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Getting the excuses in ready incase they get relegated
https://www.fansnetwork.co.uk/footba.../215859/page:1
Unnecessary use of ready
A little while ago I found out that teams that have been accustomed to playing a lot of their football in the top division (or yo-yoed between the top two tiers) generally have more stable fan bases than clubs who have spend some time in the lower reaches and have come back up to the top couple of divisions.
There's no doubt Swansea will lose fans this summer. During their few seasons in the Championship they were getting average attendances of a few more than 15,000. Since promotion that has risen to around 20,500 every season (give or take a few fingers). Their attendances rose slightly every season in the Premier League but have dropped by around 100 last season and by a similar amount this season.
When we were relegated we lost over 6,000 from our home gate during the first season back and almost another 5,000 a season later, losing just under 30% of our crowd in each season. I wouldn't be surprised if Swansea's crowd drops by a similar percentage if they get relegated - a second season in the Championship could see them with their lowest crowds for well over a decade.
If they did suffer a drop of around a third each season for a couple of seasons they'd be hovering around the 12k mark, putting them in the bottom 3 of Championship attendances this season.
Wigan averaged around 1,000 less than the Jacks when they were in the Premier League. That dropped to 15,200, then 12,800, then 9,500 in League 1, back to 11,700 in the Championship and now back down to 9,100 this season. Incredible to think that, 5 years after getting an allocation of 25,000 for an FA cup final, their averaging a little more than a third of that.
I remember going to my first game in division 4. I haven't always watched Cardiff for varying reasons but I don't think I could abandon them just because we were in league 1 again. Football is so fickle. Even at the highest level like Manchester United I know fans that were going and then stopped when they had that mini slump.
Nothing more fickle than a football fan, you only have to look at some " city fans " we all know them, when the good times are here, they are " city till they die " then the next season the team are crap and its " Oh, i am going to watch the Blues " or " non-league football is where it is at, so much passion from the local boys ", then city put a run together and you see them down the ground, once again " city till i die "
I don't know if they will drop that much to start.
Season tickets are apparently already on sale, so many will have already renewed ad those that don't risk losing their place.
A successful year in the Champions shop may also rekindle things for them.
Let's not forget they have sold out most of their ground for 6 seasons now, so there will be people who haven't been able to get tickets ready to replace those who drop out.
Give it a year or 2 in the Championship and then, like us, I'd expect their support to erode.
However I'm more concerned about us. Doing well and still unable to regularly get over 20k. What happens if we don't go up and struggle next year ?
Besides which, if they win today it'll all be forgotten about