Football fans are creatures of habit and this contributed to our lowest FA Cup crowd since we arrived at St Mary's

Much has been said over the last few months about season tickets and pricing, but although price is a big factor in when one decides to attend a football match or not in the main it is one of several factors, each in their own right contributing to what the final attendance might be.

Those who seek to apologise for Nicola Cortese at every opportunity will be finding it hard to justify the ticket arrangements for the visit of Shrewsbury Town, Nicola is a ver driven and focussed businessman they will chirp, but that being the case every succesful businessman is driven by results and on Saturday the numbers through the turnstioles were an abject disaster.

The big question I would be asking if I was running the club is why we have just had our lowest ever FA Cup tie gate at St Mary's ? whi is it over five and a half thousand less than our previous low, why is it eight and a half thousand less than the first FA Cup home tie last season (incidentally against non league opposition)but perhaps more importantly why is it ten thousand less than attended the game on Tuesday night, where have all those fans gone ?

The pricing of tickets is not the complete answer, £15 for an adult and £5 for a child was a good price to bring in the families, last years game against Luton saw a big walk up on a freezing cold day, yet on Saturday before the game at least it was perfect weather yet the walk up was zilch.

In my opinion it was the closing of half the ground that contributed most to the poor attendance, it said something to the supporters about the game and almost sublimely put the thought into many peoples heads that this was a game of little importance, secondly football supporters are creatures of habits, they like to go and sit in the same seats each week, due to the nature of my work, im not a season ticket holder, however I do know where all my friends sit and when I go to the game i buy a ticket near them, for Saturday it took military precision to attend the game if you wanted to go with you mates,with either one person needing to go down and get all the tickets or face being sat apart if you couldnt get  a seat nearby a friend. Of course you could walk up and pay on the day and if I remember rightly against Luton there was a big walk up and queues and this has ben a feature of other cup ties and this maybe was in peoples minds so they just decided to give it a miss.

Whatever the reasons though the facts are that a major chunk of Saints fans didnt turn up for a game and the Club has to look at why they didnt, for some of those I spoke to Nicola's statement about Shrewsbury trying to line their pockets stuck in their throats, after all werent Saints trying to do just that by closing the Kingsland & Chapel stands, surely the cost of opening those stands is not a lot more than having them closed, yes you will need a few more stewards, but not that many more as steward numbers are done on the basis of number of supporters per steward needed, so less people in the Itchen means less stewards in that area and so they could be transferred to the other two stands, in short the cost of opening the Kingsland could almost be measured in hundreds not thousands, in my opinion this was a huge mark of disrespect to Saints supporters as after all the Kingsland is the most densly populated area of the ground, by cllosing it you were alienating more than if the Itchen had been closed.

But there was a little more, the atmosphere was flat, in the past year or so the Northam has been augurmented by the Kingsland corner and the atmosphere at the ground has been stoked up a notch, on Saturday there was none of that and to be blunt it was as flat as a pancake, perhaps the worse ever at SMS.

In conclusion as I said those who trumpet Nicola Cortese as a businessman should realise that he has top be judged on results and not wise words and on Saturday the ticketing policy resulted in a very very low attendance and that is not a succesful result. 

Photo: Action Images

eusebio added 10:54 - Nov 8 Delusional rubbish. To think, apart from giving away tickets, we would have got more that 10.5k for shrewsbury is plain daft.
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Saintpaul120 added 11:09 - Nov 8 It was a shame there were so few people there I agree. The reasons for it, I don't know and wouldn't like to summise. I will, however, agree with you that the atmosphere was very flat! I also think that Nigel Adkins confused the Shrews singing with ours as there chants sounded like OWTSGMI (substitute Shrews for Saints) when he was complimenting the fans on their support in his after match interview. It was disappointing and as hard as some individuals tried to get chants going, it didn't come off because we were fragmented around the ground. There's nothing that can be done about it though because if the whole ground had been opened up I think the Saints supporters would have been even more fragmented and, perhaps, the noise would have been around the same. We, somehow need more supporters there - perhaps on 27th or 28th against Cheltenham! Be interesting to see if there are changes made.

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lallanaland added 12:22 - Nov 8 Over 10,000 is a poor attendance for a first round FA Cup game? Come on get real, that is a more than decent crowd. Just what kind of numbers were you anticipating?
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Sam added 12:31 - Nov 8 Yawn. As said above, unless you were going to let people in for free, we were never going to get that much more than 10k against Shrewsbury. You are a very strange, bitter man.
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Longstock added 12:42 - Nov 8 Look at the other gates for this round. Saints come out as one on the highest. If you are using the Luton game as an example you need to look at the gates of other games that day. What is the comparison. What was the cost of the ticket against Luton. Did it compare with this years cost. You are silent on this. Closing the Kingsland and Chapel is not just about Stewarding. It is the beer outlets, the food outlets, the cleaning afterwards. £15 was at the top end of what many would like to pay. I know of some who stayed away because they felt the cost was too high. Look at the crowd for Dagenhan & Redbridge. Over 20,000 home supporters on a dark Tuesday night. OK I know there were ticket deals but that has to be a credit to SFC. Perhaps many chose that against the £15 cup charge. I suspect Cheltenham game will cost the same with the same restrictions. Only increased cost of tickets to cover the opening of additional area's or increased support will make a difference.

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BLEEDRED added 13:36 - Nov 8 10000 BRILLIANT CROWD, get real fans will pick and choose games I will be going to the next 2 home games but will not go to the Cheltenham game no matter what the ticket prices ( sorry if that makes me a poor fan ) As for the closing of the stands, common sense as it saved money at a guess opening the whole ground would have required a extra 100 personal (stewards , catering staff, turnstile operators etc) say 4 hours at £7 per hour per person that's £2800. NC is trying to save every pound he can so having a fully open ground that is only a third full will never make sense.

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A1079 added 14:28 - Nov 8 When I was a single person with just me to consider I used to go to virtually every game whether it be home or away and no matter how attractive or unattractive it was on paper. However, for some time due to rising costs of tickets, fuel, programmes and add ons, mortgage, bills, children etc etc I have to consider whether or not to attend any game because to justify spending any amount on football against my outgoings I need to feel sure I can afford it and whether I think I will get value for money (often I don't). Just as football is a business in terms of how it is run now, equally to many people it is a commitment which has to be weighed up against a host of other commitments. Simpy this game did not attract me at all and nor for that matter the FA Cup at this point. If I am going to spend money watching Saints, which I often do, then I would prefer to spend it on a league game. The price of the ticket to some extent was irrelevant. I have to say, for the same reasons that I have listed I will not bother with the Cheltenham game. Does that make me a fair weather supporter and no doubt in later rounds (if we get there) if attendance goes up then people will be accused of being trophy seekers and not real supporters. it is a matter of economics which for many of us is a stronger case than any passion or support you have for a club. I love watching Saints and support them as much as I viably can but I do not have an open cheque book for watching them or for that matter any other form of entertainment.

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legod7 added 15:32 - Nov 8 If that is the sort of rubbish that will be served up in our next FA Cup game it is lucky only 10,000 turned up. It was the most inept performance served up by Saints at home since the Swindon JPT match.(Y es I was unlucky to go to that one as well ) Yes,I am a season ticket holder,but if the perform like that in our next 3 crucial league games then we will be in the bottom six instead of the top six.

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zippy added 19:07 - Nov 8 Are you a actually a saints fan ? does make we wonder did we not have the biggest gate of the round ....there is something ugly inside this site that is the only thing this site has got right for years
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felly1 added 18:55 - Nov 9 Last season Luton brought down around 3000 fans,it was also the 2nd round which may have pulled more people in,also after playing the Daggers on the Tuesday night,i reckon alot of non season ticket holders preferred the chance to watch us move into the top 6 rather than spend £18 on a 1st round cup match which is not as popular as it once was.Personally i expected a crowd of about 12000 so it was haedly a suprise to me.Also rather than sit in my usual spot in the Northam i gave the Itchen South a go.Me and my buddies were frankly dismayed by the dead atmosphere there,the moaners and groaners and some bloke continually calling Guly..Julie which really began to grate after a while.Dont get me wrong the game was awful and Saints looked frankly uninterested,even more bizarre to me was the praise heaped upon Lallana after the game by the Echo and Adkins,i guess he kept going and had the ball alot,a nice goal at the end but to me he was on autopilot along with pretty much everyone else.....There was no urgency in anyones performance.

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