Attendances at Vicarage Road

Watford fan Nick Gibb obtained (via a Freedom of Information request) the exact numbers through the turnstiles at Vicarage Road. Pretty much everybody can clearly see the amount of empty seats at each home game despite matches being sold out and the official attendance figures given - however, I'm surprised to see that the amount of no-shows is averaging out at around 3000 per game:

https://twitter.com/keepofftrack/status/953342569727053825

This has since been picked up by the Mercury: http://www.hertfordshiremercury.co....news/revealed-how-many-watford-ticket-1076668




Thoughts on this? It's easy to say at the moment that we're on a poor run so it's no surprise that people have stayed away, but this has been going on a lot longer than our current diabolical form. Should those ticket holders that don't attend regularly be prevented from renewing, being as there's a waiting list? Is the ticket exchange process on the website inadequate? Or do we just have a very large number of wealthy day trippers who buy a season ticket just to watch one game per season, when Manchester Rovers or Nottingham Hotspurts come to town??

 

I honestly wouldn't say it's a surprise at all based on the number of empty seats at most home league games.

 

We have a hardcore of around 14,000, the remainder just make up the numbers when times are good. We have a relatively big family area and families have other interests so probably pick and choose games. Our season ticket prices also pretty low so we attract some who only pick the big games to go to. Ticket exchange also not easy.

 

Ticket exchange is a joke. They only release season tickets for the big games but let you put them up too late to sell. I've missed tonnes of games these last 3 seasons. If I had sold my seat for each game my season ticket renewal would be a third off. I know it shows a lack of loyalty but a combination of three young kids and being a store retail manager make it tough to be a regular. The club should do more to help get my seat available to others.

 

They really need to do something about this.

I’m not an ST holder but when I try and buy tickets it says that it’s sold out when there are hundreds of seats empty in reality.

In the SEJ in particular it’s always roughly the same areas of seats that’s are empty so I wonder if these are tickets handed out to the community / players families & friends / other initiatives and just not taken up?

 

The times are good...

Personally im bored of the Premier League already. I was far more engrossed in the Championship even when we were ****.

Couple that with the matchday experience at the Vic being a bit ****, away days are my priority now.

Think a lot of other fans feel the same way tbh.

 

I picked up possibly the last pair of available seats that were next to each other for the Southampton game for myself and the better half, and we were shocked to see the number of empty seats, particularly in the SEJ stand. It’s frustrating but understandable for the reasons already highlighted. I suspect the declared v actual attendance stats would be roughly the same for most other clubs of our size.

 

One word describes this statistic EMBARRASSING support your team by showing up and cheering us on or clear off and by a season ticket at Arsenal and no show there like you do at the Vic. Sell tickets to real fans.

 

Every club does it these days.
For instance the average attendance at the Emirates is around 10% less than announced, same for other clubs i believe. As far as football clubs are concerned the only thing that matters is that the seat has been paid for.. and actually i believe they have an obligation to give out this figure for accounting purposes. Really they should give out two attendances figures.. seats sold and actual attendees.


Got me thinking about one thing though. Our supposed record average attendance is the 20,594 in the first season back in the Prem this time round. But looking at those figures the actual average must have been around 18,500 or so.. slightly less the past two seasons.
So.. our average in 82/83, the first season in the top flight, of 19,488 should be regarded as our best ever because i believe back then the attendances given were actual numbers in the ground.

 

This is no different to any other football club now or in the past.

 

Surprisingly the same for the big games so it's not just people buying a ticket and only going to games v top 6 for example.

Does the 75 mile ST still exist? Some may be those people missing the few games they are allowed to.

 

I miss few games as a ST holder. Maybe 2/3. If the club made it easy to make it available I would. They don’t so I don’t bother. It’s that simple.

 

How far in the past? Do you know when they started counting season ticket in the attendance or do you think they always have?

 

What is odd is that we apparently have thousands on the season ticket waiting list

 

The difference these days is that the percentage of season ticket holders in the ground is way higher than it used to be, particularly at clubs like Watford. 30 years ago the number of ST no shows would have represented a negligible error.

 

That wasnt what he said. He said it was no different in the past. I just wondered how far back he meant.

 

The 75 mile season ticket was maintained for existing ST holders only - no new ones are issued. As I understand it you have to stipulate the games you won’t be attending quite a while in advance or the game will be taken off your allowance. Therefore I don’t imagine 75 mile tickets contribute to the problem significantly.
I would imagine a bigger problem is pricing of kids’ tickets in the family stand. £30 a season is brilliant value- I used it myself when my girls were younger. However I believe there may be some people who have a child’s ST that they never actually use other than to upgrade to adult when the “big” boys come to town.
I assume that from barcode scans the club can deduce who actually uses their tickets. Maybe serial no shows could get a yellow card and then have their tickets withdrawn if they continue. I’m talking about obvious abuse only - not a week off to visit granny or a holiday in Costa Packet.

 

Aren't the club already addressing no shows? Definitely think a use it or lose it policy should be in place and no doubt the Family Stand is abused by some.

Are there sound reasons for not having unrestricted seating? Not being able to buy pairs of tickets when they are on general sale must put off many.

 

I take you mean unreserved seating?


Season ticket holders in every stand?

 

Yeah I did mean unreserved. Predictive text is only as good as the user I guess.

 

Back in the days when you could pay cash on the turnstile the quoted figure always seemed lower than the actual attendance!

 

These attendance figures are why it's important that the capacity is increased. With a waiting list for season tickets and limited availability for "Premier League" fans there's a lack of premium view seats now at the Vic.
There are many different types of football fans to cater for and Watford can't do some groups very well at present because the ground is limited. If they don't make it attractive they'll chose the new London stadiums instead. Which is unfortunately what is happening.
When you've got amazing new stadiums at Chelsea Arsenal West Ham Tottenham not to mention Wembley Brentford possibly Luton and QPR, Watford still need to invest heavily in our stadium which was neglected for so long before the Pozzo era.

 

I tend to only go to Man Utd, Arsenal, Chelsea, Man City and Spurs at home, the others matches I give my ST to someone but no one really seems too interested in taking it when it's not the big 5.

 

Can I have your Liverpool one then!

 

They need to allow ticket exchange for every game, not just the sold out ones. That way non-season ticket holders would have access to better seats and groups of 2-3 seats as opposed to just singles. I'm sure many of those empty seats would be sold if they were made available, whereas at the moment people are put off coming.

My family has 5 season tickets together, and not all of us can make every game. But we usually let a friend come with rather than leave an empty seat, however it's not always easy to find someone who wants to watch Watford v Stoke on a cold Saturday afternoon so on those occasions the seat remains empty and we don't have the ability to put it on the ticket exchange.

 

Ticket exchange should be as simple as going on to your ticket account and selecting 'release tickets' for a match. This should be able to be cancelled at any time, up to the point of purchase.

If a ticket is sold, something like £5-£10 a ticket should be added as credit to your account, to spend in the shop, at the bar or on season tickets next season.

At the moment, it seems like re-sell tickets are de-prioritized for non ST seats in the stadium. This can make it very difficult to both give you seat away, and for buyers to find decent seats together.

If this is a cost-problem for the club, then charge the £5 extra to the purchaser when there are x% of free seats elsewhere in the stadium. This will give purchasers the choice of where to sit without the club losing out.

It's frustrating that it is so difficult to give up your seats for others.

 

Guess why!

 

You're not suggesting some kind of accounting impropriety are you?

 

There's nothing amazing about West Ham's stadium.

 

I get the impression the ticket exchange system is a bit of a PR exercise and the club feels the admin effort to run it properly is too great.

 

Too late until our first season back in the Premier League

 

They need to up the price of season tickets to cater for demand and also increase the kids season ticket price.

The discount for renewals should be graded according to attendance.

Ie 80%+ attended full discount
70%+ attended half discount
60%+attended quarter discount
no discount for other renewals.

 

No, fiddling at the turnstiles

 

Probably a bit of both