In this morning’s Telegraph, Matt Law proudly announced that “season ticket renewals for next season have apparently gone well with over 90 per cent of fans understood to be taking up the club’s offer of making a 20 per cent payment”…
On the surface, this sounds promising in these most testing of times, but that’s 80% off what ought to be sitting in the coffers, right now. However, I’m given to understand from several acquaintances that the club have spent the last few days (season ticket applications are now supposedly closed) telephoning anyone who hasn’t renewed.
The thrust of the questions is what one might expect from a golf club or gym where a client had decided not to continue, a polite ‘had you been aware of the deadline, and if so would you mind sharing how you made your decision?’
With 80% of gate receipts paused, and this wretched virus still running the rule over how people are behaving in their everyday life, it is ambitious to imagine that football clubs are going to ‘suddenly’ snap back into life for a long while yet.
This is rush hour in #London – ludicrous. Get back to work ffs pic.twitter.com/0PmqFy8Tn4
— Mike Graham 🍾 (@Iromg) August 6, 2020
Most pubs and restaurants in England are currently sleepwalking into a financial oblivion, with a fraction of their regular customers coming through the doors, and reduced opening hours. Compounding all this is an evident distrust of public transport – and that’s for those that have recently been made redundant.
The full extent of the damage to Tottenham remains to be seen, what is for certain is that they will not be alone.
🌚
Yes, you make a good point. It’ll only fish out a small percentage. Also you can be contagious just before you start show symptoms too.
Gastro tourism. 😄👍😜
Is that ninety per cent of the over sixty thousand season ticket holders? If it is it’s some achievement, some clubs like Celtic are going to show their games on Celtic TV in lieu of attendance at the game. How they’re going to get this past Sky TV who are paying the Scottish FA for the right to show the Premier League on Sky I don’t know.
Won’t help much, eighty percent are reckoned to have no symptoms, temperature thing is a fig leaf being touted by the airlines and others desperate to get customers back. I’m not blaming them for that but don’t give people a false sense of confidence.
The problem is, having had the virus and being knocked on my arse for over two weeks (and pretty scared as my lungs started to tighten at the ed of the second week) the affects of the virus may also be around for years. I’m 3+ months on and have a constant ‘heartburn’ and reflux feeling across my lungs. Prior to these 2+ weeks off work ill I’d only had three days off in the last 5 and half years. I’m not sickly or a hypercondriac but if you do get ill it’s not something to take lightly. Short of anything concrete saying i can’t get it again I’ll be having the vaccine.
I’m in no hurry to take a vaccine. I know someone who got Guillain-Barré Syndrome as a direct result of the flu vaccine and still doesn’t have the proper use of his legs, 3 years later.
The media in their blissful ignorance have managed to hype this up – after the event.
Only now, as the UK is bankrupted, are people thinking about the idea of shielding the vulnerable and letting all the normal folk out – what should’ve happened in the first instance.
The after effects of this are going to be around for years in England, not months.
Total mismanagement.
You’re right, these people will screw it up for everyone.
There will always be a section of the population that do not want to engage with reality. Instead of trying to learn and get to the truth, they will latch on to cock-eyed theories based on heresay. I don’t understand why they do this but I know they will never change.
It’s deceptive. To be honest there are a lot of complacent people out there. Social distancing? – yeah right, some people haven’t a clue about keeping 1.5m apart or good hygiene. As I said, it only takes one person to screw it for everyone. Total lock-down is not fun and has led to significant job losses, business closures (1 million Aussies are currently unemployed) and a rise in mental health issues. Yet there are still people out there shouting about their ‘rights’, convinced that this is some kind of hoax, hyperbole or government conspiracy, quite prepared by their own selfishness to endanger the lives of countless other fellow human beings. Yes, things are good in WA now, but it is inevitable that, like NZ, someone will slip through the cracks and everything is going to turn to poo quite quickly.
I was thinking the exact same thing!! so many of this way of thinking has popped up last few months.
Sounds positive, good to hear.
I could explain why it could be possible to find a vaccine for this but to find one for the common cold /flu is more problematic but judging from your comment I assume you would not be interested anyway.
I’m sat in a hospital waiting for a scan. On entrance they zapped my forehead to take my temperature and it took about a second. I can see this working at football stadia. It won’t completely eliminate the chance of contagious carriers entering but it would help.
“The problem with football crowds is they need to be big or it can deteriorate into the atmosphere of cricket match quite quickly.”
Is this a cheeky dig at Arsenal?
Here in Perth the (AFL) football is going ahead with our 60,000 seat stadium operating at a reduced capacity. Initially it was to be 30,000 but attendance figures haven’t been over 26,000. Social distancing is still in place – 1.5m apart and every second row is empty (I think the first 5 rows pitch side have also been closed). The big difference between here and elsewhere is that there has been no community transmission so mass gatherings using public transport is viable (even though there is a potential high risk as use of face masks is not compulsory in WA). NZ has demonstrated that you can never be certain and it only takes one person to become infected and we are back to square one. But how good is it to have a live crowd in! (now you can’t hear the players whinging to the umpires).
Big sweeping “we are all…” there. I am not hoping for a vaccine. Nobody has ever come up with a vaccine for the common cold. Ever wondered why that is? Why should it be possible to come up with one and so quickly for this particular cold/flu?
And the doom mongering scenarios that the mainstream media have been hyping these last few months are starting to collapse based on actual data rather than conspiracy theories. People are not dying or gravely ill in hospital. By year’s end we will have had no more deaths than in any other year. It is all a question of whether whoever is pulling Boris’s strings is going to allow him to open everything up again ever or if we are stuck in this dystopian nightmare…
I completely agree. Some very pertinent points you make.
We’re all hoping for that vaccine to be approved ASAP. As far as I can see it’s the only thing that will majorly change the current landscape.
The big problem for any entertainment based industry is people being close together for sustained periods of time is the danger. Most of society can in theory get on with it but ents are screwed.
The problem with football crowds is they need to be big or it can deteriorate into the atmosphere of cricket match quite quickly.
If the capacity is reduced, they may find the need to reduce the admission prices.
The pubs near me are existing on handfuls of regulars to keep the tills from seizing up completely.
In London, you’ve got the whole public transport thing to hurdle and there’s no guarantee that the return of football will do that.
The problem is largely that the MSM decided to eat itself and LBC for example are still indulging in doom fests.
There’s also the matter of folk having changed their lifestyles. Having to wear a mask to physically shop for food is uncomfortable for many.
When the kids go back in September we’ll get a better idea but I wouldn’t hold my breath.
I can see reduced capacity seating working. At least it’s outside and inside the concourse is well ventilated. The stadium could be well set up for distancing at the turnstiles. As long as the transport system can cope with 15,000 fans at a time, it should be ok.
That said, 1/4 capacity is still a massive financial hit and the atmosphere would barely be better than an empty stadium.
“Hello?”
“Hello!, this is Daniel Levy (click). Hello?”
Damn it. Its Thursday. No half price food. I’ve been taking full advantage. Have tucked into some nice grub. Crouch end. Muswell hill (toffs) Islington and hackney. Roll on Monday🌚👍. Think I’ll head to the Royal borough of K&C