............fair point

There's nothing more reproachful than a huge new ground with three of four pockets of supporters and the shouts of the players echoing around the stadium.  I imagine Darlington must have been the most extreme example.  Reading and Milwall both Championship clubs haven't always risen above that and the North Stand, unfinished for years a la Bristol Shitty, looked horrendous as Town's flirtation with promotion to the top league turned sour with Dave McKay and subsequently nosedived under Ken Beamish.

Where Reading succeeded was in having a genuinely wealthy, astute and also committed backer who was able to develop team as well as ground (as well as infrastructure) and the edge we held over them in the post 69 years evaporated. 

Both towns were doing well economically in those years ... but contrast the ownership.  However it is true that Swindon has been more susceptible to changing economic trends than its neighbour and still may lack a catalyst as wealthy, astute and committed as was Madjeski.

You need to develop a squad AND a ground and if you cant afford or finance both then it's going to be very difficult to attempt what Reg rightly points out is the exceptional Reading like transformation from small to medium other than for a few relatively stellar seasons max.  You need the astuteness to make it all sustainable and to tap into the local and hopefully affluent enough local community.

How confident are we that Wigan will be bigger than us in 10 or even 5 years time?

The first step in a change to the County Ground has to be big now I feel (even though we all love it) but hopefully it can be developed in a way that isn't uniform but perhaps modular.  That is to say allowing for growth in stands and related facilities.  I don't like the stadium concept but the tiering system at Wembley worked pretty well in some respects because the empty spaces were confined to the top tier rather than pitchside or immediately above.  Will there ever be scope, as in Germany, to even have terraces. 

Anyway for now lets just concentrate on our side of the bargain and getting in a position to "take potshots" at the traders.

And who's going to sit in this big extened stadium ?

You and me arguing and a few sprinklings of moaners I guess.

It's a modest little dream of mine to imagine 15,000 ultras most weeks and high teens inc day trippers and away fans for some of the bigger Championship teams

Oh dear. It's been stated 100,000 times before on this forum and elsewhere - the purpose of the ground redevelopment is NOT to build a bigger ground due to weekly sell outs. It is to create new income streams through off-field commercial activities. Why do people find this so hard to grasp?!

100,000 ?

If only we could get 10% of those expressing an opinion through the turnstiles we would need a bigger ground.

......oh.......sorry 15%

I never said it was expressed by 100,000 different people ;)

We rarely sell over 10,000 so we may as well clear the stratton bank and put a casino and hotel over there

So it was 10,000 people expressing the same idea 10 times each, then we would need 150% of them to turn up to fill the current ground.

Maths is on my side

** nostalgia alert**

I remember the days we would get over 10k for a mid-table game against Barnsley,  and 13 to 14k when we played Bristol City. If we can get back to a championship level I think we could average 10k.

I thought the casino was going between the Town End and North Stand?

Is it enough to stay give us a realistic chance to stay there though?

This year there are two teams under 10K average, Peterborough and Doncaster, with Barnsley on just over 10K. There are eight teams with over 20K averages and another 3 with 18K averages.

Nah, fuck it. Of course we will stay there.

We are quite comparable to Barnsley

Seriously?!  We average 8,000 right now in League 2.  Do you really think that two promotions would add only another 2,000 to the gate?  Just 10 days ago we had 29,000+ fans at Wembley, a proportion of whom would certainly be persuaded to come along more regularly if Championship football was on offer.  And then you have the significantly increased away attendances as well.

I am fairly sure we would average well above 10,000 in the Championship.  That is why the infrastructure development piece is so important because, as Red Rag pointed out, it would have to go hand in hand with success on the pitch.  No way of proving this, but my hunch is that two promotions and a fully redeveloped, town centre stadium would add at least 50% to our present gates, and probably more.  Attendances in the low to mid teens should be perfectly achievable...with more than that for the very big games.

Insofar as both have had one season in the top flight...but Barnsley have had 60 odd seasons in Div2 against our 18, which makes them a bigger small club.

Nothing to do with the manager or team then, just the stadium

I don't quite get the "bigger club" mantra if a club has had a higher standing; more success at consistency maybe! Support wise, I remember when Barnsley used to average around 5k, crowds up to 16-20k when doing well in a higher league - we are on a par with that (except I think we'll always average more than 5k).

Depends on how well we do :). In all honesty there is no reason we couldn't average 11-12k, but we only managed 8k home fans against Rovers and that's when we are top of the league in a local derby (Ok, it's only league 2).

Well my theory for the Rovers attendance is that we've had Wembley and near 4000 people renew their season tickets this month, I doubt any bugger has a penny to their name!

There's plenty of examples of how a new or redeveloped stadium can increase attendances...even the scum, with their shithole by the sewage works have had bigger crowds at the Kassam, than at The Manor.

It's the old chicken and egg scenario.

Is it 'Build it and they will come' or is success on the pitch a prerequisite for more fans?

If a few millions are thrown at a revamped stadium but the progress on the pitch stalls, then all we will get is the moaners saying the money should have been spent on the team.

It is a very difficult balancing act - but the board must know what sort of financial commitment they are prepared for.

My view is that without success on the pitch or at the very least the prospect of it, no more fans will turn up no matter how good any new stadium may be.

Coventry and Derby are another couple of clubs with new grounds but underachieving on the pitch despite decent crowds

Reading have the ideal blueprint for us.

... For pretty much everyone (stadium location aside which is more of my opinion rather than a business issue).

I'm with you on the stadium location.  It's a soulless part of Reading...but a small price to pay, I guess.  Happily for us, we have the potential to have the best of both worlds.

Talking of Bristol City, I read somewhere that Roger Malone is living in Florida now

Taking little boys home  ;D