Saturdays Gate

Discuss all matters related to Dagenham and Redbridge
SUSSEX DAGGER
Posts: 2619
Joined: Sun Oct 20, 2013 2:47 am

Once again poor and not helped by a resurgent West Ham being at home.

Left me wondering did we give consideration to moving this game to Sunday.

I know there was a good turnout from the Green Army and perhaps we were frightened of losing a couple of hundred of them paying top dollar but I think you will find Plymouth is a place that most of those in attendance originate from and probably not currently reside at.

If that is not the case and the majority of them are residents then I take me hat off to them, being that Plymouth is currently an Island and they embarked on a horrendous journey to support their team.

Getting really worried now about these falling gates and think that an occasional Sunday especially when West Ham are at home is given serious consideration.
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ThatRoundThing
Posts: 554
Joined: Sat Oct 19, 2013 11:40 am

Figures don't lay all the blame on West Ham matches Chris.

Saturdays HOME fan attendance was 1281, I've picked out a few other low HOME fan attendances to try and find if there was a link to West Ham. Surprisingly of the lowest I found, West Ham were not at Home those days.

Aug 10 v York 1129 Home fans. West Ham no game
Aug 24 v Newport. 1290 Home fans. West Ham away
Sep 14 v Bristol R 1065 Home fans. West Ham played the day after (Sun)
Nov 30 v Wycombe. 1257 Home fans. West Ham were at Home to Fulham.

I too thought West Ham had more of an influence on our attendances but apparently not. Very worrying.
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ARNU
Posts: 3746
Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 4:43 pm

Its the price.

Its a pretty downtrodden and poverty stricken area and our prices don't recognise this.Now theres all manner of reasons why the price is the price but the paying punter dosent care about them and votes with his feet.A standing place in the sieve aint worth more than a tenner but us die hards will pay the asking price until we get fed up.Simply some people haven't got the dough.Funny how they all turn up when its £2.50 though.So id say more realistic pricing will increase the gate.Economics probably wont stretch to this brilliant idea so the gates will continue to fall.

It might help if the fackin team could win at home occasionally too.Who's looking forward to next week ? Not me.
Bollix to Shampoo, it's real poo we want !
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Masked Man
Posts: 153
Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 2:45 pm

I didn't buy a season ticket this year(main reason, early bird brought forward) and decided I would skip a few games when the weather was shit and or the team playing pants. Saturday was one of the games I skipped. This coming Saturday might be another.
ronaldaggero
Posts: 30
Joined: Sat Oct 19, 2013 11:27 pm

Masked Man wrote:I didn't buy a season ticket this year(main reason, early bird brought forward) and decided I would skip a few games when the weather was shit and or the team playing pants. Saturday was one of the games I skipped. This coming Saturday might be another.
We have to beat Mansfield on Sat. and I'm sure we will play well , will be a convincing victory and we can all say it was because the Masked Man was present .
It's a real shame that every time we get a platform for a descent run we slip up and lose one when we could have / should have done better. Last 2 home games have been frustrating , we need to get at teams early on and give them something to think about , really need Norris starting , he is prepared to get his shots away , if we don't get shots in on target , then we aint gonna score , simples.
admin
Site Admin
Posts: 475
Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:24 pm

I wasn't intending on posting on here much but there's something I would like to point regarding this. It first started to really concern me when Southend only had 18 fewer fans compared to us a few weeks ago. After that e-mailed the club with a lot of suggestions as to how to improve the situation. The clubs response was poor in my opinion and it made me realise that we are club with no ambition who will end up playing conference/conference south football very soon. It's only Accrington Stanley who have smaller gates compared to us and atomsphere there is supposed to be a lot better than ours. It's frustrating supporting Dagenham and I'm on verge of giving up.
Daggers No 2 Fan
Posts: 229
Joined: Sat Oct 26, 2013 6:02 pm

Wow, so because the club didn't respond in the manner that you wanted to your suggestions, that means they have no ambition.
Surely, if they really had no ambition, they'd have resigned from the Football League and applied to join a lower league instead.

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that your suggestions were a combination of:
1) things that have been done before anyway
2) things that would have had a negative impact on finances in short, medium and long term
3) things that were plain daft
HogansHeros
Posts: 67
Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 5:52 pm

Admission prices at Burton were £15 for an adult and £5 for a youngster. That seems about right to me. I think £27 for a lad and a Dad to stand in the sieve is quite a lot.
admin
Site Admin
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Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:24 pm

Daggers No 2 Fan wrote:Wow, so because the club didn't respond in the manner that you wanted to your suggestions, that means they have no ambition.
Surely, if they really had no ambition, they'd have resigned from the Football League and applied to join a lower league instead.

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that your suggestions were a combination of:
1) things that have been done before anyway
2) things that would have had a negative impact on finances in short, medium and long term
3) things that were plain daft
Ok then genius, I'll put this question to you. What would make new fans want to support Dagenham rather than support the likes of Orient, Southend, Wimbledon, West Ham etc.? What makes supporting our club more attractive than supporting one of our rivals?
matt_drfc
Posts: 1332
Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 1:58 pm

admin wrote:I wasn't intending on posting on here much but there's something I would like to point regarding this. It first started to really concern me when Southend only had 18 fewer fans compared to us a few weeks ago. After that e-mailed the club with a lot of suggestions as to how to improve the situation. The clubs response was poor in my opinion and it made me realise that we are club with no ambition who will end up playing conference/conference south football very soon. It's only Accrington Stanley who have smaller gates compared to us and atomsphere there is supposed to be a lot better than ours. It's frustrating supporting Dagenham and I'm on verge of giving up.
They probably had more than us, there were a few in the sieve. Considering they have been in the football league a lot longer than us and don't have a premier league club a few miles away it's guaranteed they have a bigger fan base... It's not that the club have no ambition at all, if we had none then we would have gone back to the conference instantly. The club hasn't changed over the past 7/8 years, so why would we get relegated now? I'm not being funny but you are actually a proper idiot.
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Mike the Dagger
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admin wrote:
Ok then genius, I'll put this question to you. What would make new fans want to support Dagenham rather than support the likes of Orient, Southend, Wimbledon, West Ham etc.? What makes supporting our club more attractive than supporting one of our rivals?
I don't think many people go off and watch other clubs over us, even West Ham really. Price does make a difference, especially on season tickets. Once the season is under way though, what really matters is are the team playing well and winning, plus the weather etc. It is far more likely people will stay in or away to watch one of the dozen or so games that are on the TV every week than defect to Southend or Orient.

Right now we aren't playing well, and our home form has gone to pieces. the "anti-racism day" bumper crowd was wasted as we then turned in an abject performance in a poor atmosphere, which is not going to get many of the extra bodies back through the gates in a hurry at full price.

Oddly enough the best games recently were in the bad weather v Scunthorpe and Wimbledon, but only the die hards will have come out to watch on days like that sadly.

Its tricky getting more people in through the gate, times are hard, and there are lots of other things that people can do with their free time than stand and watch Zavon Hines look half interested in a game of football on a Saturday afternoon.

Meanwhile, average attendances are still up on the Conference championship season and lets not forget that its only 8 seasons since the average was 1242 (2005/06). It takes time to build a fan base.
Daggers No 2 Fan
Posts: 229
Joined: Sat Oct 26, 2013 6:02 pm

admin wrote:
Ok then genius, I'll put this question to you. What would make new fans want to support Dagenham rather than support the likes of Orient, Southend, Wimbledon, West Ham etc.? What makes supporting our club more attractive than supporting one of our rivals?
Pretty much nothing. Support for football clubs isn't direct competition, it's driven by other things, including emotional attachment.
People will tend to support either:
1) their local team
2) a team they have some sort of link to (e.g. through family supporting the club)
3) a team that is successful

Now, let's look at those in turn. Most of the locals aren't really locals any more, so don't care. The links will reduce as more and more people move away.
The team isn't really successful. It's had some good moments over the 20ish years it's been around. It hasn't had the time that the other clubs you mention have had to build up support.
It wouldn't matter what any other club offered, I wouldn't stop supporting my team to go and support them. It works exactly the same the other way.
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Masked Man
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Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 2:45 pm

Unfortunately it seems a lot of people who 'like' football are only interested in it at the highest level.
dagger4eva
Posts: 1735
Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 1:39 pm

Number 1 reason is absolutely down to cost (despite fact we still charge amongst the cheapest tickets in the football league) so I believe.

As Mike said, I doubt very much indeed that those 2-300 previous regulars arent going elsewhere. They are just chosing not to come to every home game like they used to.

As also said, it doesnt help that every single bleeding chance we manage to draw in a big crowd the team fails to produce a sparkling performance.

As also said again, a whole host of people have moved away to, dare I say it, nicer areas. I took will likely be moving away in the next 6 months to a different area of Essex. Will make coming to games more challenging but sure I will still be at about 75% or therabouts.

We've never had amazing support and anyone that is struggling to come to terms with that (admin) had better learn to just deal with it, coz in the current climate (nothing to do with club's ambition) it isn't about to change any time soon!
SUSSEX DAGGER
Posts: 2619
Joined: Sun Oct 20, 2013 2:47 am

HogansHeros wrote:Admission prices at Burton were £15 for an adult and £5 for a youngster. That seems about right to me. I think £27 for a lad and a Dad to stand in the sieve is quite a lot.
East End Club West End Prices.

We certainly are not one of the cheapest D4E in fact I would say in an away supporters view we are one of the most expensive.

You know D4E my Son used to bring four mates regularly and up to 8 on an occasional basis. Last Season they were charge £6 this year it is £17, a eye watering 283% increase.

This Season only 2 out of that 8 have been to a couple of games. The decision to decrease the age band for Juniors was in my mind commercial madness, you priced out a element of a potential future fan base a element who are less able to afford it.

The rise to a tenner they would have suffered, but £6 to £17 was madness for what after all has been a very poor product over the past two seasons.

So there is 8 we have lost with £600 in revenue down the pan.
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