I don't know how well this will come out on Graham's page, so I'll pick out the really interesting bits.

To begin with, our last 4 seasons look like producing an average of over 9,000 a game. The last time this happened was around the late 1950's.

Our record average is 4 short of 16000 would you believe, for 1950-51, where every game was watched by a 5 figure crowd. (I've got a copy of an Evening Post article that reckons the record is 15,373 for 51-52, but I don't agree.). Our record league att endance of 29,091 occurred the year before for the visit of Notts County.

The halcyon years for the club's financial boys were probably the 8 years after the war. 149 of 176 home league games were watched by crowds of 10,000 or more, that's nearly 85% of all home matches! The average for those 8 years was a magnificent 13,94 6.

Of the 1152 home league matches played since the war, (up to and including West Brom on Boxing Day 1997), only 3 have been over the magical 25,000 mark, the Mad House's limit. If we assume that a decent atmosphere will be created by say 15,000, this fi gure has been exceeded 88 times since the war at EP, equivalent to only 7.6% of all league games. So the message is clear guys - if you want a decent atmosphere at The Mad House, you're going to have to bring along a friend or two! To be fair to Mr Mad, i f the team can start to float to the upper reaches of Div 1 next year, I think the support WILL be there. Only 5 years ago the Royals were playing in front of less than 4000. We have come a long way in a short space of time, and whether we like it or not, a large amount of this is down to a certain large-girthed wandering Scottish gentleman! Bless him!

Getting back to the stats, the overall average for the 1152 games is 8,238 with the lowest average of 3224 occurring during possibly the lowest point in our history of 1982-83.

Our lowest highest gate of a season, (if you see what I mean!), is 5423 against Derby in 1984-85. (The highest gate in 82-3 was 7646 against Portsmouth by the way). The highest lowest gate not surprisingly was 10168 against Millwall in the 50-51 record year.

What else can I tell you? Up to the end of 1997, a grand total of 9,490,317 souls have passed through the various turnstiles at EP since the war.

I don't suppose I'll be able to get away with NOT mentioning the dross? If you don't want to know, look away now!

You all probably know that the lowest ever league gate at EP was 1713 against Preston in 1982, but this figure was run perilously close by the 1739 saddos who witnessed the 1-1 draw with Walsall at the back end of 84-5. 4 other sub-2000 gates have been recorded, 3 during the dark days of 82-3, and the most surprising one being the 1934 who turned up for the Bradford City game at the end of the 1990-91 season. Just to show that there's nothing new under the sun, our last game of 1938-39 against Bournemo uth was only watched by 1785! (But as it's pre-war I haven't counted it!). And the last sub-3000 league attendance? Not as long ago as you might think - 2481 witnessed McGhee's boys whipping Rotherham 3-1, Shaka making his league debut in case you're inte rested.

To finish, our last 5 figure average for a season? What do you reckon - McGhee/Quinn/Gooding play-off kings? Branfoot's Record Breaking Royals of 85-6? Jack Mansell's "total football" team of 69-70? Nope. You have to go back to 1961-62, the d ays of Dick Spiers, Maurice Evans, Jimmy Wheeler and Dougie Webb for that one. 11117 for the record. Now wouldn't it be marvellous to finish our last ever season at Elm Park by breaking the magic 10000 mark?. A total of 120,718 have been to the games in 1 997. So we need another 109,282 in the games against Bury, Birmingham, Tranmere, Portsmouth, Man City, Port Vale, Huddersfield, Stoke, Middlesbrough and Norwich. That's say 11000 each game. Mmmm. Should get at least that against Pompey, Man City, Stoke, M iddlesbrough and Norwich, maybe even Birmingham. What the hell, Bury, Tranmere, Portsmouth and Port Vale are all below us and must be ripe for a thumping, so who knows - we may reach the target after all!