I don't want to pay for an 'experience', I just want to watch the footy

Agreed 110%

Why should FFA chip in for stadiums that provide crap pitches? The teams ALREADY pay rent. Should renters pay landlords to renovate their homes now?

This article is spot on. I think the same thing. I am going to be massively critical here, but watch me make points the game cant argue with and needs to act on right now. If we really do want to grow crowds then we need to start pulling every known trick in the book - and then some. Lets start by massaging peoples experiences, not determining them or distracting them from the main event, the actual purpose for attending in the first place - the actual game - at ALL times. The whole experience is out of wack at the moment, its all over the place. The NRL needs a central policy - damn the stadium policy. What the fans need is to have this experience massaged into them, so the fans determine the quality of their experience - its not drawn (some say drained) out of them....they do it by themselves. They get worked up. They start banding together in unison. Its got to be more movie theater than concert. Ive noticed that the NBA and NFL have this huge ground announcement show and spotlights when running on at some venue's (eg chicago bulls back in the day) - in our culture thats try hard. And listen to everybody - most are sick of things along those lines. I think it gets in the way too. We dont want to make lazy supporters - they should get out their match guides to find out who the players are. We want to generate anticipation, not eat up that anticipation on superfluous things. The music could be background level music. We want people engaging in conversation and beginning chants before the match. We want them focussed on the match to come. If they are actively listening to music, then how can they get into the mood? Needs: Minimal music/background levels. Limit ground announcer before match. Limit MC doing stuff with the crowd, make it infrequent or not at all. Really, say its a broncos game - only one person can win a prize - what about the 34,499 others? Big deal - a prize. Who cares. The game should be front and center. Before game starts you want silence from the stadium and to hear only the crowd. The 60 second count down is a very good idea. You just want to be listening to the crowd at that point - you want to get drawn in and start building up in anticipation. There should be no pomp and ceremony when the players come on. The music drowns out the atmosphere if done too strongly, so it should be used sparingly. There should be no fireworks unless its origin. There should be no fireworks after a try as a rule. Even when a try is scored while a team is 20 points behind, they will often throw on the fireworks. Yeaaaaah......... There needs to be a reverence for the spectacle on the field. You really want to generate a feeling when at the theater or movies or a dance event like your kids go to and perform - the curtain event. The curtain comes down hiding the stage (or is down already) and you know things are about to start when it comes up. It makes attention and everyone go's quiet. So in the sports case you need to make a drastic change from whats happening now. I went to the T20 cricket a couple years back. And it was ground announcer every 2 seconds - maybe because its cricket. But it was highly annoying. The music at league games is annoying as well. When I think of great atmosphere I think of world football. Very few countries have the music at concert levels like they do in America. Even cheerleaders I think distract from the game a bit too much (and sure those girls, right!...., but hey if we are being objective here...) So I think we need to put the game front and center and let the crowd work itself into a frenzy. I think its lazy to have to announce the team, but I guess it can still be done; just as I think it breeds laziness to try and work the crowd up with canned lines "And here comes your team Brisbane!!!!" Maybe if that was the only thing the announcer announced it would not be so bad - but altogether its sensory overload. We need to encourage active support, and I think needless distractions are taking away from that. If people wonder why cheering is down, or we dont sing - there's your answer. Plus anticipation, and build up. Its draining - and a culture needs to be built. ___ Second thing: We need to segregate supporters -- there is nothing worse than someone going to a game all dressed up in his gear, and he's sitting surrounded by opposition supporters. There needs to be separation. And then of course you can have a family section. Having an away section (a bay) is all well and good, but it needs to be total segregation. And we need to enforce this mentality. You are going to a game to barrack and be a part of the supporter group. If you are not in on that then you need to be drawn in. The words general entry need to be stricken from the RL vocabulary mostly. Specific sections need to be foremost, front and central when you look at the ticketing options. Like around origin time, if your from NSW you dont want to sit anywhere near the qld'ers, and vice versa - so why is any team offering up general admission en`masse . The game needs to do little things to drum it into people's heads - pick a side, get in amongst it, cheer, support, let the players hear it. __ So ideally we want to reach a situation of where you sit depends on who you will be supporting. That you can’t beat sitting with your own fans, in an area where you can wear your jersey and colours with pride, supporting your team. In brisbane they have a broncos supporters area, and its grown large, and its really cool seeing the colors. Sydney teams need to start growing theirs, get away fans to the stadiums and start something. We can't keep having a situation where you determine where you want to sit based on how good a seat is (generally/general admission to the whole east/west side, ect). Basically we want the desire of support to be so strong that if your teams seats are in the cruddy section - you won't care. You'll go there to sit and enjoy it because of the atmosphere.

That's interesting MT cheers. The music at Parra, they're obviously trying to find something that works for everyone but it's loud as all hell and they are clearly not going to get rid of it despite repeated requests.

*should have got

Turning it off would have been an option if we asked for it. If we went to management and said "no music, we want to hear the terrace build up to kick off" then that's what we would have got, the club were totally behind the NTC in how the pre match stuff should be organised. The agreement between the club and the fans was that we wanted to build the atmosphere around the ground and get the prawn sangas involved. Thus a decision was made to have music that was relevant to the club, not random pop songs.

um did you just prove that it's cheaper to go to the footy than the sprint cars and you get more entertainment at the footy? How wasn't this the first comment provided?

Yeah what's your point then? Every single person at the games hate it and the person who thought it up got the sack.

All sports have had a decrease in crowds since 2007. So it's not a Rugby League thing, it's a sport thing.

An odd venue to complain about extraneous hoopla, as the Bruce "experience" is as bare bones as it gets. This week it was the usual drip screaming for five minutes before the game (with everyone willing him to STFU), followed up with an interminable half time break, "enlivened" by a couple of sad sacks trying to catch a footy, and an ersatz Wheel of Fortune competition.

All your yahoo's must come to Australia then, can't get them to shut up at games.

The beer taste like crap anyway so just take a flask in with you and order a coke.

Yeah, they do it, but it's only a small section. I've sat in the Newcastle fan zone when they beat the broncos at suncorp a couple of years ago, and it was great. But there were plenty of fans not in those seats. Basically, to select a supporter bay you have to specifically select that option, and then you get stuck in a corner. Make it a simple choice when buying tickets (Home, Away or Family) and then give them part of a side or end so people actually want to sit there. This should at least be the case at the big stadiums.

not to mention the cost of food and drink. I'd prefer an Intrust Super Cup game as a lead up to the Broncos but that won't happen. They could select the match of the round from the south west, better than watching the basketball scores in U20's where nobody tackles. Leave the other stuff out, send buck to the paddock for a spell and just have a few cheer leaders for when they score, looking at the Bronco's form to date, they won't get tired. Not sure about Sydney, but you guys have to travel far, unlike our inner city stadium.

In Aussie Rules the ball is there to be won by either side at the center bounce. In Cricket you have your opening bat facing your fast opening bowler. But in soccer you have a dinky non contested kick sideways, can see why the countdown clock wouldn't work there. Not sure about the rugbies

Then how is it that a multi-billion dollar empire like the NRL doesn't own any decent stadiums?

They certainly do mate, if this forum is anything to go by!

Wayne Canberrans arent short for coin. $25 is a fair price for a ticket to the footy. Park at the CIT for free mate. Now reducing ticket prices wont make a difference, but a more friendly timeslot would - sunday arvo! But another factor is the Raiders - they barely advertise their home games. And on top of that, in their ads they dont educate the fans on who the players are.

Unless something has radically changed since the last game of last season, the "entertainment" or "extras" at a Raiders game look to have a budget of about $10. Splitting that across the crowd of say 10,000, means a saving of 0.1 cents each. Seriously though, I suspect the economics of football are that a large % of the crowd is rusted on and will go anyway unless priced right out of it. So by cutting the price you're just giving away revenue, and I suspect the gain in people from a lower price isn't going to be enough to outweigh what you give away for the people who go regardless of the price.

Fireworks comes from the stands.