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Famous QPR Fans
at 22:17 26 Jun 2024

In a questionnaire the other day, Alex Chalk, Conservative MP for Cheltenham, was asked:
Q. Are you a football fan, and which team do you support?
A. As a child in the 1980s I collected Panini stickers and developed a soft spot for Spurs, so I lightly support them. As well as CTFC, I also follow QPR, as I lived near Loftus Road for a while when I was building my career as a barrister in London.
[Post edited 26 Jun 22:18]
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Corny Joke Warning
at 22:04 26 Jun 2024

Needs an injection
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Leaving loftus road...
at 11:51 20 Jun 2024

It would cost many, many millions to do what you suggest, and all for an extra 2k seats and some corporate hospitality,

I am neither an accountant or a construction expert, but I would be fairly certain that such a venture could never get the money back during the life of the stadium.

Therefore unless your owners were prepared to fund the capital investment needed without requiring any return (v.unlikely?), then surely such a scheme would only be adding to the £2m per month which the club is currently losing, not mitigating it, at least with interest rates where they currently are.

As for the Bees/GTech, three things have emerged from that move.
1. Originally it was meant to have a 20k capacity, but they realised that reducing the overall capacity to 17.5k to allow extra premium seating (lounges etc) would produce a higher return. Therefore your proposal might not even lead to a higher capacity than at present.
2. Our owner has concluded that even with a modern, new 17.5k stadium, it is simply not possible to break even, never mind turn a profit, in the Championship.
3. While experience has shown that even though our first 3 seasons in the PL have been profitable, this has only been by dint of transfer profits and having the lowest wage bill in the division.

And even this last is becoming ever harder, since we can no longer easily sign eg Watkins from Exeter for £5m and sell for £33m, or Toney from Posh for £10m and sell for £50m(?), since every other bugger is onto that now. Meaning that we're now signing players for £25-30m, with wages to match. Which in turn reduced the %age profits to be made, esp when you count the odd dud who has to be sold at a loss.

My guess is that the owner's least worst outcome is to try to stay in the PL long enough to bank a few million quid for when we eventually get relegated, which we can then use to bounce back up again.

Whilst the best possible outcome is to seek major outside investment, which he's doing, in the hope of long term financial sustainability in the PL.

All of which suggests that wherever else QPR might end up, there is no future at LR, whether rebuilt or not, such are the economics of the game these days.

(And I might add that I take no joy in saying any of that for either club, since beyond the local rivalry etc, I'm actually old-school at heart and genuinely like to see clubs like BFC, QPR and Fulham survive and thrive against the likes of Chelsea, Arsenal and Man U etc.)
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Departures in the development squad
at 15:08 18 Jun 2024

Cheltenham's new Director of Football is Gary Johnson, who managed Torquay for a few years until February.
While their new assistant manager is Aaron Downes, who was interim manager at Torquay after Johnson stepped away.
And AJB was on loan at Torquay last season.

Looks like Johnson is getting the band back together again at Whaddon Road.
[Post edited 18 Jun 15:09]
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Tottenham friendly tickets now on sale
at 13:02 18 Jun 2024

Re Dynamic Pricing, I hope it never arrives in English football. But I'm caustiously hopeful that it won't, because what you're describing are basically one-off events (concerts, MC v BM etc).

League Football is different in 2 respects. First, if you raise prices through the season to exploit increased demand, all well and good. But what if you have a crap season and find you're nowhere near selling out? The dynamics of that would see prices go down.

Second, the whole point about a ST is that even though it is discounted from matchday prices, nonetheless it is guaranteed income, paid up front - vital in order to budget for the season ahead (transfers, wages etc). Dynamic pricing on a match-by-match basis gives you none of that.

And even for a one-off like QPR v Spurs, there is a dnager that people will wait to see what team Spurs put out. Which is fine if stars like Son and, er, Maddison appear - you could probably sell out LR at top prices to Koreans alone. But what if Spurs field a B team, full of youngsters etc? No premium ticket prices there.
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Yes, it is Griffin Park
at 12:19 18 Jun 2024

For years, one of the touchline stands had a massive advertising sign on the roof, clearly visible on the Heathrow flightpath, saying "Next Time, Fly KLM" (club sponsors).

When the sponsorship ended, a fanzine asked for suggestions for a replacement. The winner was "Next Time, Flush Over Fulham".
[Post edited 18 Jun 12:21]
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Yes, it is Griffin Park
at 23:58 17 Jun 2024

What did they do?

For one thing, they stopped cramming people in in potentially very unsafe numbers. Then they replaced a lot of standing with seating. Above all, with the club's debts having reached unsustainable levels by the mid 1980's, the then Chairman/Owner replaced the big Royal Oak (Kop) Stand behind the goal with the tiny 'Wendy House' stand, using the space saved behind to build flats for sale.

I'm not exactly sure what the Royal Oak stand capacity was, but it was certainly over 10k. While the two tier Wendy, with seating upstairs, was around 2k.

Which is why GP's record attendance was just under 39k (in 1949), just as Loftus Road's was over 35k (in 1974).

Anyhow, thanks for posting that - I'd seen it before, but it was nice to be reminded, especially since the move to the GTech.
[Post edited 18 Jun 0:00]
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Tottenham friendly tickets now on sale
at 23:32 17 Jun 2024

Thanks for that, very interesting.

Anyhow, as regards Brentford, their "Use it or Lose it" policy is slightly more nuanced than described:
“There will be consequences if fans consistently leave their seat empty. If a season ticket holder fails to use their ticket for a league match, they will get a yellow card. If they get four yellow cards by the next renewal date in 2025, they will lose the automatic right to renew their season ticket for 2025/26.”

If you cannot use your ST for a given game, you can avoid a Yellow Card by assigning it to another Member, or by posting it for sale on the official Ticket Exchange.

While if you miss a game for an unavoidable reason (illness, road or public transport problem etc), you can appeal and have it scrubbed from the record.

All in all, this ST Holder doesn't think it too bad, though there were a lot of administrative and system problems when it was first introduced last season eg fans incorrectly being logged as not attending, or valid excuses for non-attendance not being recognised etc, warning letters being wrongly sent out.

Oh and btw, I think I'm right in saying that if from this season you post your ticket on the Exchange at least 7 days before the game, they guarantee to refund you your 19th value anyhow, even if it doesn't subsequently sell. (They must be very confident it will sell, or at least that the odd one which doesn't will be more than compensated by the sale of tickets at matchday prices well in excess of the ST price you're actually paying)
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Tottenham friendly tickets now on sale
at 23:09 17 Jun 2024

Not quite.

They have announced that there will be no more new Senior Concession ST's made available from season 2025/26 onwards, though if you're already in before that, you will still be able to go on renewing each season.

As for the concession itself, it is presently a generous (imo) 50% off the regular ST rate, but even there they intend to reduce it by 5% a season for the next five seasons until it reaches a 25% discount.

It's quite clear they don't want "legacy fans", many of whom will by definition have been supporting the team for decades, since they don't spend enough in the bars, restaurants and souvenir shops etc. Far more lucrative to replace them with high spending tourists and Koreans etc.

Absolutely disgraceful.
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Bikes in London
at 22:34 2 Jun 2024

One aspect of this war between motorists and cyclists that invariably gets overlooked is that in one important respect, they should both be on the same side.

That is, there are actually two types of motorist, those who need to use their vehicles and those who don't, but just want to, essentially from selfishness/laziness.

Thing is, if you discourage/inhibit/restrict the latter category, while simultaneously promoting cycling, the resulting decrease in congestion benefits the former, while the reduced pollution etc benefits everyone else.

But it seems to be the selfish/lazy lot who make the most noise, just because they can no longer drive their Chiswick Tractor a quarter of a mile down the road and park outside Waitrose, while they pick up some onions and a bottle of Prosecco.
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Clever Shop Names
at 22:15 2 Jun 2024

Funeral Director on Chiswick High Road:

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/p/AF1QipMuE2qhBuWMQFSrwLy3CRNgy8HVgfC3dXFwQx11

Dunno why you need to click on link?
[Post edited 2 Jun 22:19]
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Clever Shop Names
at 16:26 2 Jun 2024

There is a company which supplies Portaloos to public events etc. The motto on the side of their lorries is: "No.1 in the business of No.2's"

Though maybe it's not so clever, since although I can remember the motto, I don't remember the name of the company.
[Post edited 2 Jun 16:27]
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Quite Surreal
at 15:55 2 Jun 2024

A man was coming towards me carrying a tray of drinks.
He had a Dortmund hat, scarf, shirt and a tatoo on his leg.
I stepped back to let him through as he passed me he satd.
" Cheers Pal" in the broadest Scottish Accent i was taken aback.


A Scotsman buying a round of drinks?

"Taken aback" doesn't begin to cover it!
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Bikes in London
at 19:21 31 May 2024

I know CHR quite well, indeed travelled the length of it just last week, by bus..

I really don't recognise your description of it as having been "ruined" by the cycle lane.

And as for spending "30 minutes" to get over the lights at Turnham Green Terrace, that's complete nonsense.

You may have a case to make, but you really don't help it by such ludicrous exagerration - quite the opposite, in fact.
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Club crests
at 13:48 30 May 2024

Re Juve replacing their old, rather stylish crest with a simple "J" design, this came soon after Jeep became the club's main sponsor. The letter "J" features prominently in all Jeep's adverting, naturally enough.

Coincidence? I think not.
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Bikes in London
at 13:40 30 May 2024

A few years back, when the West London cycleway was being extended through Chiswick, the local car lobby started protesting about this, often quite vehemently.

One of their complaints was that the cycle way interefered with bus lanes.

Then someone went back through the archives to when the bus lanes themselves were first introduced, and found the EXACT SAME protestestors complaining about them, too!

This embarrassed them. For about four minutes.
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Spurs stadium
at 21:46 29 May 2024

Apparently the regular football dressing rooms, which are top notch, are in one stand.

But for NFL, they've built an entirely separate set of dressing rooms in the stand opposite - NFL squads are so massive, not just players, but coaches, physios, analysts etc, that they would struggle to fit in the football dressing rooms.
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Iconic Graffiti
at 21:36 29 May 2024

Graffito on a Belfast wall: "We'll never forget you, Jimmy Sands!"

(In a Loyalist area, naturally)
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1st time visiting Bath
at 21:21 29 May 2024

"I'm treating the wife to a weekend in Bath for our Anniversary."

Here is a notable Bath-based company you might like to visit:
https://www.lovehoney.net/

I only know this because I know someone who lives over the road from their warehouse, you can see the company sign from his kitchen window.
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Bikes in London
at 21:05 29 May 2024

Do you imagine that inconsiderate drivers only behave dangerously like this to cyclists?

That is, they would never behave like this to you when you're in your car, or walking along the street?

And as for drivers who have dashcams and may use footage to prosecute other dangerous road users, whether drivers or cyclists, are they "grasses" too?
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