Tag Archives: She Wore A Yellow Ribbon

Some Arsenal ticketing thoughts…

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This is a general ramble about a few different things with one thing in common. Tickets.

WBA away has sold out at 30+ credits. I was surprised at this. WBA away was one of the first games I went to. It often went to General Sale. Was very rarely at 5+.

Whilst the £26 away ticket is brilliant for away fans who want to go to every game, it has also created a scenario where people are credit hoarding.

Last season, Everton away, on the same weekend, sold out at 20+. Crystal Palace started off at 40+. I have no idea what the upcoming game against Spurs will end up selling out at. Probably 45+.

The idea of the credit system is simple. It rewards people for going to games. The more games people go to, the more credits they obtain, the better games they go to. You start off with your Stoke’s, WBA’s and Sunderland’s, games that people do not want to go to so the amount of credit’s drop.

But the £26 ticket, alongside the rise of social media, has meant people are now buying tickets for games that they have no wish to go to in greater numbers than previously.

At £26, you can buy an away brief, knowing that if you are unable to shift it, you are not taking a big hit to the bank account. But with Twitter and Facebook, shifting those tickets is often easy.

I am a member of the away scheme. I have to buy tickets for every away game, so have made use of selling tickets on social media for games that I can not make. It has its advantages. But I have never bought a ticket with the plan to sell it on straight away.

Recently I had a moan about our current away support. One of the fans I moaned about (who spent most of the game getting excited when Sadio Mane got on the ball) responded to my blog. “One of the four of us in the stands is a Millwall fan”.

How has a Millwall fan bought tickets for Liverpool v Arsenal?

Unsurprisingly they are students, and it really highlights the dilution of our away support.

People are buying tickets online, then selling them on to students who do not regularly go to games (and often support other teams) who go to universities near to where we are playing. When we play Man U, the away section is filled with fans who go to a university in the North West. These fans just want to go to the football, tell their friends they are going to the football, more interested in selfies then cheering for the team.

They are getting their tickets from people who have bought their ticket with no interest in going. Tickets going to fans who have never been to a game, rather than those who have done the hard miles.

I was added to a Whatsapp group not too long ago. It was to buy and sell tickets. When Arsenal drew Southampton in the FA Cup, one chap put in a request for 50 tickets. He was involved with an Arsenal Supporters Club and wanted 50 tickets so that his members, mainly students at South Coast universities, could go to games.

50 tickets. And he got them all.

That means there were 50 people who bought a ticket for an FA Cup game who had no intention of going. And instead they were sold on, then sold on again, so that people could have a day out at the football.

The club have recently cracked down on fans selling on Twitter. Some innocent fans trying to sell their tickets to games they can no longer make have been incorrectly caught in the net, but the club need to do more, and stop the credit hoarders from staying above 40+ credits without actually going to a game themselves, selling to local students, selling to Millwall fans.

On a side note, I laughed at the Spurs fan who tried to shift his Millwall ticket for £125 who then got his ST cancelled. Boy did he cry on Twitter. That’s what you get for selling for profit. Maybe he should have contacted our Liverpool going Millwall friend?

Real fans who have done the miles are missing out on tickets, whilst Arsenal fans hoard credits and sell to people who see football as a day out rather than a way of life. It’s not right. And there is no easy solution.

 

My second thought surrounds Under 23 games.

Arsenal are set to play Manchester City at the Emirates Stadium in a Premier League 2 fixture.

Tickets are available for £4 adults, £2 children. A brilliant deal and well worth going to see some of our youth. For many of those who feel priced out, who can no longer take their lads football, the game next Monday – kicking off a 7pm – could be a great opportunity. But my thought is why charge at all?

I imagine the price covers the cost of opening and running the stadium for that day. But Arsenal could easily absorb this.

The club could curry a lot of favour by offering tickets for all U23 games for free to all fans, no matter if that game be at the Emirates or at Meadow Park, in Borehamwood. I imagine there will be a lot of fans who would be happy taking their kids to a youth game for nothing.

The club could easily absorb the cost no matter the venue, and it would be a good way of giving people who don’t go down The Arsenal on a regular basis to go to a game. A chance for kids to get the bug at an early age. I imagine many of the dissatisfied fans who no longer go to the 1st team game due to Wenger, Kroenke, Gazidis et al would also go to the U23’s as a way to keep backing The Arsenal.

There is no need for Arsenal to be charging for U23 games. Make them free. Let anyone go. It will be a stronger future for our club.

Keenos

10 reasons why Arsenal WILL beat Bayern Munich tonight

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1. Under Arsene Wenger, Arsenal have never lost a Last 16 2nd leg Champions League tie at home

2. In their last 5 Last 16 2nd leg Champions League tie’s, Arsenal have lost just once

3. Arsenal’s Last 16 2nd leg Champions League record under Arsene Wenger reads: P 14 W 7 D 3 L 4 F 21 A 10

4. Only once have Arsenal ever lost both legs of a Round 16 game (2015/16)

5. Alexis Sanchez was rested for 45 minutes against Liverpool. He will be fresh and ready to go

6. Mesut Ozil is back from his illness. He will be fresh and ready to go

7. Aaron Ramsey is returning from injury

8. Yaya Sanogo is in fine form for the U23’s. He is available to start having been included in Arsenal’s Champions League squad for the knockout stages

9. The last time there was an Wenger Out protest, Arsenal won, beating Norwich 1-0

10. With Arsenal having just an FA Cup tie at the weekend, Wenger can put out his strongest XI then rest players for the lesser competition on Saturday

Keenos

Predictable, Sanchez & Ozil, Fans, Wenger Out Protest

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Predictable, Predictable, Predictable

Is anyone surprised anymore?

What sums everything up is that when we went 1-0 down, there was no anger, there was no frustration, there was just a shrug of the shoulders. At 2-0 down fans steamed down to the bar to get a pint. When the third went in fans simply got up and left. No mass protest, no booing.

The only ones showing anger, and it was more a faux anger, are those who went to get on camera. Want to be famous. Everyone else just could not be bothered anymore.

A long journey to a top side, with no trains and a 4 hour drive home, people decided to get on the road early. What is the point in getting angry anymore when it happens all the time?

Since beating Manchester City away 2-0 on the 18th January 2015, our results against Man U, Spurs, Liverpool, Manchester City, and Chelsea reads:

1111

Without bashing a dead horse, as we are all bored of it and negativity breeds negativity, it is just getting all a bit too predictable.

This predictability is the main reason it is time for Arsene Wenger to leave. The belief in the fans is gone, the belief in the players too. We go 1-0 down away from home in a big game, you just know we are not going to get back into it. Might as well leave the game and head home.

With a new manager will come a new belief. It will breath life back into the fans. Going 1-0 down will not mean the predictability of defeat. At least in the minds of the fans. We can get back to cheering the side on again, rather than shrugging those shoulders and wondering if getting home at midnight from Liverpool is really worth it.

Alex Sanchez and Mesut Ozil

One was “dropped” the other was “ill”. Plenty of rumours flying around about the reasons neither started on Saturday. To be honest, I do not care about the rumours, my opinion is simple.

They both have contract offers sitting on the table to be signed, they either sign it or they can f*** off.

Back in the day, the likes of Ian Wright, Tony Adams and Ray Parlour signed contracts without even reading it. We were The Arsenal.

We have lost better players than Sanchez and Ozil in the past and they can both be replaced. If they do not want to play for The Arsenal, just leave.

Fans

I used to be proud of our away support. The best in the land, I would say. But now they are no more than an embarrassment.

This has nothing to do with the infighting. Just a few years ago, when we went 1-0 down, a roar would go up. ARSENAL, ARSENAL, ARSENAL. Now it is silent as it is so predictable. But you can not blame the fans for this apathy.

The issue with the fan base is the fans actions. It is just embarrassing. This go’s beyond Lad Bible fans and Arsenal Fan TV.

As I was entering the stadium on Saturday, a lad was nearly in tears outside the stadium. He had been kicked out for throwing beer. He was crying, begging the police officer to let him back in. The officer was refusing. I laughed. Good. A lesson learnt. Do not act like a cock.

It happens every away game, you have 20 idiots throwing beer in the air whilst another 50 surround them videoing it. I would kick them all out.

Then in the stand things got worse.

Behind me was an Arsenal fan who seemed to be more of a Sadio Mane fan than an Arsenal fan. Everytime Mane got the ball, he screamed in excitement SADIOOOOO as if he was having an orgasm. “That’s why he got 4 star skills on FIFA” “He should get an inform, that card will be sick” “Monreal is an 81, he should be a 75”. An Arsenal fan more interested in FIFA than Arsenal. Willing on Mane so that he gets an inform card. The state of our fanbase.

As we went 3-1 down, fans begun to leave in disgust, and no one could really blame them. Except for the 3 lads standing infront of us. All on their phones taking selfies of them looking sad. They must have taken 3 or 4 pictures, all trying to pull the saddest face possible. More interested in letting the world know they were at football, and sad, rather than actually being at the football.

I love going football. I love the drink up with my mates. But a lot of our cringeworthy fanbase is ruining it. Making me wonder why I spend so much money going up and down the country to be surrounded by a bunch of knobs.

Wenger Out Protest

There is a Wenger Out protest before Bayern Munich on Tuesday. Plenty of details about it on Twitter. If you sit there all day on social media moaning about Arsenal and Arsene Wenger, get off your lazy backsides and turn up to the protest.

If you moan all day every day and enter the stadium on Tuesday quietly without joining the protest, it shows you are nothing but hot air. Someone who moans on social media for attention.

Turn up or shut up.

Keenos