17.30 kick offs
A very healthy gate and carnival atmosphere yesterday.
I really think the club should explore the possibility of playing a few fixtures in August, Sept, April and May if the opposition agree.
Society's working and leisure hours have changed, and maybe three or four of these early evening kick offs in balmy weather,can entice and hook future fans.
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Personally, I hated it. 3 o'clock on a Saturday please
Not so good for those of us who travel a long distance and have the frequent pleasure of bus replacement train services Saturday evening/nights
I'm all for Saturday 3 o'clock kick offs, but just a few games in the good weather, that maybe allows us to expand our core support. Being a family club, it even gives the mums, grans , wife's, girlfriends and daughters the chance to get their retail therapy fix and still make the game.
It would be interesting to see how much the beer, catering and club shop figures compared to a 3 pm kick off.
Plus the dads, grandads, husbands, boyfriends and sons too presumably.
I agree with @ChasHarps. It was great sitting outside the marquee before the game although the musical acts weren't really our cup of tea. We always liked the setup in that pub near Oxford's ground particularly as we seemed to play them when the weather was decent. As has been said by others the M25 was a breeze yesterday both before and after.
For all your ribbing of DevC, this has to be one of the most ludicrous, stereotyping sexist sentences I've ever seen on here.
I personally hated all the sitting around waiting for the late kick off but looked like the beer sales was up.Maybe give it a go a couple of times next season.
Its great for people wanting to get the gardening done or play a round of golf in the morning. League would probably not allow it though.
I'm with chas the atmosphere seemed a lot better and the feel
drcongo you sound like one of the PC pricks that surround Jeremy Corbyn, that are so out of touch with reality,and are leading to the annihilation of the Labour Party
Personally I loved it, more time to get properly hammered before the game.
Leave Mr Corbyn alone he's doing a great job ensuring we have a landslide for the Tories!
Yes PC overload. You make a good point Chas. Keep your input coming, you make some good points for discussion.
PC gone mad.
Not sure I'd describe the weather as balmy yesterday! What a contrast with the low 20s we were enjoying this time last year.
The atmosphere was electric much of the time, although Wycombe's total dominance for most of the game did tend to mute the initial massive Cambridge input. (They could do with one or two additions to their repertoire as well.)
Great and very encouraging performance to end the season and, for once, seen by a big crowd. So often in the past performances have been disappointing in front of larger attendances.
Ignoring the stupid remarks by @drcongo I can see the commercial benefits of these later kick offs. Personally though it wasn't the easiest to work the day around with the extra travel needed from a non local. Not enough time in the day pre travel to do much more than the retail therapy already mentioned and an arrival at home that didn't allow a night out.
Might be worth a look at once a season if they can arrange and advertise a good pre game like yesterday earlier than they did this time. I wonder if the club actually cleared much profit out of it though.
Come on Dev. I sense some number crunching may be imminent. A complication yesterday was the substantial police presence, considered necessary no doubt in the context of 4 hours of rock music and beer swilling, including 500 free pints.
And @ChasHarps you sound like an outdated dinosaur from the 70s. We can't all be perfect.
Dinosaur....70s...blah....blah...blah...do you know what year it is....I am more virtuous than you...blah blah blah....boring
Out of interest am i correct in beleiving are both Dr Congo and Chris adminstrators on this forum ??
@ChasHarps yes I think they are. I'm not and it did give me a wry smile given some of the abuse along similar lines you (and others) gave Dev. (It did come across to me as somewhat 'dated')
I don't know if you can put the bigger gate down to the kickoff time but it's worth looking into personally it wasn't a burden. The twenty cops was overkill I thought especially when I saw our crack bunch of stewards who were ready for anything.
@Morris_Ital You mean our bunch of stewards on crack who are good for nothing?
I had noticed they reguarly 'team up' and go on a PC attack.
The 'Crack' bunch of stewards on the pitch, looked uncanning like some of the bar and catering staff !! They had obviously been 'Sido'd' (do a good job anywhere).
17:30 kick offs? Would anyone be so keen if it was playing away to a team that asked for a 17:30 ko?
@Right_in_the_Middle , I read your post and for a moment thought @drcongo had made the clearly tongue in cheek remarks.
But reading back up, it's clearly ChasHarps original comment. And as @bookertease alludes to, it's exceptionally hypocritical to make such a comment when he repeatedly bored on about a light hearted tongue in cheek comment from dev.
The music had nothing to do with the numbers of police and the "free pint" i was given was actually a voucher to claim a Free beer at the first match of next season so that has nothing to do with the police yesterday either.
Let's at least keep it to facts micra
Thanks for saying I'm PC. Though I have a feeling you're attempting to use it as a pejorative, which says more about you than it does me.
Whatever the reason for the unusually substantial police presence @marlow hair, the cost must have been substantial and I wanted to alert @DevC to this factor in what I anticipated would possibly be a reaction to his friend Righty's speculation about the likelihood of the club having made much profit from the innovation.
I think I can be excused (and Thames Valley Police may similarly need to be excused) for thinking that 500 free pints would be dispensed during the afternoon. This was categorically stated in the first announcement about the pop-up music fest but, to be fair, may subsequently have been edited out.
Returning to the original point of the thread -17.30 kickoffs.
I would not rule it out without proper discussion, but I find it difficult to see how this match can be used as an indicator of future success of an evening kickoff, given that it was the last game of the season against opposition located less than 100 mile away, with both clubs going into the match having an outside chance of reaching the playoffs.
I think those factors are likely to have a greater impact on the crowd size than the kickoff time.
Exeter v Carlisle (6774) and Grimsby v Plymouth (6866) also attracted good crowds, but I doubt that the prospect of setting off for home at 8pm or later, to Carlisle (350 miles), or Plymouth (375 miles) had a positive impact on the crowd numbers.
Really isn't a time you could schedule a match between either Devon club and Grimsby and Carlisle without it involving either a very early start and/or a very late return.
I believe that clubs do not have discretion to move games away from 3pm on Saturday due to league contractural requirements (eg football pools) but I free to being corrected.
If football was invented today, I wonder what time matches would be played - early evening Saturday fairly strong contender.