Stadium Expansion

[Magnus]

[Wycombe Royal]

Having lived in Wycombe for 10 years (1/2 a mile from Adams Park) before I escpaped back to Berkshire I can agree with most ofthat blog. Thereisn't much scope in Wycombe for an increase in attendances. We think we have it bad in Reading with lots of people supporting London clubs, in Wycombe that problem is magnified further.

Adams Park, although it has accessibility issues, is just about right for that club as it is now. And to be honest I can't see that they are ever going to move up to the Championship where a bigger stadium might be required. If they did they would probably just be the Scunthorpe of the south averaging around 6k.

[Rev Algenon Stickleback H]

Having lived in Wycombe for 10 years (1/2 a mile from Adams Park) before I escpaped back to Berkshire I can agree with most ofthat blog. Thereisn't much scope in Wycombe for an increase in attendances. We think we have it bad in Reading with lots of people supporting London clubs, in Wycombe that problem is magnified further.

Adams Park, although it has accessibility issues, is just about right for that club as it is now. And to be honest I can't see that they are ever going to move up to the Championship where a bigger stadium might be required. If they did they would probably just be the Scunthorpe of the south averaging around 6k.

They aren't ever going to be in a position where they'd need a 20000 capacity for league games, but being a Doncaster type club, with a Doncaster size stadium, probably is feasible. That would certainly be a step up from now.

Pretty much every club sees a jump in crowds unless their new ground is crap, so those new fans must come from somewhere. It's fair to suggest a lot of fans who only started going after when we moved to the Madejski supported other clubs previously.

For a more extreme example, look at MK dons. The perceived wisdom was that their crowds would be abysmal as the people all supported another team already.

The truth is, just as clubs gain fans when they move up a division or two, there's something alluring about a local side that will bring in the casual followers of a premier league club. Those new fans all come from somewhere, and being an armchair fan of a team from a different locality is no substitute. They won't change overnight. I doubt hardly any of the brand new Reading fans who came to the Madejski in August 1998 threw away their Liverpool/Arsenal/Man Utd allegiences overnight, deciding to support Reading instead. They'd have supported both clubs.

[Wycombe Royal]

Having lived in Wycombe I can tell you that the town cannot be compared to Reading at all in terms of the increase in fans they might get.

Wycombe is a small town and a large proportion of it's residents are from the ethnic minorities (more than Reading) and not many people from those ethnic backgrounds go to watch football. In my opinion they would be more of a Scunthorpe than a Doncaster averaging well under 10k if they ever made it to the Championship.

The only reason for them getting a larger stadium in my opinion would be to still have Wasps playing at it.

[Rev Algenon Stickleback H]

They got around 5500 in the third tier at Adams Park, which is more than Scunthorpe got at that level. Even in their promotion season, two years back, Scunthorpe only averaged 5021. Wycombe also get higher crowds in the 4th tier than Scunthorpe did when they were there.

Their crowds would have to drop from current levels to be the equivalent of Scunthorpe.

[Royal With Cheese]

The stadium expansion would only have been a bad idea given we went down. If it had gone ahead and we'd stayed up it could easily have been a success.

It's certainly the next logical stop for the club when we get promoted to the top flight next time.

I suspect the majority of us will never know.

C'mon RL, if you gave up the fag's you'd have at least another 5 years in you. More than enought to get back to the promised land.

[Four Of Clubs]

... not exactly 'expansion-related' but I couldn't be @rsed to raise a new thread - and haven't seen it mentioned elsewhere -

- yesterday I noticed the new FST's in the North Stand - put in places where more folk can watch them too (i.e. up on the walls) instead of everyone bunched round in a big semicircle between the food outlets - gazing up at the ceilings.

Are they a stadium-wide upgrade - is this more evidence of the use of 'Sig's dosh' ?

[WoodleyRoyal]

in the east as well, the t.v upgrade was planned before the season started though - it was on the os, stadium upgrade storey

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=100022&start=0&st=0&sk=t&sd=a

[Four Of Clubs]

OK Ta missed that snippet

- not tended to bother much with OS apart from Ticket news, when needs be - I still get RFC E-Newsletter e-mails of course BUT now the article links take you off via that 'communicatoremail' thingy which needs a login/account (did it start doing it that way from this season - I'm sure it didn't do it before ? ) - so I have to go via a direct link to the OS itself - which I don't always find the time to go back and do.

That probably got mentioned on the OS too!

[SpaceCruiser]

I'm confused. Was Schards right, or not?

I still think he's wrong!

[Harpers So Solid Crew]

I cant even remember what he said, other than he thoguht no.

Then again he also wanted RFC to spend loads of money on new players.

[Svlad Cjelli]

I'm confused. Was Schards right, or not?

No way of telling. The only way to find out if a stadium expenasion was justified in the PL was for Reading to stay in the PL.

They didn't.

[SpaceCruiser]

I'm confused. Was Schards right, or not?

No way of telling. The only way to find out if a stadium expenasion was justified in the PL was for Reading to stay in the PL.

They didn't.

What about if they were about to go back up?

[Svlad Cjelli]

Then a whole new 64 page thread could start up.

[Mr Angry]

Had we stayed up, expansion would have been justified; we didn't stay up therefore no expansion of The Mad Stad is justified.

Should we go back up to the Premier League - AND STAY THERE - it will become a topice for discussion again, but as it stands, there is no way expansion can be justified at this time.

[Schards#2]

I'm confused. Was Schards right, or not?

No way of telling. The only way to find out if a stadium expenasion was justified in the PL was for Reading to stay in the PL.

They didn't.

There is a way of telling actually, it's looking at the attendances and seeing that, to date, we would barely have sold an extra seat had the expansion gone ahead.

We would, however, have been having to cut our cloth further to the extent of around £15,000,000 and would probably be a division lower as a result and playing in front of 9,000 odd each week.

[Harpers So Solid Crew]

How do you work out that we would have sold no extra tickets. Better seats, better view, better facilities, all have added to attendances at most clubs that have done this and maintained the level of performance, had we managed to stay in the Prem, RIP, why would the same not have happened at RFC?

[jonboy29red]

i would have thouhgt more seats would of meant a diffrent price structure on tickets so as to fill them or would that not have been viable

[Harpers So Solid Crew]

To be fair it might be a time before they consider an extension now.

[Rex]

The surrounding area cannot cope and would need investment. Car parking at a premium, surrounding roads choked, rail extension to Green Park????????

As attractive as the planned extension was it was a dead duck.