The unofficial AFC Rushden & Diamonds messageboard

Looking back I see when we met the Ploppies back in our first season in the Conference (1996/97) and we had that glorious 1-5 win, there were 4,628 fans at the Rockinghorse, 5170 at Nene Park 10 days later. Where have all those fans gone? I don't just mean ours, but theirs as well? Support for both clubs has just evaporated. Have they gone to the Knobblers? Have they gone to MK Dongs? Where has both teams lost their fans to - or did we both just have such fickle glory hunters that now we're both just left with our hardcore support?

I do wonder sometimes, have people just lost interest? I guess we're in a better position in some ways as we're just coming back from some really poor years, they're on a roll (up until recently) and yet still their support doesn't come out to get behind them.

If we do start to have some success (play-offs etc) I wonder if some of our fans will come back, or are we like the Ploppies, just destined to have a small fan base? What will bring the fans back? Is success enough? It hasn't been for the Ploppies !

Mind you when people I've seen singing "Rushden till I die" are lording it on their Facebook accounts about supporting Luton and Watford these days I guess I can answer my own question :roll:

No staying power some people

If you also consider that some of those defectors were the most dedicated fans too, who rarely missed a game, home or away, it makes you wonder what upset them.

Formic wrote:If you also consider that some of those defectors were the most dedicated fans too, who rarely missed a game, home or away, it makes you wonder what upset them.

Garry Hill - simples

He was just the tip of the iceberg.

Basil wrote:

Formic wrote:If you also consider that some of those defectors were the most dedicated fans too, who rarely missed a game, home or away, it makes you wonder what upset them.

Garry Hill - simples

We had dwindling crowds long before he arrived on the scene.

We lost the Milton Keynes contingent, which didn't help. MK Dons offer a lot of freebie tickets I'm told, so that would be an incentive for them to stop coming.

We lost a chunk of the Air Wair contingent when that closed. Costs understandably meant that we couldn't keep it open for home fans as well after losing League status, but it put off a number coming back.

The big part is obviously down to the dark years 2004 - 2009 (pre JEMS).

Also didn't Max Griggs invite alot of sponsors to matches? I know Max still goes to games occasionally, but doubt the sponsors do.

I know that I don't get to anywhere near as many games as I would like to now for work reasons, I wonder if a % of those fans also have the same problem - the rise of the 24/7 working shift patterns over the past 10-15 years must account for some.

The main areas I think we have lost fans on are:

Cost will definately be a contributer to a major % as well I would take an educated guess at. Take a family of 4 now, 2 adults and 2 kids under 16 (but over 8), just to get into Nene Park these days is £42.00. Add on a programme, £3.50, burger & chips for the kids and 2 hot drinks for the adults another £10, parking £2, you are already looking at over £55 per home game - that is without considering travel to and from the ground but lets say you are coming from Bedford Road Rushden, thats another £5 at least on petrol.

£60 for a family day out 23 times a season, £1380 a year on average - that's nearly 3 months payments on the average mortgaged family home!!

Apathy over recent seasons and bad press for on the field poor performance will have caused another big drop in those numbers.

The current economic situation, although only really affecting the past 3 years at most, will have also had an effect as people prioritise their areas of spending.

I also do not see anywhere near enough marketing of matchday activities going on in the local and wider areas, email reminders to the database members of upcoming games (that costs NOWT to sort out apart from 20 mins of someones time!), I can't even recall any adverts (I mean proper adverts) being played on local commercial radio or even on Radio Diamonds (often they do a good job the RD presenters, but mumbling next game details just does not have the impact a targeted properly recorded radio ad would do)

I'm confident that with on the pitch success, the "glory hunters" will come back, and I for one will welcome that, but it will be mainly down to a combination of improvements in all the above and the success on the pitch that will increase the support base in future.

Mad Dog, I had a season ticket in the AirWair and I think you'll find a lot of fellow AirWair folk were put off by the way it was done, the closure that is. I found out when I went down to renew my season ticket, until that moment I thought it was open. I relocated to the South Stand, but a lot of folk I spoke to didn't bother. I can understand. But hey hoy, that's history, move on. Let's slaughter K*ttering tomorrow