JonnyComeEarly
UTA!!
- Thread starter
- #81
Hope im wrong but fear monday will be a tense and nervy performance from the stands.
Let's be honest, we're a fairly middle class club,
5. Bin all the loud PA music on the build up to the kick off and allow the fans to create a proper atmosphere themselves.
The boro atmosphere may have been a one-off, but we need to aim for that. We need some proper long-lasting songs not just Albiiiooooon which fades after 15 seconds. The Amex has its moments but to much of the time the North has some weird inner-stand battle going on with each side which is embarrassing. We really do need to up our game and it starts on Monday.
I've been at the Riverside when the traffic outside on a very distant road is louder than the Boro support.
Simply, we have to step up on Monday evening, and it will help if the team plays well. It would be nice to suggest that a sell-out crowd will lift the team with its fantastic support, but a lifetime of supporting the Albion makes me think otherwise.
It's a sad fact that the larger the crowd at the Albion - and this was true at the Goldstone too - the more people in it are just waiting to bring out the 'same old rubbish' moans. We had fantastic, noisy crowds when we were smashing our way through the third and second divisions under Alan Mullery and then when we got to the top flight and it wasn't quite so easy, the moans started and the crowds started to fall.
Give people a bandwagon like the 1983 FA Cup run to jump on and everything will be great, but the league attendances that season were terrible. Loads of people complained that they couldn't get tickets for the final even though they were lifelong fans, but only around 14,000 of those 'lifelong fans' could be bothered to attend the league match against Stoke when Cup Final ticket vouchers were given away - the match after our win at Anfield.
You'd think the opportunity for promotion to the Premier League would get everyone going, and I hope I'm proved wrong on Saturday, but I think it's the crowd not the stadium.
Completely agree. Considering what was at stake against Derby, and how the match was going, it was so disappointing to see the lack of passion both vocally & physically in WSU. There are a few groups & individuals who try to get the songs going, stand at appropriate times (to applaud great play or berate the opposition or ref).......but.....
We are definitely in the minority. Sometimes I wonder whether it's too much bother to stand up to celebrate our goals! The number of times I've stood up to sing or roar our team on when it's obvious they're under the cosh but I look round to see all these faces staring as if I've stood up & burst into song in the middle of a restaurant!
Christ! Do they ACTUALLY want their team to win? Do they realise how rare these opportunities to get automatic promotion to the top division actually are? Don't they know how much their support can influence the game if they actually bothered to get passionate about it?
The club can't force people to sing, shout, boo, cheer, berate. But they can help those who want to do so without suffering the chagrin of those who are obviously above such public displays of passion for their club & football!
Make the Amex a hostile place for away teams to play. Move the away fans away from the goal. Have a meeting with those who DO want to make an atmosphere. Discuss location, drums, flags, air horns etc etc & help them to establish something worthwhile. Stop the pre-match music & get into the habit of getting to their seats earlier to get the songs going.
Seeing how my lad & his mates have got the bug (home & away), I am optimistic that we will eventually see new generations who could shift the balance to a more passionate crowd BUT this will ONLY happen if the club creates the right conditions for it & stops the "Sit On Your Hands" brigade from persisting the atmosphere of disapproval that currently dominates the Amex.
An Under 21 section, with attractive pricing, is a great idea to help them develop their own Albion fan identity...perhaps as Ultras.
What's stopping people? - nothing, so what if people are looking towards you if your singing, why does this put you or anyone else off, why care what they think? Just sing if you want to and don't look for excuses, but equally don't expect everyone to join in because it's not in some peoples nature (too self conscious)
Or maybe they are looking at you because they are desperately trying to figure out what is being sung (far too quickly) so they can join in?
Let's be honest, we're a fairly middle class club, and the fanbase has grown so much in a short time that not all 26k are going to be die hard. With the best will in the world, our demographics isn't going to lend itself to comparing in vociferousness with an old fashioned working class club like Boro.
Trust me, as an old Goldstone North Stander, I'm not self conscious. I don't give a monkeys.
But my lad & his mates feel intimidated by all of these adults who look disapprovingly when they want to replicate their Away Day antics. My worry is that they will be cowed by the literally silent majority. I'm hoping they will carry through their plan to move to the North Stand with mates from the Family Stand when they're 16. They see that as the solution to feeling free to properly get behind our team. An U21 section would be fantastic as I doubt they'll all get seats together in the North.
I also bloody hate songs being sung at 100mph & wish people could slow it all down.
Get yourselves a decent up-to-date (well pop-era anyway) anthem. "Sussex By the Sea" IMHO is a joke, it doesn't strike fear into anybody. You need something spikey.
Boro's build up included a lot of pre-match music to hype the atmosphere, (I think Strings for Yasmin by Tin Tin Out was played a couple of times (used to be used by Sky for the football) + a lot of other similar era music too) - They used music to get the crowd going so why would you want to get rid of the music?
The biggest thing we have against creating an atmosphere is the high number of ST holders since the start of the Amex, it means that fans who want to sing can't move to the same area because of this.
Besides, with the existing atmosphere we have at our games, we still managed to equal Boro's points total and only lost out by a couple of goals over the course of the season. are you really trying to say the difference was the home atmosphere?
Home records of both teams:
Middlesbrough = W 16, D 5, L 2, GD +26
Brighton = W 15, D 5, L 3, GD +22
Don't think it is. The North Stand holds more too.
Was happy to hear the pa turned up at the last game - no one gets into their seats until 10-15 mins before ko so the pa is the best way to get a pre-match atmosphere.