worth_the_wait

Like Villa away, a bit unfortunate if you're 65 years old.

158 left in block UV1. (57 of these are 'RV')

Fair points. I accept that the atmosphere is pretty lousy at most of the top 2 division grounds, for the reasons that have already been stated eg many at full capacity, extortionate ticket prices, OTT security, obsession with making it a "family club", etc etc. ie basically a total disregard for the supporter. But I was pleasantly surprised to find that at the lower end of the league, where clubs actually value your support a bit more, the atmosphere was much better than I had expected ... certainly in terms of an organised singing section/drum banging/flag waving/young lads group ("ultras" or whatever you want to call it). In the last 12 months I've been to Accrington Stanley and Colchester Utd, and both of those clubs had a good sized sections giving it absolutely everything. I just don't think it's true to say there's nowhere in England with a good atmosphere. In terms of comparison, I'd say that the clubs with average crowds in the 3-4000 range are not dissimilar to those mid-sized clubs in Scotland with similar crowds. Obviously the Celtic/Rangers/Hearts/Hibs/Aberdeen/etc etc brigade are head-and-shoulders above most clubs in the Premier League, but that wasn't my original point. It was that quite a few of our 4th Division ("League Two") clubs, seem to be picking up the slack of the so-called bigger clubs. Unrelated ... Scotland really has some strange rules regarding alcohol ... on trains. I think I'm right in saying, you can't drink your own alcohol on a station in Scotland, or on a Scotrail train, but you can drink on other TOC trains in Scotland eg LNER, Avanti West Coast, TransPennine. In addition, you're not even allowed to display alcohol on Scotrail trains, even if it's unopened. So the guard was giving announcements reminding everyone to cover up any alcohol, like it was hard core pornography. What do the authorities think will happen if someone catches sight of a ... shock horror ... bottle of wine?

I think you're overdoing it a bit. For every Dunfermline v Falkirk humdinger, there are a load more sedate games - where the only atmosphere is a bunch of black-shirted 15 years olds jumping up and down endlessly to an incessant drum beat. I've been a couple of Scottish games recently, and yeah it was decent. But we're not talking about 1980 Celtic/Rangers levels of passion. As I said, some of the lower league English clubs have got a pretty big "ultra" scene. A lot bigger than anything in the top 2 divisions. The Hearts/Hibs games look about the best there is at the moment. I suspect the Dundee derby is also well tasty. Celtic/Rangers games used to be the best, until the clubs and authorities pretty much nullified the away support ... so it's only at Hampden you get anything like a proper old firm game.

Not strictly true. Some of the lower league clubs have decent atmospheres. In the last couple of years i've done a few neutral games, from Accrington to Colchester ... and been pleasantly surprised by the decent atmosphere. It's in the upper echelons of the English game, that the atmospheres have really tanked.

Have a look through the 328 pages of the Cooper OUT thread, if you're struggling to sleep one night. You'll find plenty in there.

There were quite a few posters on here, saying that we had a squad that was "comfortable mid-table" (and that everything was the fault of the previous manager).

I agree, that at the moment, we're particularly bad. We're on a big "down" phase after having a period of success some years back. As has been said before, the likes of Forest and Cov have been shite for 20 years, and are currently on a "high" and up for it. Give it time, that will change.

But you could say that about almost any club. I've been to Stoke, Derby, Forest, West Brom, Birmingham, and Wolves when the atmosphere has been absolutely shite. And I've also been to those same grounds that have occasionally been rocking ... when something good has happened.

So long as he's not holding the nail above your tyre at that moment!

The only time I saw him make a save that mattered (at the time), was away to Southampton the season we got relegated. He saved a penalty in the 32nd minute. But even then it didn't really matter, as 3 minutes later, he let a goal in ... and they won the game 1-0.

There's an article about Mobile ticketing on the Premier League website. https://www.premierleague.com/news/4071456 The article dates 2nd Aug 2024 said: "Digital ticketing will become a mandatory requirement for all existing Premier League clubs by no later than Season 2026/27. Newly promoted clubs will have a period of two years to implement its use upon joining the League." One thing that amused me was in the introduction where it asked "What is digital ticketing?" and it stated: "A digital ticket is one that is delivered electronically, most commonly to a mobile phone. It allows clubs to assign each Home or Away match ticket to an assigned supporter who is registered with the club" With the demise of ipods, what else is there to download it to? I've got visions of someone holding up their laptop to the turnstile scanner ..............

<ignore this - couldn't upload picture. doh!>

My jumbled thoughts, in no particular order ... We've already shut down all the coal-fired power stations, so there's nothing more we can do there. That's a massive reduction in CO2. Get rid of the remaining oil-fired power stations. Nuclear fusion is the holy grail, but whilst we've got further with it ... we always seem to be "15-20 years off commercial production". We still need to keep developing it, but it's a medium/long term solution. Whilst any form of nuclear fission has its downside, I think we need go down the Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) route - at least as a means of increasing our base load capability. No more solar farms. Covering valuable farmland in the SE of Britain with solar farms is bonkers, if you actually think about the amount of time they are productive. But I'm all in favour of putting solar panels on waste land, tops of commercial buildings, car parks, industrial units etc. And it makes sense to encourage all households to have solar panels and battery storage, to at least provide domestic resilience and take load of the grid at critical times. Increase the amount of hydro generated electricity. There's a massive opportunity here, just be diverting some running water through a pipe into a generator ... and then doing it again umpteen times down the length of a river. Or over every weir in the country. And apart from during a drought when river levels are really low, it's a pretty much reliable source of power. The existing Pumped Storage Hydro (PSH) schemes are great, but can't see much chance of building any more. Build some more offshore wind farms, but these need to go alongside developing "energy storage" capabilities. I'm not sure battery storage will scale up anywhere near the levels needed. Liquid Air Energy Storage (LAES) might be a better solution. It would take a lot of these to give the required resilience, but would be more environmentally friendly - and not needing access to all the various rare minerals needed in battery production. Keep gas fired power stations as the standby. It's not ideal, but it's the least worst of the fossil fuels. In time, phase out the biomass plants, as they're not really quite as "carbon neutral" as made out. But it's going to be a while before we'll be anywhere near decommissioning Drax.

Sorry, I thought you understood what I meant by "you can't really store electricity as such." You can only "store electricity" in a capacitor, and you generally can't store that much of it in the real world. Most electricity grids are based around generating it, when it is actually needed. So for example, at half time of a big football match, when millions of people go and put the kettle on ... the authorities will bring onstream whatever they need to generate the corresponding electricity eg bring up a gas-fired power station, or bring wind farms online etc. When you talk colloquially about "storing electricity", what you actually mean is a device that has energy stored in a form that can be converted back into electricity. So in the case of a rechargeable battery ... you plug it into the mains, use electricity to make chemical changes to the battery ie store chemical energy ("charge it up"). Then at a future point in time, the battery can be used to generate an electrical current - for whatever you want to do. But the battery isn't actually storing electricity. In the same way, when you have excess electricity generated, you could use it to pump water up a mountain. You are then storing gravitational energy. When you need to generate electricity again, you can let the water run downhill and through a turbine. But as per the example above with a battery, you're not actually storing electricity. You are doing something that gives you the means to generate electricity as and when you need it. That's what Pumped Storage Hydro (PSH) schemes are. Hopefully that explains it a bit better.

When you say "use all the energy they produce", what do you actually mean? You could increase wind power 10-fold from our current level, but that's still not going to help you when there isn't much wind around. The last 2 days have seen wind power electricity generation at about 3% during the evening peak requirements (approx 45 Gigawatts). Multiply that by 10, and you're still nowhere near half our requirements. Bear in mind, that you can't really store electricity as such. You need to generate electricity at the time you need it. So even if we dramatically expand wind electricity generation, what are we going to do with the excess? We can export it to other countries via the Interconnectors, in the hope that they will export their surplus to us when we need it. But there's absolutely no guarantee they would have a surplus when we need it. The only other thing we can do with our excess wind-generated electricity, is convert it into some other energy ... and indeed there are quite a few options. eg Pumped Storage Hydro, liquid air energy storage, spinning wheels rotational energy, or recharging batteries. But do any of these realistically scale up anywhere near to providing 30-45 Gigawatts of electricity, for several days or longer if a nice big High pressure system plonks itself over us? If we're talking about "storing" electricity, we're not just talking about a "underinvestment in infrastructure" ... we're talking about a quantum leap of process, and of technology scaled-up to unimaginable levels. The cost of which would be eye watering. Not just for domestic users, but also business and industry (the consequences of which are frightening). My initial question stands ... how is this all going to work, if the plan is to try and rely on renewables such as wind and solar?

I notice that over the last hour or so, 68% of the UK's electricity generation is from Gas. As high as I've seen it in the last couple of years Wind had been producing a good % of power over most of the previous week, but is down to 6% at the moment. Solar obviously 0% at the moment, and pretty much negligible for the whole of December. How's this all going to work with an increasing population, electric cars, heat pumps, railway electrification, etc ? <<< Edited: Attached a picture I was having trouble with earlier! >>>

It's pretty much standard practice across all clubs, and tbh other spectator sports as well. I believe the club have to give accurate attendance figures to the relevant safety authorities, for their records. But nearly always quote the "tickets sold" figure, to the general public. The only time i remember them quoting an exact attendance, was when we played Middlesbrough in the snow 10 or so years ago. There were only about 8500 in the ground, so quoting 25000 would've made them a laughing stock. In fairness to the club, they did quote the 8500 figure.

A very sensible and balanced comment. Unfortunately, not one that will cut any ice with quite a few. "I've paid my money, and do what the f... I like". Yep absolutely true, and not one that anyone has disputed. But irrelevant. "Some people have got a life outside football". Yep, true again. So have most of us. Families, careers, hobbies, etc. Again irrelevant. "Some people have got a good reason for leaving early". Yep, again true. And again, not one that anyone is disputing. It's the sheer numbers that do it every match, no matter what the days of the week or kickoff time - lunchtime, afternoon, evening, night. "Why are people so bothered about what other people do". It's been explained so many times. If you don't understand by now, you never will. "I stay to the end, I'm a better supporter than you, meh meh meh meh" Has anyone seriously claimed that? Although the clue might be in the first part of the word "supporter". "If I stay to the end, it takes me an extra 30/60/90 minutes to get home". Oh for the millionth time, stop exaggerating! And maybe try parking somewhere different, you might find it reduces the difference to not that much. Obviously this doesn't necessarily apply if you have mobility issues and have to park close to the ground. Apologies if I've missed off any of the other usual irrelevant excuses. As has been said umpteen times before, there are good reasons why some people leave early. Health issues, urgent appointments, family commitments, 4-0 down with a few minutes to go. etc etc. No one is having a go at anyone for those reasons. But it's just the sheer numbers now. It's not a good look. And if you don't care about how bad it looks, that's fine. But just admit it. Don't make excuses.

"beating the traffic" is what lots of people seem to live for. Each to their own, I suppose. But pretty pathetic, all the same.

Last time I stayed to the end of the match, it took me 30 minutes queueing for the bogs, I got stuck in my car for 3 hours on Freemans Common, and all the roads on the way home were blocked, and I didn't get home until 3 days later.

Filbert Street Spion Kop pens - early/mid 1980's. "You're not coming on the pitch!"

City v Sevilla - Mar 2017 - just after the final whistle.

Ipswich May 1991 - Hare Krishna day.

Orient 1980 - Martin Henderson - kit!