TIME IS RIGHT TO FINISH HOME PARK

The facts are hairybloke that we used to get the same or better attendance figures as the likes of Norwich, Ipswich and Southampton.

Try to work out why they have solid 20k fanbases, even in the lower leagues, when we don't.

It's not frikkin rocket science.

oddball wrote:

So a bit of income from a stand is going to be the universal panacea to solving Argyle's financial problems.True you may get the odd banquet,wedding reception,but dont forget Brent's hotel will be right alongside competing for business as will all the hotels that are planned to be built in the city centre.Plus all these fancy restaurants on the Hoe waterfront,and Royal william Yard.They will all be doing banquets,conferences,wedding receptions.The extra revenue streams from the new stand wont amount to very much at all.In fact if the current drinks prices being charged in the argyle business lounge are anything to go by,then businesses may well avoid it.

In a similar vein, I have been asking, ever since Kagami-San came on the scene, for an example, backed by facts and figures, of where else a FL Club been financially supported by income generated by non football use of it's facilities.

It must also be remembered that the ground is owned by the City Council, who, I am sure, will be asking questions about non football related ventures on a property they rent out specifically for sports use-or for a share of any profits generated thereon.. I expect that Council tax paying businesses such as hotels, restaurants etc. will also be asking why a local Authority is subsidising a potential business rival of theirs

hairy j wrote:

GOB wrote:

Spot on Hairy, success dictates the crowd size, sustained success ensures it.

Considering Argyle's continuous pish poor record it's a miracle that anyone bothers to turn up at all.

It's the SLEEPING GIANT myth and the catchment area myth.

There's a million and one reasons why we don't fill the ground every home game but one of those reasons isn't the "apathetic janner" that, we as Argyle fans, seem to believe exists.

How many people who live in Plymouth are from Plymouth?
How many of those like football?
How many of those can afford the time and money to attend regularly?
How many of those want to go?

I know we have the Cornish contingent but the above list is the core support at Home Park and it's not this 20,000 people that James Brent/Chris Webb seem to think it is.

No sir,the catchment area is not a myth,it's a fact.1.8 million people in Devon and Cornwall alone,within relatively easy transportation time of Plymouth.Can you not see the correlation between the lack of success and lack of support? To broaden this argumant a little further,lets go back to 2006 and look at the example of Cardiff and their recent and future attendance history.In season 2005/6,Cardiff had an average gate of 11720,having reached an attendance peak of 15569 in their initial season back in the CCC after a very long absence-in fact,their pattern was almost identical to ours after a few seasons back in the second tier.To pose your questions again;

How many people who lived in Cardiff were from Cardiff?
How many of them liked football?
How many of those could afford the time and money to attend regularly?
How many of those wanted to go?

Fast forward to 2012,taking into account an FA cup final,a league cup final and consistent play off positions and the answer to the last and most important question in Cardiff's case would seem to be 22100,which was their average gate last season.You could also carry out similar analysis for Reading,Hull,Swansea etc.What makes you think that if a successful team were to be produced at HP,the results wouldn't be the same? As Tring has pointed out,our gates can be statistically proven to have been superior to any number of clubs at one time-why would this be any different in future should real success be achieved? I happen to agree with the "apathetic janner" comment that you make-that is a myth and is a convenient scapegoat for the failure of the top level of the club to do it's job ever since the formation of the club-you might as well say that all Welshmen were apathetic before 2006.It's a product of history rather than genetics.

cardiff a good example, sleeping giant.

in late 1999 or was it 2000/2001 ? sam hamman turns up 'welsh army' & money spent with many soundbites & seige mentality all of sudden they are 2 division higher.

stagnation, but still the brand keeps the 11k going (pre 2000 that was 3.5K)
they are sold on having spent much money they havent got or did have & now they have 22k !!

success & continued success will bring crowds in. nothing else.

hull spent a fortune in 2001 but took 3 years to get out the 4th divsion but they rode the crest of the new gound wave.

also of note all cardiff, reading swansea hull soton have all have new grounds int he last 15years & had success directly or indirectly as a result..........

Greenskin wrote:

hairy j wrote:

GOB wrote:

Spot on Hairy, success dictates the crowd size, sustained success ensures it.

Considering Argyle's continuous pish poor record it's a miracle that anyone bothers to turn up at all.

It's the SLEEPING GIANT myth and the catchment area myth.

There's a million and one reasons why we don't fill the ground every home game but one of those reasons isn't the "apathetic janner" that, we as Argyle fans, seem to believe exists.

How many people who live in Plymouth are from Plymouth?
How many of those like football?
How many of those can afford the time and money to attend regularly?
How many of those want to go?

I know we have the Cornish contingent but the above list is the core support at Home Park and it's not this 20,000 people that James Brent/Chris Webb seem to think it is.

No sir,the catchment area is not a myth,it's a fact.1.8 million people in Devon and Cornwall alone,within relatively easy transportation time of Plymouth.Can you not see the correlation between the lack of success and lack of support? To broaden this argumant a little further,lets go back to 2006 and look at the example of Cardiff and their recent and future attendance history.In season 2005/6,Cardiff had an average gate of 11720,having reached an attendance peak of 15569 in their initial season back in the CCC after a very long absence-in fact,their pattern was almost identical to ours after a few seasons back in the second tier.To pose your questions again;

How many people who lived in Cardiff were from Cardiff?
How many of them liked football?
How many of those could afford the time and money to attend regularly?
How many of those wanted to go?

Fast forward to 2012,taking into account an FA cup final,a league cup final and consistent play off positions and the answer to the last and most important question in Cardiff's case would seem to be 22100,which was their average gate last season.You could also carry out similar analysis for Reading,Hull,Swansea etc.What makes you think that if a successful team were to be produced at HP,the results wouldn't be the same? As Tring has pointed out,our gates can be statistically proven to have been superior to any number of clubs at one time-why would this be any different in future should real success be achieved? I happen to agree with the "apathetic janner" comment that you make-that is a myth and is a convenient scapegoat for the failure of the top level of the club to do it's job ever since the formation of the club-you might as well say that all Welshmen were apathetic before 2006.It's a product of history rather than genetics.

Cardiff. Metropolitan population of 860,000
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Cardiff City... a club with huge amounts of debt that still haven't been promoted into the promised land.

Great example.

Cardiff. Average attendance last season - 22,000

Our gates were good once upon a time when we had a few ships in and sailors had nothing else to do on a Saturday. Since we've had an all seater stadium, I can only remember one sell-out and that was Watford in the cup.

I can remember when we played Everton in the FA Cup 1989, only 3rd round, 28,000 packed inside HP...no spare tickets that day, what an atmosphere, drew 1-1 Sean McCarthy scoring for us before Burrows hand balled for the penalty equaliser.

punchdrunk wrote:

I can remember when we played Everton in the FA Cup 1989, only 3rd round, 28,000 packed inside HP...no spare tickets that day, what an atmosphere, drew 1-1 Sean McCarthy scoring for us before Burrows hand balled for the penalty equaliser.

A one-off.

You cannot rewrite history and fact. We've never been supported like the other giants of the game so we are not a sleeping giant.

hairy j wrote:

punchdrunk wrote:

I can remember when we played Everton in the FA Cup 1989, only 3rd round, 28,000 packed inside HP...no spare tickets that day, what an atmosphere, drew 1-1 Sean McCarthy scoring for us before Burrows hand balled for the penalty equaliser.

A one-off.

You cannot rewrite history and fact. We've never been supported like the other giants of the game so we are not a sleeping giant.

Thats because we have never had sustained success at the top -level driven by financial investment at boardroom level.
Norwich, Southampton to name a few used to get smaller crowds then us, sustained time and investment at the top level transformed them into clubs that can regularly get attendances like the ones we get once every decade

hairy j wrote:

Greenskin wrote:

hairy j wrote:

GOB wrote:

Spot on Hairy, success dictates the crowd size, sustained success ensures it.

Considering Argyle's continuous pish poor record it's a miracle that anyone bothers to turn up at all.

It's the SLEEPING GIANT myth and the catchment area myth.

There's a million and one reasons why we don't fill the ground every home game but one of those reasons isn't the "apathetic janner" that, we as Argyle fans, seem to believe exists.

How many people who live in Plymouth are from Plymouth?
How many of those like football?
How many of those can afford the time and money to attend regularly?
How many of those want to go?

I know we have the Cornish contingent but the above list is the core support at Home Park and it's not this 20,000 people that James Brent/Chris Webb seem to think it is.

No sir,the catchment area is not a myth,it's a fact.1.8 million people in Devon and Cornwall alone,within relatively easy transportation time of Plymouth.Can you not see the correlation between the lack of success and lack of support? To broaden this argumant a little further,lets go back to 2006 and look at the example of Cardiff and their recent and future attendance history.In season 2005/6,Cardiff had an average gate of 11720,having reached an attendance peak of 15569 in their initial season back in the CCC after a very long absence-in fact,their pattern was almost identical to ours after a few seasons back in the second tier.To pose your questions again;

How many people who lived in Cardiff were from Cardiff?
How many of them liked football?
How many of those could afford the time and money to attend regularly?
How many of those wanted to go?

Fast forward to 2012,taking into account an FA cup final,a league cup final and consistent play off positions and the answer to the last and most important question in Cardiff's case would seem to be 22100,which was their average gate last season.You could also carry out similar analysis for Reading,Hull,Swansea etc.What makes you think that if a successful team were to be produced at HP,the results wouldn't be the same? As Tring has pointed out,our gates can be statistically proven to have been superior to any number of clubs at one time-why would this be any different in future should real success be achieved? I happen to agree with the "apathetic janner" comment that you make-that is a myth and is a convenient scapegoat for the failure of the top level of the club to do it's job ever since the formation of the club-you might as well say that all Welshmen were apathetic before 2006.It's a product of history rather than genetics.

Cardiff. Metropolitan population of 860,000
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Cardiff City... a club with huge amounts of debt that still haven't been promoted into the promised land.

Great example.

Cardiff. Average attendance last season - 22,000

Our gates were good once upon a time when we had a few ships in and sailors had nothing else to do on a Saturday. Since we've had an all seater stadium, I can only remember one sell-out and that was Watford in the cup.

FFS,if you're going to put forward an argument,then make it an intelligent and supportable one.When was our record gate? 1936,i believe,43596 against Aston Villa.Were there lots of "sailors with nothing to do on a saturday" on that particular day? Or,in my lifetime ,when we got 38000 against Everton and Santos and 35000 in the cup against Derby? Derby is always regarded as a football town,yet the crowd for the replay at Derby was 27000.Lots of sailors in town again that day,i suppose.

I have been going to Argyle since around 1962 and went on to become a matelot so not only a janner but a sailor type janner at that. Fact, in the early mid 60's and beyond there were quite a lot of off duty matelots who went to Home Park on a Saturday afternoon. When we played Pompey it was the battle of the Ports because they had much the same supporters. In those days there was a rivalry between Devonport and Portsmouth Ratings far more than now. Today matelots have more money and better things to do on a Saturday than support a club in a City they do not hail from. TV also televises matches which was not the case then so if they wanted to see football then the only place to do that was at Home Park. There were also many more ships and matelots then which is another fact.

Sensiblegreeny wrote:

I have been going to Argyle since around 1962 and went on to become a matelot so not only a janner but a sailor type janner at that. Fact, in the early mid 60's and beyond there were quite a lot of off duty matelots who went to Home Park on a Saturday afternoon. When we played Pompey it was the battle of the Ports because they had much the same supporters. In those days there was a rivalry between Devonport and Portsmouth Ratings far more than now. Today matelots have more money and better things to do on a Saturday than support a club in a City they do not hail from. TV also televises matches which was not the case then so if they wanted to see football then the only place to do that was at Home Park. There were also many more ships and matelots then which is another fact.

Ah right.So it was all matelots in the crowd against Everton in 1975.Glad thats all sorted then.Come to think of it,how did i ever to fail to notice that the 16400 average crowd that we got in our first season back in the CCC was composed almost entirely of Jolly Jack types? Bleddy unobservant of me.

Just on the point highlighted,i notice that in 1962/63 Argyle averaged around 16000.What percentage of that crowd would you say were matelots?

Firstly I didn't say anything about who was in the crowd in 1975. I was in Gib then so have no idea. I said early/mid 60's so please don't misquote. On the second one I have no idea of numbers anymore than you do apart from the season average you looked up. What I do know is that there were many, that is many so you don't misquote or go overboard, who were matelots and went to Home Park at varying times of the season when in port. I'm sure there are others of a certain age group who post on here who can verify, without quoting actual numbers to the nearest 10, who know that there were a lot of jolly jack tars who went to Argyle in those days.

Sensiblegreeny wrote:

Firstly I didn't say anything about who was in the crowd in 1975. I was in Gib then so have no idea. I said early/mid 60's so please don't misquote. On the second one I have no idea of numbers anymore than you do apart from the season average you looked up. What I do know is that there were many, that is many so you don't misquote or go overboard, who were matelots and went to Home Park at varying times of the season when in port. I'm sure there are others of a certain age group who post on here who can verify, without quoting actual numbers to the nearest 10, who know that there were a lot of jolly jack tars who went to Argyle in those days.

I think you really miss the point.The bloke who posted earlier said that Argyle used to get good gates due to "sailors having nothng better to do on a saturday afternoon",which i believe to be one of the most shallow and ignorant statements that i've ever read and which should be challenged.You made the point that indeed there were plenty of matelots around at HP,which would seem to back up his point to a certain extent.All i asked was a percentage estimate of the crowd who were RN,not a figure to the nearest ten.Was the figure 50%,which would indeed back up the previous posters comments? Or was it 10%? 25%? 2%? Just a ball park figure,thats all to give some indication of the truth or otherwise of the PP's assertion.Actually,it may be worth asking for Tring's opinion on this one as well,i think he was a regular supporter at the time.

The good gates were not due entirely to matelots but were partly to do with them is my point. As I've said I have no idea of the percentage or real numbers but there were plenty who went when around and with nothing better to do. A good number of them weren't Argyle supporters as such but were football fans who could not go to see a live match involving their own home town club. I worked with 2 blokes at one time who were Villa and Middlesborough fans who went to Argyle regularly. It was hardly an extention of Aggy Weston's or the NAAFI but when sailors were poorly paid and could not afford to travel home every spare weekend the a couple of shillings on a Saturday afternoon at Argyle when the pubs were shut was a place they went. To put the wages in context when I joined as a lad in 1965 my pay was a grand £5 per fortnight.

Has Tring ever been a suporter? Gosh it's hard to believe isn't it these days.

Sensiblegreeny wrote:

The good gates were not due entirely to matelots but were partly to do with them is my point. As I've said I have no idea of the percentage or real numbers but there were plenty who went when around and with nothing better to do. A good number of them weren't Argyle supporters as such but were football fans who could not go to see a live match involving their own home town club. I worked with 2 blokes at one time who were Villa and Middlesborough fans who went to Argyle regularly. It was hardly an extention of Aggy Weston's or the NAAFI but when sailors were poorly paid and could not afford to travel home every spare weekend the a couple of shillings on a Saturday afternoon at Argyle when the pubs were shut was a place they went. To put the wages in context when I joined as a lad in 1965 my pay was a grand £5 per fortnight.

Has Tring ever been a suporter? Gosh it's hard to believe isn't it these days.

Still doesn't answer the question,though.How plenty was plenty? And no,it isn't hard to believe that Tring was a supporter.People like Tring and Freathy are actually far more positive in their thinking on Argyle than most because they believe in the potential of the club and have plainly been driven to distraction by the continuing cycle of mediocrity.Their problem in relation to those who blindly,fatalistically and unquestioningly accept every decision that the club makes is that they speak their minds and are somehow regarded as disloyal-more power to them for that i say, and long may the biting and withering criticism of atrocious management/directorship continue.

How much is he paying you for his PR? Tell you what you tell me what percentage of the gates weren't matelots with nothing else to do then. Or ok I'll agree with you and there were absolutely no matelots there at all I just made it up.

I am trying hard not to over exagerate the numbers here because the biggest percentage of people at the ground were locals. However, there were plenty of matelots who went. Honest there were. They were allowed ashore in Civies even in those days and didn't take their hats everywhere and wave them around. Hats were reserved for hitchhiking.

Just to add to the statistic argument that we had an average attendance of 16,500ish once upon a time... yes we did. For one single year in the Championship in 2004/05. The following season, in the same league, we averaged 13,700ish and the season after that we averaged 13,000ish and, after that, it remained at 13,000. The squad that we had during the 2006/07 season was this and we averaged just 13,000
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and we finished 11th.

Building a 30,000+ stadium isn't small minded or lacking in ambition, it makes perfect sense to build one for 20,000 people as we're never likely to fill it very often.

punchdrunk wrote:

hairy j wrote:

punchdrunk wrote:

I can remember when we played Everton in the FA Cup 1989, only 3rd round, 28,000 packed inside HP...no spare tickets that day, what an atmosphere, drew 1-1 Sean McCarthy scoring for us before Burrows hand balled for the penalty equaliser.

A one-off.

You cannot rewrite history and fact. We've never been supported like the other giants of the game so we are not a sleeping giant.

Thats because we have never had sustained success at the top -level driven by financial investment at boardroom level.
Norwich, Southampton to name a few used to get smaller crowds then us, sustained time and investment at the top level transformed them into clubs that can regularly get attendances like the ones we get once every decade

Spot on.

Historical success not only breeds a larger active fanbase but they also have belief. I live in Bournemouth and my barber is a Saints fan. When they were in League 1 and we had beaten them at home on the first day he was still talking about being in the Premiership in a few years time. He truly believed that their slip into League 1 was a blip. He did this based on their history since the 1970's.

He of course was right. That's why Norwich sold out their season tickets in League 1 also. Where are they both now?

Being in the top flight of football for a number of years means that the younger generation see no need to support Man Utd or Chelsea when they have a local team competing against them in their own right. Maintain that position and you have a hardcore bedrock of support that will still be there when the going gets tough.

Do we believe? No, because we've never played in the top flight. Apathetic? Maybe but if for over 100 years of playing the same thing happens time after time it is normal human behaviour to think that next time it will be the same result.

hairy j wrote:

Just to add to the statistic argument that we had an average attendance of 16,500ish once upon a time... yes we did. For one single year in the Championship in 2004/05. The following season, in the same league, we averaged 13,700ish and the season after that we averaged 13,000ish and, after that, it remained at 13,000. The squad that we had during the 2006/07 season was this and we averaged just 13,000
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and we finished 11th.

Building a 30,000+ stadium isn't small minded or lacking in ambition, it makes perfect sense to build one for 20,000 people as we're never likely to fill it very often.

But isn't that what GS is getting at Hairy? That no real ambition was shown during that period? No great investment in finishing the stadium, and cheap signings to replace the best players who were sold?

I see both sides of the argument on this. Why have a half empty stadium every week, countered by the argument that a new sadium would attract more fans, especially if some showcase signings were almost made to coincide with the expanded stadium.


It's like the chicken and the egg. Do we wait until the extra capacity is needed, or expand now while the new grandstand is being built, and with some decent investment in the playing side of things, the fans should turn up to watch. What would be disastrous would be to do it half assed again. Build the new grandstand leaving an ok maximum capacity, and don't invest in the playing side again. That would leave us pretty much where we are now for years.

Exactly,without additional financial investment the club will just stagnate in the lower leagues.People wont come to watch rubbish.

Another bone of contention with me is £20 to watch the standard of football served up over the last couple of years? It was roughly the same to watch Championship football, and you can watch much better football in higher leagues for the same or not much more.

5-6,000 paying £20 or 8-9,000 maybe paying £15 works out about the same, but the extra fans give the ground a much better atmosphere and would spend on programmes, food and drink and probably some money in the club shop too.

The die-hards will always pay whatever the entrance price, but a big campaign highlighting the price reduction would surely bring more people in?

Greenjock wrote:

hairy j wrote:

Just to add to the statistic argument that we had an average attendance of 16,500ish once upon a time... yes we did. For one single year in the Championship in 2004/05. The following season, in the same league, we averaged 13,700ish and the season after that we averaged 13,000ish and, after that, it remained at 13,000. The squad that we had during the 2006/07 season was this and we averaged just 13,000
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and we finished 11th.

Building a 30,000+ stadium isn't small minded or lacking in ambition, it makes perfect sense to build one for 20,000 people as we're never likely to fill it very often.

But isn't that what GS is getting at Hairy? That no real ambition was shown during that period? No great investment in finishing the stadium, and cheap signings to replace the best players who were sold?

I see both sides of the argument on this. Why have a half empty stadium every week, countered by the argument that a new sadium would attract more fans, especially if some showcase signings were almost made to coincide with the expanded stadium.


It's like the chicken and the egg. Do we wait until the extra capacity is needed, or expand now while the new grandstand is being built, and with some decent investment in the playing side of things, the fans should turn up to watch. What would be disastrous would be to do it half assed again. Build the new grandstand leaving an ok maximum capacity, and don't invest in the playing side again. That would leave us pretty much where we are now for years.

It's partly what i'm getting at Jock,the way that the momentum was thrown away in 2004/5 with the inevitable decline in interest that a 17th place finish brought [see the comparison with Cardiff in an earlier post].Actually,i do think that a 30000 stadium would be over ambitious ATM,20k would be ok,preferably with plenty of room for expansion.But this guy is just so tunnel visioned that he just cannot see the comparison between Argyle and clubs like Cardiff,Swansea,Reading etc who were all,not so long ago,getting smaller gates than us but who will be filling their stadia comfortably in the season to come.Is that such a difficult comparison to understand? Fairly obvious to me.No one is saying that Argyle should literally be compared to clubs like Man Utd,Liverpool,Chelseas,Newcastle etc when using the term "sleeping giant".But there is no reason why Argyle shouldn't emulate clubs like those mentioned earlier-if results were similar,support would be similar and would be easily big enough to sustain a premiership club,no matter how many boats were alongside in any given season.

Reading another.....when they played at Elm Park they were averaging 4-5k a game

Sleeping giant is such a misnomer perhaps a diazepam induced lethargy would be more appropriate.

Nick Wall wrote:

punchdrunk wrote:

hairy j wrote:

punchdrunk wrote:

I can remember when we played Everton in the FA Cup 1989, only 3rd round, 28,000 packed inside HP...no spare tickets that day, what an atmosphere, drew 1-1 Sean McCarthy scoring for us before Burrows hand balled for the penalty equaliser.

A one-off.

You cannot rewrite history and fact. We've never been supported like the other giants of the game so we are not a sleeping giant.

Thats because we have never had sustained success at the top -level driven by financial investment at boardroom level.
Norwich, Southampton to name a few used to get smaller crowds then us, sustained time and investment at the top level transformed them into clubs that can regularly get attendances like the ones we get once every decade

Spot on.

Historical success not only breeds a larger active fanbase but they also have belief. I live in Bournemouth and my barber is a Saints fan. When they were in League 1 and we had beaten them at home on the first day he was still talking about being in the Premiership in a few years time. He truly believed that their slip into League 1 was a blip. He did this based on their history since the 1970's.

He of course was right. That's why Norwich sold out their season tickets in League 1 also. Where are they both now?

Being in the top flight of football for a number of years means that the younger generation see no need to support Man Utd or Chelsea when they have a local team competing against them in their own right. Maintain that position and you have a hardcore bedrock of support that will still be there when the going gets tough.

Do we believe? No, because we've never played in the top flight. Apathetic? Maybe but if for over 100 years of playing the same thing happens time after time it is normal human behaviour to think that next time it will be the same result.

Thank you.