njh1968

This If people can t see the link between their pint and pie (which is a bit strange, particularly when you have a black & gold scarf on) handing over £500+ has to resonate. I agree that we all have a choice and people don t want to be told what to do, but look at the facts, several million pounds coming in will aid the owner to clink on and continue to destroy the club. This is our biggest weapon and we have to use it. As said the Trust need to be pushing this out from now.

Cant say I heard much booing, heard plenty of cheers and applause

especially if he gives them 4k tickets

Got to agree, if you want to build up your points these are the opportunities. Probably more chance this season with how things look like they are going. So

Interesting that Grimsby have been given an allocation of 4,069, which is more than the usual maximum, again trying to cover the lack of home fans.

We have got to avoid falling for that. ST renewals is our best and biggest chance to really hit him hard

I had seen this earlier when I was on the ticket website, that there are 3 home league games on sale which is unusual, normally we have one at a time. A guy on football heaven highlighted it too and hopefully it means DC is getting more desperate for cash. How early will the early bird ST be out …. Enough is Enough

I think they could bring 3k+

It would be helpful if a list of the various groups could be shared, so we know who is part of the wider umbrella group and who remains separate. Appreciate some groups may feel ‘their’ interests are best served with a single focus but the bigger picture has to be ‘our’ collective effort against the regime.

The pigs look in a bit of turmoil at the start of the season hopefully that will continue for them to keep the score down …..

By no means an expert and not advocating it but if you watch some of those annoying ‘auditors’ who fly drones all over the place, they seem to get them over what might be seen as sensitive sites and private companies. Not sure if football grounds are protected but as others have said there are exclusion zones which prevent flying over sone places, which the ‘auditors’ seem to be able to view easily to check an areas fly status,

To be honest it does me too and checking in with the Blackpool fans did shift some of my thinking about accepting that you will never convince some to stop funding the owner and so use that energy with those who want and are prepared to be part of the ‘fight’

I know there was plenty of writing on the walls for a number of years with how DC operated but the complete collapse over the last 3/4 has been a real shock. We had a sniff of the play offs in Jan and even when we did nt buy it felt like just another missed opportunity. When I listened to the Trust meeting, where they laid out the finances it was clear to see we had been on borrowed time for quite a while but despite that we had 3 of my greatest Wednesday experiences in my nearly 50 years of watching us, over the last few years, the play offs v Peterborough & Dingles and the ‘run in’ to us surviving the following year, with the last 3 away wins at Blackburn, QPR and Sunderland being amazing to be part of. These were achieved in spite of DC not because of him and what stands out in those games are the fans, the togetherness, which makes football special and seeing where we are now with the splits emerging and reading the comments from Blackpool fans about how it went for them we are heading for a rough ride as a fanbase.

Agree it seems completely illogical given where we are and what DC has done to us. It comes down to individual choice but the Stoke attendance was significantly down compared to last years opening day and I would image the Leeds game will have less Owls than in normal circumstances, I suppose it might be that we need to temper the expectations and any reduction is a start and not see it as a failure if some still attend.

Its a long post so bear with me I mentioned in another thread about the experience of Blackpool and the split that occurred in their fanbase when they boycotted matches. So I went on one of their forums and asked how that period had felt for them and if they had any thoughts. From some of the posts that period has left a significant legacy which is still hard to overcome. Below are a few of the responses but for many contributors NAPM - ‘not a penny more’ was the key part of their campaign against their owners. They acknowledge that it is not easy but they felt it had to be done first the good of the club. They only took c. 8k to a play off final, during this period!!! We all have a choice and there were many Blackpool fans who did nt boycott games for their own reasons but thought it may be helpful to share some of what was said from fans who have been through what we are in the midst of. ‘It will get nasty, painful and emotional at times but, for the long term good of your club, the more severe the boycott, the quicker a solution will come about’ ‘A Massive boycott is the only way to resolve your issues’ ‘It took a very long time between the first whispered suggestions of a boycott and it actually happening. Unless your situation is resolved this season, a boycott probably won’t have much impact until ST renewal’ ‘What you’ll have, on a bigger scale, is a block of fans who won’t ever boycott. They may be your older generation that have always gone every other week for a catch up with old friends. It’s just what they do and to stop that, when older, is difficult’ ‘We started off with organised protests in the ground. A tennis ball protest against Burnley which held up the match for 10 minutes. A walk out on 70 mins against Cardiff then the centre circle protest against Huddersgield at the end of the 1st half which got the match abandoned. After that a complete boycott which lasted about 3 seasons and often turned nasty with fans still going in given loads of abuse’ ‘The pain of not going to see your team is horrendous but there comes a time when you have to say enough is enough of people taking the ******** out of the fans . It has to be done and the more who boycott the quicker salvation will be . It’s like a knife in the heart of true supporters’ ‘It was hard at first and there are some people who will never forgive the ones who didn't boycott and it affected the atmosphere for years after’ ‘Nobody is saying a boycott will work - but if you hit most moneymen in the pocket you will probably have an impact of some sorts’ ‘do not ever forget you support the players and manager even when you boycott. Still watch them on tv, post on forums, go to away games ( if you really must, I didn't go for 5 seasons). But do not stop supporting your club. But dont give them any money’ Some fans highlighted the court case which finally got the Oystons out of Blackpool but there remains a powerful sense that the fans played a crucial part. ‘The Oystons screwed up, embezzled money, and were brought to rights in court. The judge was clearly affected by the fans boycott and love of the club, which influenced how he determined what happened to the club next, I believe, but the boycott in itself didn't get rid of the Oystons’ ‘We wouldn't have got rid of the Oystons without Mr Belokon, who owned a 50% stake in the club, taking them to court and winning. The boycott helped but wouldn't have succeeded by itself, surely’ ‘It wouldn't have happened without the colossal effort and expense that Belokon threw at it. We did an amazing thing as fans, but the Oystons were so bloody minded they enjoyed defying us’ My overall take aways are that (unless a take over happens quickly, not looking likely) we could be in for a similar situation. Its really hard to not attend games for some, no matter how much pressure, awareness raising happens and new threads we start basically asking the same question and expecting a new or different answer. Maybe others need to see some momentum to join in or that we continue to lose the vast majority of games. A number of posters mentioned the Blackpool Supporters Trust who did a lot of the organising around protests but also you need other external factors to help, both Reading and Blackpool were saved through the courts and I know the Trust have been looking into stuff from a legal perspective. I know this is a long post and some may not want to read to the end but it gives an indication of where we could be heading and that expecting large numbers of fans just to stop going with the first call for a boycott is unrealistic, despite the mess we are in, but the message seems to be to push withholding funds but also keep chipping away at it from a range of angles so that as many fans as possible feel they can join the protests, which is something the Reading supporters have spoken about. In many ways we are still in the early stages of this despite being several months since the start of the protests. UTO, WAWAW, WTID,

One of the things the Reading supporters group emphasised was that they had a range of protests and understood that they needed to offer this as one size does nt fit all but they wanted to bring as many fans as possible with them. The splitting we are seeing is probably inevitable to some extent, the Blackpool example was very acrimonious and we seem to be going that way with flare ups between fans

C.1,300

Absolutely it would be news, as was Leicester, which I think made more publicity in terms of how that worked, with fans outside, then coming in, being on Sky etc than it would have if no one had turned up. The problem we have is that the person in charge appears not to care, so just on season ticket holders not going I don t think it will make any difference to him, whether they do or don’t

Genuine question, what specific impact does it have for a season ticket holder to attend and not spend any additional money, on the club’s future?

I know everything is a mess but how are tickets not on sale a week before the game ?

will that mean DC sells !!!!!!

If a boycott is called can see DC giving Leeds more tickets, if he can get away with it.

Even Palmer said we were a bit underprepared for Leicester so use to get more minutes in. Of course don t want any injuries but getting some a bit more game time will help.

Palmer will start as captain

The release of emotion and noise when we scored was amazing, proud of the players and fans today