Wed Dec 05, 2012 9:19 pm
I've look through a programme to find last season's away following, excluding cup games and play-offs:
(Those in red are the ones who we took more to them than they brought to us)
(Those underlined are the ones we have been to this season)
West Ham - 966
Burnley - 456
Portsmouth - 1732
Blackpool - 1569
Hull - 773
Peterborough - 365
Leeds - 361
Derby - 660
Reading - 3628
Coventry - 1130
Millwall - 1321
Watford - 1550
Nottingham Forest - 1007
Doncaster - 937
Southampton - 1842
Leicester - 949
Ipswich - 321
Brighton - 796
Bristol - 788
Birmingham - 1277
Middlesbrough - 453
Barnsley - 420
Palace - 2415
Average - 1118
Average brought to us - 771
So as you can see our average is down, but not by much. And looking at that our away support isn't too bad, 937 to Donny, 1130 to Cov, just after taking 3600 to Reading. And taking 1300 to Millwall just a few weeks later, followed by 2 away games over Xmas taking over 1000 to both. Then not getting a bad away following until Ipswich, which was a week before Wembley, with all those cup games thrown in (semi finals, and West Brom away).
And you can understand not taking many to Leeds and West Ham due to restrictions, and Peterborough which was on a tuesday night.
I just think the two main reasons for a drop in away following is the rebrand (sorry to bring it up) and distances. Teams like Wolves, Forest, Leicester don't have to travel very far on average.
Also the fact that we seem to be on TV a lot now is killing our following, Ipshwich and Bolton on a saturday evening, Blackburn on a friday night, Blackpool to be on a saturday evening. Plus our fans have been to some of these ground enough.
All in all I think our away following is decent, should be more due to league position but I've already stated reason why it's down