Fan letter to man city (Leicester best team in league)

[Cincinnati Fox]

Nice points on our team but price comparison with us is incorrect and not apples for apples.

And they do offer a £250 adult season ticket.

Dear Manchester City Football Club,

As your accounts swell and your executives pat themselves on the back on a job well done in terms of building our commercial value, our pockets are becoming emptier. Once respected as a working class club renowned for its respectful and understanding relationship with its fans, Manchester City is now just another Premier League ‘corporation’ driven solely by its bottom line. The club is embarking on a pursuit of global dominance, and whilst we’re all very much supportive of that, it is being done at our expense. The fans – those who without which there isn’t a spectacle to sell around the world for billions of pounds.

The supporters have voiced their concerns in recent years, but we’re yet to receive a proper reply. £58 against Liverpool, £48 for a seat in Level 2 of the East Stand for West Brom, and now £60 for a Champions League quarter-final tie against Paris Saint-Germain.

The problem hasn’t just emerged this season. £48 for a 3pm home game against Burnley? It shows a staggering lack of awareness for the financial demographic of the core supporter base. The Paris Saint-Germain tie may be a high profile game – as you have mentioned in your statement on March 21st, but to charge a historically working class supporter base the kind of amounts you’d expect to see at Chelsea or Arsenal, well that just isn’t going to work.

What’s more preposterous is the fact that ticket sales make up such a small percentage of the club’s income. In April 2015, The Guardian released details of the club’s annual turnover, reporting that City rake in £47m a year from gate and match day sales. With the club’s annual turnover at £347m, those sales therefore make up a measly 14% and will constitute even less of it in 2016 when City bank close to £120m from the new TV deal next season. This begs the question: how much do you really need this extra cash? When did a club that prides itself on its relationship with the local community and its core supporter base become so out of touch with the daily realities that those supporters face when deciding which games to attend and which games to skip.

This is a club that was built on the support of the working class who would toil all week just to endure a 0-0 draw against Northampton Town. Our average attendance in the 1998/1999 season was a remarkable 28,261 and 64 years earlier in 1934, 84,569 people filled Maine Road for our FA Cup 6th round tie against Stoke City. That record, to this day, has never been broken. So, despite what those ‘Emptihad’ jibes may suggest, this is not a fanbase that neglects its duties. Empty seats have become synonymous with the Etihad Stadium this season and although the insults are incredibly superficial, attendances, especially in Europe, have noticeably suffered because of obscene ticket pricing.

As we have seen in our very recent past, reducing the prices of tickets encourages the masses to come and back the lads and to provide the vociferous atmosphere that makes the Champions League, and English football especially, what it is. In our last European quarter-final against Hamburg in 2009, ticket prices were slashed to just £5 and the fans repaid you with perhaps the best atmosphere the Etihad Stadium has ever seen. Fast forward seven years and a much bleaker ambience is expected to consume the arena on April 12th. Surely the players would appreciate a full stadium? Surely those people concerned with City’s image the world over would appreciate the Etihad being a cauldron on these big European nights?

By charging as much as £60 for a match – a fee that could pay for three games at the King Power to watch the best and most exciting team in the league, two at the Allianz Arena to watch five-time European champions Bayern Munich, and 60 bottles of Stella that could probably fool me into thinking I was watching a football game – you have injured one of the single most important players to that tie, us the supporters.

We therefore strongly urge you to reconsider your ticket pricing structure.

It’s time to listen to us. Turn your back on the fans, and we’ll turn our backs on you.

Yours Sincerely,

Your supporters

[Hubert]

Have you got his number, I've got £60 for him for three matches at the KP!

 

£50 to sit on the half way line in a Cat A fixture which isn't far at all off the prices they are complaining about.

[DB11]

Our lowest category game was £22 wasn't it?

[Manwell Pablo]

Our lowest category game was £22 wasn't it?

 

Yeah but that's behind the goal?

 

Still £60 for any ticket is a joke.

[Gerard]

I pay £49 for mine in the East Stand (£48 + £1 booking fee), he can get me some tickets as well.

 

Although his facts may be wrong I agree with his sentiment entirely.

[Broxi-Bear]

KP is very near £20 a ticket in cheapest parts of the stadium for a season ticket renewal.

Mines is around £22 but only my 1st years ST so I pay more than renewal guys in Family stand.

[DB11]

Yeah but that's behind the goal?

 

Still £60 for any ticket is a joke.

 

I paid £22 and sat in SK1 in the corner

[Fennec-Fox]

Obviously If you want your club to buy expensive players and pay them $$$$$$ wages then expect to pay a little more. If you want still to be a small average club in an average league then sure you will expect to pay average money. You can't have them both ways can you!

[Basingstoke Fox]

Obviously If you want your club to buy expensive players and pay them $$$$$$ wages then expect to pay a little more. If you want still to be a small average club in an average league then sure you will expect to pay average money. You can't have them both ways can you!

 

I'm guessing you didn't read the letter properly then..

[Fennec-Fox]

I'm guessing you didn't read the letter properly then..

Conclusion: "We therefore strongly urge you to reconsider your ticket pricing structure"

This is what is it... And am referring to Mancity fans not u guys. I understand u r happy of what u got at Leicester but won't surprise me if the structure changes when the big money start to be spent.

[gerrytaggart]

....at the King Power to watch the best and most exciting team in the league.

yeeeeaaaaah booooyyyyyyy.

[Carl the Llama]

Conclusion: "We therefore strongly urge you to reconsider your ticket pricing structure"

This is what is it... And am referring to Mancity fans not u guys. I understand u r happy of what u got at Leicester but won't surprise me if the structure changes when the big money start to be spent.

You're missing the point entirely.  The argument is that with the TV deal being what it is, matchday tickets only make up a small fraction of a Premier League club's income and the lost revenue from charging £20-30 per game instead of £50 upwards is negligible in terms of purchasing power.

[Vlad the Fox]

While the twenty is plenty campaign was well publicised and had a modicum of success is their any kind of movement for home matches? There really is no need for these high ticket prices and a reduction to £25 wouldn't make a dent in the finances of a premier league club. For some clubs the high prices are destroying th traditional support, I can't think of anything more upsetting than being priced out of supporting the club you've followed for years especially now when the clubs need your money less than ever. We need to start applying pressure as prices will continue to rise while the clubs remain unchallenged.

[MC Prussian]

Conclusion: "We therefore strongly urge you to reconsider your ticket pricing structure"

This is what is it... And am referring to Mancity fans not u guys. I understand u r happy of what u got at Leicester but won't surprise me if the structure changes when the big money start to be spent.

Well, we'll have to disagree on that one. The club has realized it needs the (local) fans and I do believe the owners, with the extra support they've given the fans so far (clappers, free beer, free breakfast on away days, other giveaways), they wouldn't want to disrupt that and irritate one of the currently most passionate fan bases in the league, if not Europe.

 

The owners will be receiving a big boost to their ROI with the new TV deal money coming in and we're gathering more marketing momentum abroad, as well.

Leicester City FC is on a great path of becoming a "people's club" and I applaud the senior management as well as the consortium that owns the club on the measures they've taken so far - keep in mind a stadium expansion is also still on the table.

[MrSpaM]

I wonder how much this guy would have liked to have traded Vardy for Aguero at the start of the season considering all he keeps going on about is 'working class club'.

 

I'm sorry but this seems a little stupid to me. There ticket prices are so high because they have a ridiculously expensive stadium to run, he seems to be forgetting how many staff they employ, how over inflated their wages are, and a ridiculously expensive squad to pay. If you'd have asked this guy at the start of the season whether he wanted to trade the man city squad for a group of working class try hards there is no way he would have agreed with it.

 

They weren't moaning when they were throwing millions at players, but now they are under achieving they are expecting a refund. They've made there bed and now they can sleep in it. Was this guy complaining about their ticket prices when they were winning the league? I don't think so. It's not like their ticket prices have been going up and up and up over the past 5 years, they've pretty much stayed the same. But now there is a risk of them not getting in the champions league all of a sudden they feel they are paying too much to watch their team of 'superstars'.