The Randy Lerner thread

[Denis_B]

I'm at the point now where i simply can't be arsed to travel from Surrey to the games to be subjected to the snore fest that is our style of football, if the board can't be bothered to support the club properly then why should i be the mug that does, i was happy to travel to every single match when MON was manager but right now i feel less passion for the club than at any stage in my life.

Your paragraph is exactly why the knuckledraggers call us fickle.... you go through thick and thin mate - you go because you're a fan and you love the club.

Firstly who gives a flying feck what SHA think?

Look at their attendaces before saying we are more fickle than them

Thirdly we can all do what we want when we wnat and how we want - just like Randy has done

[thetrees]

Let's be honest here, our football isn't really better or worse than MON's.

Right now I would beat the blindness out of you..

Come again?

Surely I can't be the only here who thinks MON's kick and rush sit back for most of the game football isn't any better than McLeish's football?

This. If keeping 11 men behind the ball, as was MON's way, is exciting, then I 'm a Dutchman.

McLeish's style and MON's style are about the same, which do leave a lot to be desired. MON had more resources, and of course McLeish has inherited some of his turkeys.

The only difference that I see is that there appears to be a better team spirit, and therefore a more solid team, under McLeish's management.

[Don_Paulos]

That's a shame really. Oh well, it also has its benefits. At least we can see who the real fans are (not referring to you or anyone on here). I understand there are financial reasons but people who go to games and the suddenly stop going because they don't like the results/management aren't real fans IMO.

And who the hell cares? Seriously, your argument is lame and your point is extremely ignorant. Supporting a football club is not like defending your country in a war, it is not last man standing. You, like everyone else, support Villa from a mere coincidence. Either you are born in Birmingham, your father supports the Villa or you watched them on TV when you were little. It could have been any other team, so do not pretend like it is some calling from God that you are supporting the Villa. What we fans deserve is the mutual respect from the club and we are not getting it, and people are fleeding from the ground. We have a big stadium, but we have attendances like any other club that find itself in the lower tier or even the Championship. The pattern is alarming, and like I said in an earlier post, what matters now is getting those "plastics" back to the ground by investing or otherwise enhancing the club. What they are doing now is giving up. Appointing that manager, selling those players, not showing up at the games, not signaling any intent, not giving away any information... just not caring, all in all, making Villa much more harder to support. Are you a better fan? Certainly not, who are you kidding really, you are simply more committed and too afraid of confrontations as a person. A bit like that guy who decides to stick with his wife even though she is caught banging the entire neighborhood.

Well said.

[Mantis]

That's a shame really. Oh well, it also has its benefits. At least we can see who the real fans are (not referring to you or anyone on here). I understand there are financial reasons but people who go to games and the suddenly stop going because they don't like the results/management aren't real fans IMO.

And who the hell cares? Seriously, your argument is lame and your point is extremely ignorant. Supporting a football club is not like defending your country in a war, it is not last man standing. You, like everyone else, support Villa from a mere coincidence. Either you are born in Birmingham, your father supports the Villa or you watched them on TV when you were little. It could have been any other team, so do not pretend like it is some calling from God that you are supporting the Villa. What we fans deserve is the mutual respect from the club and we are not getting it, and people are fleeding from the ground. We have a big stadium, but we have attendances like any other club that find itself in the lower tier or even the Championship. The pattern is alarming, and like I said in an earlier post, what matters now is getting those "plastics" back to the ground by investing or otherwise enhancing the club. What they are doing now is giving up. Appointing that manager, selling those players, not showing up at the games, not signaling any intent, not giving away any information... just not caring, all in all, making Villa much more harder to support. Are you a better fan? Certainly not, who are you kidding really, you are simply more committed and too afraid of confrontations as a person. A bit like that guy who decides to stick with his wife even though she is caught banging the entire neighborhood.

Missed this.

How is it lame and ignorant? The "fans" that jump ship the moment things turn a little bit sour aren't really fans at all. The whole point of supporting a team is that you support it through thick and thin. If people are disillusioned with football in general and have lost interest then that's another issue, but unfortunately there are a number of gloryhunters out there who will only come to Villa games when we're doing well. You may sympathise with them but many don't.

You seem to have missed the point of my post. It's nothing to do with me being a "better fan", as I don't believe I am a better fan in the first place. I was merely pointing out that at least some of the gloryhunters have **** off.

[markavfc40]

I was merely pointing out that at least some of the gloryhunters have **** off.

I really don't think we've ever had glory hunting supporting. If we just take the Premiership years under Ellis then we averaged anywhere from as low as 28k in 93/94 to 37k in 04/05. During the relative up surge under Randy/Mon when it looked as though we could achieve a top 4 finish and perhaps win something we got up to averaging just over 40k in 07/08 and just under 40k in 08/09. Even in 05/06 under O'Leary when we had a poor season we averaged 34k.

I think what happened for a time under Randy was that a number of fans who had become disillusioned under Ellis and felt we were heading nowhere and showing little to no ambition returned. Those same fans who now believe the club is again heading nowhere and showing little or no ambition and have again become disillusioned have again disappeared.

Glory hunting supporting do not follow a club like Aston Villa. What we have now is a hardcore 28 - 30k and then another 10k or so who for the most part are disillusioned but will come out if a ray of light is shown. That hardcore 30k though is a big improvement in my 30 years supporting the club. In the 80's averages went as low as 15k in the top flight.

There is a big difference between glory hunters and supporters who know this club should be striving to be far better than it currently is and who have become disillusioned and I say this as a fan who goes week in week out despite what is being served up.

[jimmygreaves]

The whole point of supporting a team is that you support it through thick and thin.

Define support..........

I support the club and will do till the day I'm brown bread but I'm not that bothered any more with the week to week, match to match goings on.

Right now I just don't care that much.

The owner seems to not really give a toss any more and it just appears to be an excercise of going through the motions.

I support the club but it doesn't excite me any more.

[thetrees]

The whole point of supporting a team is that you support it through thick and thin.

Define support..........

I support the club and will do till the day I'm brown bread but I'm not that bothered any more with the week to week, match to match goings on.

Right now I just don't care that much.

The owner seems to not really give a toss any more and it just appears to be an excercise of going through the motions.

I support the club but it doesn't excite me any more.

I agree with you, but I think that the general malaise amongst others, as well as Villa supporters, is down to the abject futility of supporting a Premier League club outside of the top 4 or 6.

We can all be disillusioned by the owner, manager or players at any given time, but the fact is that football is basically destroying itself

[dukes]

I'm at the point now where i simply can't be arsed to travel from Surrey to the games to be subjected to the snore fest that is our style of football, if the board can't be bothered to support the club properly then why should i be the mug that does, i was happy to travel to every single match when MON was manager but right now i feel less passion for the club than at any stage in my life.

Let's be honest here, our football isn't really better or worse than MON's.

I'd go further than that, our football now is no worse or better than at any time during the past 10 years.

[Mantis]

I was merely pointing out that at least some of the gloryhunters have **** off.

I really don't think we've ever had glory hunting supporting. If we just take the Premiership years under Ellis then we averaged anywhere from as low as 28k in 93/94 to 37k in 04/05. During the relative up surge under Randy/Mon when it looked as though we could achieve a top 4 finish and perhaps win something we got up to averaging just over 40k in 07/08 and just under 40k in 08/09. Even in 05/06 under O'Leary when we had a poor season we averaged 34k.

I think what happened for a time under Randy was that a number of fans who had become disillusioned under Ellis and felt we were heading nowhere and showing little to no ambition returned. Those same fans who now believe the club is again heading nowhere and showing little or no ambition and have again become disillusioned have again disappeared.

Glory hunting supporting do not follow a club like Aston Villa. What we have now is a hardcore 28 - 30k and then another 10k or so who for the most part are disillusioned but will come out if a ray of light is shown. That hardcore 30k though is a big improvement in my 30 years supporting the club. In the 80's averages went as low as 15k in the top flight.

There is a big difference between glory hunters and supporters who know this club should be striving to be far better than it currently is and who have become disillusioned and I say this as a fan who goes week in week out despite what is being served up.

Perhaps gloryhunter is the wrong term, since there isn't much glory in the first place. However, my point still stands. To go to games only when the owner is spending lots of money is pretty much the same thing really.

[stanthemanisgod]

To be honest it has nothing to do with the amount of money that is being spent, but has a lot to do with the level of entertainment you can expect.

I moved away from Birmingham at an early age so supporting the club has never been about season tickets and going to the games week in week out. That does not mean I dont care about what is happening to the club, it just means I dont purchase the product Aston Villa are selling as often as you do.

For me to come to a game now (I'm posted around the UK a lot with work) is quite a logistical operation, getting tickets, travel, a place to stay etc etc. And it becomes very expensive, now if I was guaranteed an entertaining 90 mins (and not just from the away side) every time I turned up to Villa Park I might consider that outlay to be better value for money. But right now I'm reluctant to go to the effort of writing off a whole weekend and spending a couple of hundred quid on coming to the Villa.

But as somebody else alluded to we support the Villa and go to games becuase we like football, for whatever reason something in our youth leaned our loyalty towards Villa, but it could have quite easily have been any other club. What we are left with is whether we choose to spend our hard earned money on going to the games or on other (more reliable) forms of entertainment like theatre, cinema, nights out etc.

People talk about the club as a community, and whilst we probably do have more in common with the man in the seat next us at Villa than we do with the random you happen to sit next to at the cinema, we are still buying a product from a company ultimately looking to make money from us.

And like in Cinema some films will attract larger audiences than others, any club can expect to have higher demand for tickets when there is level of expectation around the club and the performances on the pitch are backing it up, just like the films that sell out on the opening weekend. Equally when performances are disappointing and the media hype isn't there then clubs will struggle.

Money certainly is one way to create the excitement required to bring people like myself back to the ground but it's not the only way and what we need to find is a way of making us and exciting and attractive option again.

[Paddywhack]

Welll...there he is..

[AVFC-Prideofbrum]

Let's be honest here, our football isn't really better or worse than MON's.

Right now I would beat the blindness out of you..

Come again?

Surely I can't be the only here who thinks MON's kick and rush sit back for most of the game football isn't any better than McLeish's football?

Our football in 07-08 was great to watch but 08-09 onwards it sort of dwindled out and we rarely ever beat teams comfortably or were that exciting. In my opinion, the only difference from what I see now and what O'Neill had towards back end of his tenure was quality of players, when you have a midfield of Petrov, Milner, Young, Downing, it is slightly easier for a team to play fairly decent football.

Although it has been a mixed bag under McLeish, at times we've looked woeful (Newcastle, QPR), at times we've looked decent. (Wigan, Blackburn, 2nd half QPR)

but it wasn't too disimilar under Mon, like when we played teams like Wolves away and got beat all over the park, barely strung a pass together or created a chance and drew 1-1 (Gabby goal) we had plenty games like that.

Football isn't that bad under McLeish, just in some games, too much of a negative mindset. I think we pass the ball okay for periods, like Man City, first 20-25 minutes, we were up in possession and knocking it around well. 2nd half vs QPR etc...but it's just about maintaining that for longer periods.

Not sure McLeish is the manager to allow us to do that mind but certainly our football when you compare quality of players is no worse IMO to what we saw under O'Neill, although under O'Neill, when we needed to be on top or get a goal, we were a lot more forceful.

[mykeyb]

I spent Saturday doing some DIY and when I had finished the very first thing I did was watch the formula 1 qualifying, not check our score or any scores that day.

I too have reached the point where although I support our club, it is becoming more and more difficult to justify the time, the money and emotion which it takes to go and watch us play.

I will no doubt at some point have a change of heart and I suppose there will be something which will be the catalyst for it,

[TRO]

Let's be honest here, our football isn't really better or worse than MON's.

Right now I would beat the blindness out of you..

Come again?

Surely I can't be the only here who thinks MON's kick and rush sit back for most of the game football isn't any better than McLeish's football?

This. If keeping 11 men behind the ball, as was MON's way, is exciting, then I 'm a Dutchman.

McLeish's style and MON's style are about the same, which do leave a lot to be desired. MON had more resources, and of course McLeish has inherited some of his turkeys.

The only difference that I see is that there appears to be a better team spirit, and therefore a more solid team, under McLeish's management.

OMG..... How I see it like you.

[RMB]

I spent Saturday doing some DIY and when I had finished the very first thing I did was watch the formula 1 qualifying, not check our score or any scores that day.

I too have reached the point where although I support our club, it is becoming more and more difficult to justify the time, the money and emotion which it takes to go and watch us play.

I will no doubt at some point have a change of heart and I suppose there will be something which will be the catalyst for it,

I'm not as far down the line as you but I know what you mean.

I think it is more the fact of how football is nowadays in general rather than what's happening at Villa.

I would stop going to the Villa if we turned in to a Man City or a Chelsea but unless a team does then it has no chance of being anywhere near the top of the table. Which is really sad for about 16 teams in the Prem.

That and the image of the Prem and how it has gone global and the money and the people who play the game and sky and just everything to do with it is pushing me away from the game at the moment.

[Zatman]

I really don't think we've ever had glory hunting supporting. If we just take the Premiership years under Ellis then we averaged anywhere from as low as 28k in 93/94 to 37k in 04/05. During the relative up surge under Randy/Mon when it looked as though we could achieve a top 4 finish and perhaps win something we got up to averaging just over 40k in 07/08 and just under 40k in 08/09. Even in 05/06 under O'Leary when we had a poor season we averaged 34k

might not of had glory hunter but MON brought a lot of neutral/passive fans with him and some have deserted since he left

[stanthemanisgod]

I would the say the combination of MoN, Randy's money andthe excitement of chasing the top 4 rebranded the Villa product in such a way that more people wanted to buy it.

I know people dont like thinking about Villa as a commercial entity but it is, Villa have done no more to retain our loyalty than say a person who only buys Rover(well did anyway) cars becauser their father and his father both worked there.

If the matchday experience is more attractive then more people will buy it, and during those years there was a genuine excitement around the club which made us more attractive to those who aren't part of the die hard 25-30k that will turn up regardless.

That's the reason there's Man Utd and Liverpool fans all over the world, its the reason in Kenya people paint Utd, Arsenal and Chelsea badges all over their buses and taxis, thses people dont have any historical loyalty to these clubs they just favour which ever brand gives them the most enjoyment.

Call it glory hunting if you want but I'd ask what glory those extra fans that went to VP ever found, but ultimately if we want to improve our position as a club we need to attract more and more of these peolpe to the club. Whereas the last 18 months or so has gone the other way and driven them onto more attractive uses of their time and money.

[Delphinho123]

I would the say the combination of MoN, Randy's money andthe excitement of chasing the top 4 rebranded the Villa product in such a way that more people wanted to buy it.

I know people dont like thinking about Villa as a commercial entity but it is, Villa have done no more to retain our loyalty than say a person who only buys Rover(well did anyway) cars becauser their father and his father both worked there.

If the matchday experience is more attractive then more people will buy it, and during those years there was a genuine excitement around the club which made us more attractive to those who aren't part of the die hard 25-30k that will turn up regardless.

That's the reason there's Man Utd and Liverpool fans all over the world, its the reason in Kenya people paint Utd, Arsenal and Chelsea badges all over their buses and taxis, thses people dont have any historical loyalty to these clubs they just favour which ever brand gives them the most enjoyment.

Call it glory hunting if you want but I'd ask what glory those extra fans that went to VP ever found, but ultimately if we want to improve our position as a club we need to attract more and more of these peolpe to the club. Whereas the last 18 months or so has gone the other way and driven them onto more attractive uses of their time and money.

Well said.

With the price of a match ticket being so high, people will choose to spend there money elsewhere. Honestly, why would someone want to pay 40 quid to watch a team play for a draw?

And thats what it boils down to. Yes, there are the 25k-30k villa fans that will go week in week out but in order to get more, our product has to be better. At the moment, its very poor.

Thats football though. Simple maths.

20,000 fans @ 41 pound a ticket = 820,000

40,000 fans @ 20 pound a ticket = 800,000

The board dont care about us. They dont need the stadium to be full every week.

I dont really know what im getting at, All I know is that Randy doesnt give a **** and football is severely broken.

[briny_ear]

Thats football though. Simple maths.

20,000 fans @ 41 pound a ticket = 820,000

40,000 fans @ 20 pound a ticket = 800,000

The board dont care about us. They dont need the stadium to be full every week.

If that really was the demand curve, I would be tempted to try:

39,500 fans @ 21 pound a ticket = 829500.

Add to that the extra income from a proportion of the 19,500 more people buying food, drinks, etc., and they are quids in.

I don't think there is a case to argue the board are deliberately trying for a lower crowd at higher prices. It can only be in their interest to get bigger crowds.

I think they have brought about lower crowds through their negative policies on selling/buying players, their managerial appointments, and their general creation of an atmosphere that the push for CL football is over.

I'm sure they didn't intend to do this and have doubled their problems by their mismanagement of the club's image.

[kidlewis]

They should Upsell things which is something I mentioned ages ago.

Also allow season ticket holders to buy things with a small discount