Quote Ferocious Aardvark="Ferocious Aardvark"No reasoning required.
Leeds got smaller crowds then because they weren't so successful. They get big crowds now because they are successful. If in ten years time they are in the 2nd division they will no longer get 2009-size crowds.
It's not rocket science.
You can call the "additional" fans "gloryhunters" or whatever. It's actually just normal.'"
Quite correct, its a source of constant amusement that some people place such a huge emphasis on crowd figures and their need to assign some sort of badge of honour to clubs who may or may not manage to maintain a core of their attendees year on year - this just means that Club A has far more geeks than Club B.
Not all clubs realise this but they are all in the entertainment business, they compete with every other form of visitor attraction that you can name, including other sporting clubs, cinemas, pubs, etc, etc, etc.
The marketing team at Club A may have worked harder during the winter to convince the general public that a season ticket is terrific value and so guarantee their core of support, on the other hand in recent years at Headingley the value of a season ticket has gradually eroded to the position where we did not get to learn of the quantity sold before the season started - a sure sign thats its less than last year then.
Its a difficult arguement to see for those who will buy a season ticket plus a new shirt for every season regardless of what happens on the field for they believe that evryone thinks like they do, in truth its not like that for the majority of people stood alongside them in the ground, and its always a surprise to them to find that not everyone goes every week, or even every month - its always a surprise to supporters on ss.com when I mention that I often "can't be @rsed" going to a Friday night game at Headingley for a variety of reasons, that I haven't had a season ticket for four seasons, and that I only attended three live matches last season (two of them were finals though - and I didn't pay for any of the three

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But thats the way it is - smart clubs will do more to attract people through the gates, dumb clubs will just rely on their hardcore of club geeks.
How many people compare the audience figures at their local cinemas ?