City one win away from back-to-back A-League crowns after stirring semi-final comeback

The fact Western are making finals and grand finals makes things worse, rather than better. If they were terrible, you could understand fans taking time to warm to them. But they have been quite good on the field. What is going to bring Western fan out? Where are they coming from? I was sceptical from the start, and nothing I've seen since has changed my mind.

What does stadium size have to do with a crowd if none of the clubs are filling it to capacity?

The more they change, the more they stay the same. Look at the 2004 grand final.

So we are actually getting a final with a 7k tops crowd. Oh how things have changed.

can’t keep looking at it like that Roberto – vic & nsw have the population to support 3-4 teams (SA doesn’t and QLD im still iffy on) absolutely disagree with victory having “good crowds this season” – what was there average, around 9000? – which was massively inflated due to melbourne derbies and matches against the big nsw teams in the season and finals (15k, 11k, 17k etc) yes covid and yes finished rock bottom last year – but they recruited a great coach and squad this season. poppa does play a boring defensive brand of football, (but that shouldnt turn fans away) victory have also had amazing time slots, for viewing matches throughout the season. They have history and success that majority of clubs in the a league can only dream of and should have a very rusted on 15+ year supporter base due to these 2 things victory is also going to be having a multi million dollar marquee player this upcoming season – absolutely cannot keep cutting this club any slack, with its dwindling crowds, they should be averaging 25k plus they have close to 20,000+ membership renewals each year alone (the most in the a league) the fact victory can’t get every member to regularly attend matches each week – let alone the casuals that might be enticed due to the ‘atmosphere’ is a real issues. i havent even touched on sydney yet lol people can keep throwing up macathur and western unis crowds, but im telling you the apl and fa arent that worried (maybe in a couple years if they remain the same) all the effort needs to go into getting victory, sydney, wanderers and citys crowds up (inparticular victory and sydney) and im not talking giving these cubs any more marquee players either funded by the league both states have serious issues with supporters

im only going to address your comments, because you regularly make ludicrous statements about a club you know zero about. do you honestly think the FFA or APL are even remotely concerned with western unis and macarthurs attendances? because i can tell you, they're not. (if they remain the same in a few years, they might well be – but right now, theyre bottom on the list of priorities) attendance figures have nothing to do with adelaide or brisbane or the mariners or newcastle etc etc. those 4 markets could attract sub 5000 crowds each week and it wouldn’t make a dent to the bigger picture.............. which is that the 4 biggest clubs in the league (victory/sydney/wanderers/city) haven’t been pulling their weight with crowds for a long time - even pre covid, there crowds were trending drastically south. hindmarsh is capped at 11,889 with the stand out of commotion - adelaide got how much in there 2 home finals? a crowd of over 9000 (against the biggest club in the competition, on a midweek time slot that never works in adelaide) and a crowd of over 10,000 (against the smallest team in the comp) - regardless, thats over 80% of the current capacity of the stadium. do you want to run some numbers and see what city and victory have averaged in a much larger stadium (30,000+) in the finals - given the amount of memberships both clubs have sold in comparison to adelaide for arguments sake? - even if you excuse that timeframe yesterday, citys crowd would've been around the same figure season after season you'll find small market sides like adelaide or brisbane finish in the top 4/5 in terms of attendance - this should never ever happen - the fact this constantly does shows you where the issues are. victory and sydney should be getting 20K+ every week, given their standing in the sport. wanderers and city should easily be getting over 15k to matches as well cant keep using covid as an excuse for people not turning up - especially when numbers are even more inflated when you take into account larger attendances due to melbourne and sydney derbies throughout the season

WU makes finals in their third season. Obviously poor effort and club needs to be disbanded…are most A League fans just pessimists?

I don't think the criticism of Victory is particularly fair. Attendances have been down across the league this year. COVID was a big factor, but its impact will diminish over time. Wait until next season to pass judgement on Victory. For City and Western, however, their attendances are deeply concerning. That is not just judging from this season, but from before COVID. City have not been able to generate and maintain a sustainable support base, and if their recent success doesn't help to generate that support base you have to wonder what will. Similarly for Western, it was always questionable where their fans were going to come from, and despite them putting good sides on the pitch we're no closer to knowing. The Grand Final this weekend will go a long way to demonstrating the combined potential of these two clubs. If they can't sell it out, the APL should be asking serious questions about the ongoing benefit of having three clubs in Melbourne. If a club like Western can only draw 2-3k per week, the A-League is better off having the club in a new market and giving the two existing clubs more space to grow.

Relatively speaking, Victory crowds remained pretty good much of the season. Looking at it more broadly, Sydney and Melbourne now have 3 franchises each, indeed Sydney has another 2 A-League franchises on its doorstep, that comes to 8 of 12 franchises. Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide are probably better placed for crowds given they remain single city clubs.

What about Adelaide , you can use the excuse of the new grandstand there were empty seats. Its the pot calling the kettle black. Sydney FC final game of the season was bigger than both your semi finals. As for the tired legs Adelaide made six subs to three though 2 were useless Ibusuki and Tratt. The late show was also based on Carvalho and Caletti coming on full of energy,

You have to assume Ibusuki was barely fit to sit on the bench, otherwise he'd have been used.

disappointing result, but the legs were gone by the 60th min - just hanging on for dear life, and couldn’t in the end - happens anyways, i want to bring up some comments made by adelaide fans in the stadium as well as several fans on the flight home last night. - it had to do with attendance. from my guess-timate, i don’t think there was even 8000 there yesterday afternoon (no way was that a 5 figure turn out) - absolutely embarrassing turn out, for a semi final match. where was the "home" crowd? that should be watching the richest club, who in recent seasons finished first or second and has a socceroos forward line. there are serious issues with crowds in victoria/nsw and has been for a few seasons now. Victory is back to being semi successful and even their crowds were poor this season The a league will never reach decent crowd levels until vic/nsw figure out what exactly is going on in relation to the lack of attendance and support from its 'fans' these crowds are even more inflated when you consider the number of free tickets and 2 for 1's that clubs like western united, melbourne city etc have been doing.

APL will be breathing sighs of relief. A Western vs Adelaide GF in Melbourne would have been a disaster.

3-1 WU in the final

Vearts biggest mistake was to bring back Yengi Ibusuki combo. A quick fast striker will make hay out of the chaos that Yengi causes. Then Tratt as an attacking option that was a bit of a joke. Berengeur his fitness was not that bad , still outran McLaren who has become lazier this year, his execution was poor however. I thought it was strange to put him straight back in the starting line up. Gomulka under pressure had a poor game. Colakovski despite the snubs he has received from Kisnorbo after winning him a title came on added a lot of energy and helped City dominate extra time. This isn't City of last year, who wrapped up the title with a month to go, then used reserve teams for the rest of the season to rest, its an even money bet at this stage.