The Egg chasers relegation

[Silver Fox]

How annoying will it be for you cavemen that the biggest crowd of the season may well be for a rugby match !

This seems unlikely, unless LI are somehow going to draw a full house for an almost relegated team.

Oh and wouldn't the eye gouging, cheap shotting racists be the cavemen?

[Nameless]

Bang on, no way would LI fill the Mad Stad these days !
But given their is a major European game being played there which could be between two very well supported English teams there is every chance a genuine sell out crowd could be seen (no segregation or seat netting needed !).

The caveman one is interesting. Would it refer to coin throwing, in fighting, flare lighting types ? Or how about biting, rascist, drug taking, rapist types ?
Or maybe just a tongue in cheek reference to individuals with a bit of an intolerant attitude ?

[paultheroyal]

[Nameless]

Presumably you think you are making a point Paul ?

Gonna post the Keane tackle on Haaland ? Or the Leeds player who just got an 8 match ban for biting ? Or the Toni Schumaker assault ? Or various Suarez offences ? Or Diouf spitting at people ?

Some disgraceful thugs in both sports. Is anyone trying to excuse any of it ?

[Fox Talbot]

Hey, yesterday I posted what I hoped was an informative, level-headed and mildly controversial contribution to this thread.

No reaction. Instead the last 4 posts have been people insulting each other / the sports they don't like.

Am I doing something wrong here?

[MoorgateRoyal]

I'd just like to dip in to the general argument here and say that I hate rugby and I hope London Irish get relegated and leave the stadium forever.

[Nameless]

Hey, yesterday I posted what I hoped was an informative, level-headed and mildly controversial contribution to this thread.

No reaction. Instead the last 4 posts have been people insulting each other / the sports they don't like.

Am I doing something wrong here?

Yep, posting at the bottom of a page so no one sees it !

Not sure there has really been any insulting, it's all tongue in cheek. And being a very longstanding RFC STH I'm not sure what sport you think I don't like ?

There is quite a bit I disagree with on your post. Clubs can set prices as they wish and if they pitch them low to draw people in then I'm not sure who loses really. Historically we gave away lots of tickets in local schools and we had a deal where local football clubs could buy at heavily discounted prices.
Issuing figures of tickets produced is what every club does AFAIK, it's not massaging anything and I thought it was well known. It kind of makes sense - it's the number of seats accounted for at a game. If you ignore the people who have a ticket but don't turn up your books don't balance. It' s more honest than the old way where Elm Park used to be heaving and we'd all laugh when they said there were 10k there and the money man walked off with bags full of cash that was kept off the books.

[Old Biscuitman]

I enjoy both sports. Watched Reading as a small boy back in the Dark Ages of Div 3 South, then played rugby at a decent amateur level. The two sports have their different plusses, no point IMO in being extreme in opinions, but then I am out of touch with HNA culture.

But just to stir the discussion pot, I believe the forthcoming semi final of rugby's European Cup at the Madjeski on April 23 will be the highest quality event there this year, given the abysmal home football so far!

I will duck to avoid the brickbats from Hobnobbers.

[AthleticoSpizz]

.........not from me, I have the ability to enjoy both sports

I also generally find the Madejski under utilised

[muirinho]

Just to return the original topic for discussion, I was amused to notice tonight, that after a break from the football for the last couple of weeks, but rugby continuing regardless, the pitch looked in decent nick!

Who woulda thunk it?

[Maneki Neko]

could be something to do with a recent upturn in the weather and reduction in the massive levels of rain we had in Jan/Feb


also- no one thinks its the rugby alone making the pitch bad. of course having one of the two teams that play there having two weeks off has given the groundsmen a better chance of sorting it out. the issue is having two teams playing there, so that there is at least 1 game a week, which gives the grass no time to ever recover. without the rugby it would always have time to recover, and if it was just a rugby stadium i'm sure it would be mostly fine too

[Fox Talbot]

.........not from me, I have the ability to enjoy both sports

I also generally find the Madejski under utilised

You make it sound like you go along there just in case something's happening!

[Fox Talbot]

Issuing figures of tickets produced is what every club does AFAIK, it's not massaging anything and I thought it was well known. It kind of makes sense - it's the number of seats accounted for at a game. If you ignore the people who have a ticket but don't turn up your books don't balance. It' s more honest than the old way where Elm Park used to be heaving and we'd all laugh when they said there were 10k there and the money man walked off with bags full of cash that was kept off the books.

There are / were called 'attendances' not 'sales' for a reason. And in more honest times the clubs declared both an attendance and a receipts figure. As a public we've been used to / like knowing how many people are actually watching the game - that's more important to us than the club's internal accounting mechanism.

The gap between truth and data widens further - last night 15,678 Looked more like 10,500 to me, how about you? Why should we have to guess?

[Nameless]

Issuing figures of tickets produced is what every club does AFAIK, it's not massaging anything and I thought it was well known. It kind of makes sense - it's the number of seats accounted for at a game. If you ignore the people who have a ticket but don't turn up your books don't balance. It' s more honest than the old way where Elm Park used to be heaving and we'd all laugh when they said there were 10k there and the money man walked off with bags full of cash that was kept off the books.

There are / were called 'attendances' not 'sales' for a reason. And in more honest times the clubs declared both an attendance and a receipts figure. As a public we've been used to / like knowing how many people are actually watching the game - that's more important to us than the club's internal accounting mechanism.

The gap between truth and data widens further - last night 15,678 Looked more like 10,500 to me, how about you? Why should we have to guess?

As I said, clubs used to undercall attendances on a regular basis. The figures now are 'honest' , they are tickets sold rather than the traditionally invented numbers. Also in years gone by no one actually knew what the 'attendance' was. It was a guess. When clubs took cash on the turnstiles there was all sort of 'leakage'.
It's an odd thing to get excited about though. Do people really care exactly how many other people are watching the same game as them ?

[Nameless]

could be something to do with a recent upturn in the weather and reduction in the massive levels of rain we had in Jan/Feb


also- no one thinks its the rugby alone making the pitch bad. of course having one of the two teams that play there having two weeks off has given the groundsmen a better chance of sorting it out. the issue is having two teams playing there, so that there is at least 1 game a week, which gives the grass no time to ever recover. without the rugby it would always have time to recover, and if it was just a rugby stadium i'm sure it would be mostly fine too

The pitch isn't / hasn't been 'bad'. It's just been slightly patchy. Interestingly the goal mouths were still the worst part last night. And they aren't even on the bit that is used for rugby ! And the bit the football linesmen use. So while the bits 'ruined by rugby have recovered in a matter of days the bits overused by football haven't.

It's all a huge over reaction IMHO. People wouldn't recognise a 'bad' pitch if they same it these days ! Anyone recall the Hereford v Newcastle cup game of years ago ? It looked like a ploughed field with a river running through it !
The pitch is quite able to cope with a game a week if the underlying issues are sorted.

[Fox Talbot]

Nameless - I think you over-exaggerate the fiddling that went on years ago. The disparity between declared and actual attendances today is much wider than any under-reporting of attendances years ago.

The only two instances of obvious under-declaration at Elm Park that come straight to mind were Man utd in 1970 and Wolves in 1985 - and the first of those might simply have been people breaking in.

[SCIAG]

Just to return the original topic for discussion, I was amused to notice tonight, that after a break from the football for the last couple of weeks, but rugby continuing regardless, the pitch looked in decent nick!

Who woulda thunk it?

And the photos posted earlier in the thread are from a period where Irish didn't play at the Madejski for a month...

[tmesis]

Issuing figures of tickets produced is what every club does AFAIK, it's not massaging anything and I thought it was well known. It kind of makes sense - it's the number of seats accounted for at a game. If you ignore the people who have a ticket but don't turn up your books don't balance. It' s more honest than the old way where Elm Park used to be heaving and we'd all laugh when they said there were 10k there and the money man walked off with bags full of cash that was kept off the books.

There are / were called 'attendances' not 'sales' for a reason. And in more honest times the clubs declared both an attendance and a receipts figure. As a public we've been used to / like knowing how many people are actually watching the game - that's more important to us than the club's internal accounting mechanism.

The gap between truth and data widens further - last night 15,678 Looked more like 10,500 to me, how about you? Why should we have to guess?

It's not really about being more honest in the past, but more that there were no tickets sold in advance for terraces, except season tickets, so there couldn't be a difference between the two figures.

The exception was for season tickets (a much smaller % of the crowd than now) which were always counted whether the season ticket holder turned up or not. In that sense we aren't so different from the past.

There certainly has been a shift towards clubs announcing "tickets sold" in the last 10 years or so. It certainly wasn't always the case at the Madejski. The opening day crowd, for example, was lower than the number of tickets sold, due to some of the turnstiles not counting anyone going through them.

I can also remember a friendly v Spurs given as 21000 or so, yet having to be declared "sold out" (with fans locked outside) as we gave away a lot of free tickets that day.


I'd also disagree with the statement that crowds in the past were a guess. Crowds weren't worked out from gate money taken. The turnstiles counted everyone who went through. You had the odd dodgy bloke on the gate*, but not enough to really impact the figures.

* I remember going to the Victoria Ground, Stoke, and it was £7.50 to get in. The turnstile guy was letting in two people for £10. They'd bunch up and squeeze through on one click, and he'd pocket the £2.50 difference.

[tidus_mi2]

Newcastle 13-6 Irish

Irish are relegated.

[tmesis]

Irish lose 6-13 at Newcastle and are 7 points behind with two games to go.

They could stay up, but it would mean them beating Harlequins (possible) and also away at Wasps (very unlikely), and hoping Newcastle lose both remaining games, without picking up bonus points.

The fat lady is taking the stage.