There were a few eyebrows raised in the Southampton supporter base when it was announced that the first of the two pre season friendlies at St Mary's would be against AFC Bournemouth, now it is clear why.
The first reaction from most Saints fans I have spoken to or read their posts on social media are totally perplexed at why Saints have planned a home pre season friendly against near neighbours AFC Bournemouth.
Their first thoughts were that after 124 years of sitting in the shadow of their neighbours from across the New Forest that their supporters were gloating at being what they see as the top dogs for the first time in that period.
So who the hell decided to basically set up a party for them in our own house to give them the opportunity to celebrate in front of us and ram it down our throats.
Whoever did this seems to have no grasp on how football and supporting your team works, you know your local rivals are going to give you stick, so you sure don't give them the opportunity to do so on your own turf, could you imagine Everton going down and playing a game against Liverpool at Goodison pre season so they could put up with 90 minutes of abuse, No neither can I so who had this bright idea in St Mary's.
To be honest most Saints supporters have historically not seen Bournemouth as rivals, our local derby is Portsmouth and that will never change, indeed in the 1970's, 80's and 90's Saints would regularly travel down to what was then called Dean Court to either raise funds for their latest money issues or for testimonials for one of their players.
They knew that with so many Saints supporters living in Bournemouth and a healthy travelling support on the day from the SO postcodes that it would be a bumper crowd.
That went sour a little in the 1990's when the home fans decided to make it nasty by chanting abuse during a minutes silence for the Mayor of Southampton who had died in an air crash a few days earlier, of course the football club itself distanced itself from the disgraceful act, but the feeling towards Bournemouth supporters changed on that day, they were seen not as local rivals but "Bitter Bournemouth"
Since then and with the Cherries fortunes flourishing after the turn of the century, they have tried without much success to turn this into a local derby, but they have found little appetite from across the New Forest, where there is still only one rival and that is Portsmouth.
So it seems that Saints supporters are boycotting this game, with less than 36 hours to go before kick off it seems that Saints have sold little more than 5,000 tickets, meaning that we will outnumber the Cherries fans but only just.
But that figure is unlikely to change much give the price of the tickets,
Initially they were priced just about right, £10 for adults and £5 for those under 18's, but this price was only for season ticket holders and members and although they could buy 4 tickets each, this price expired on the 11th July
After that the price rose to £15 for adults and £10 for under 18's and it gets worse, if you turn up on the day it is £20 for an adult ticket although the U18 price will stay the same at £10.
This pricing is also the same for Saturday's friendly against AZ Alkmaar, from the look at the online sales it seems that they have sold even less tickets for that fixture than for Tuesday's night's game and I suspect that there will be a lot less AZ Alkmaar fans to boost the attendance that Bournemouth fans.
Pre season games are a chance to attract those who do not attend games regularly, some are lapsed fans due to both disenchantment and also being priced out due to these tough times we live in financially, some due to both.
There are also those that have perhaps never been, but could be attracted, parents with young children just getting into football for example.
Pre season friendlies are the ideal opportunities to tempt them into attending the game and perhaps persuade them to come back more often, so why price these games so high, the matchday price for both of these friendlies for an adult is the same as the cheapest price for the Norwich City game and indeed many Championship fixtures for this season.
Everyone knows that pre season friendlies tend to sell slowly, but as peoples enthusiasm builds as the season nears, it increases and it is in the days before the game that it reaches it's peak.
After a good result at Reading, a game where we sold 2,400 tickets it seems that we will barely double that for the home friendlies, normally you would expect a raft of sales both online and on the day, we don't seem to have sold many on line and I doubt whether the walk up on the day will be much given the price.
Someone is getting their marketing strategy badly wrong at St Mary's, if anyone reads this article within the club they should consider how they can turn a negative situation into a positive.
Cancel the day of game increase for both games and publicise this, especially for the Alkmaar game where there is still time to build up some momentum, perhaps offer some discount in the club shop for on the day for those that buy a ticket, encourage the younger generation to go, give a free kids ticket away with every adult ticket sold, there are countless opportunities out there to market not just these games but the season ahead.
Pre season friendlies are loss leaders, they are not about preaching to the faithful, they are about attracting those to the ground that aren't going regularly now, tempting them into the fold.
In defence of the club, there has been a lot of change and some new employees who are having to learn as they go along, they are making mistakes before the season has even started though, they thought it was a good idea to offer the fans who had spent £500 plus on travelling to Turkey to watch the Goztepe game, that would be about 200 of our lost loyal supporters, tickets to watch the squad train at £55 a pop.
There was no take up, most were appalled at the so called offer and to be blunt few Saints fans were actually in Izmir by Friday morning, with most travelling on that day itself.
Whoever thought of that one clearly hasn't followed a club like Saints in a previous life, perhaps Manchester United or Arsenal fans would buy this one, but not club's like Saints were it is about the community and you don't fleece your community.
As I say Pre season friendlies are loss leaders, these two are just losses !