I have 06/07 but nothing before then. I’m not sure how far back we have published away followings in the programme?
You are right about the 15/16 being propped up by Port Vale but we had a lot of away days in that season on Tuesday nights because of games being called off for internationals. I remember being miffed at many because I can’t do Tuesdays.
If I get chance it might be interesting to separate the Saturdays and Tuesdays to see the averages.
Interesting bringing up 15/16. Home attendances weren’t amazing for a team going for 2nd (not just play offs). Only went above 5k 4-5 times.
Rochdale on 2nd January- think team were 2nd with S O’D winning this first three games in charge, 4,800.
Millwall at home a month later was same.
Scunthorpe on a Tuesday night was 3.8k.
Swindon in late April was 5, 095.
The question is, how much did the club do to try to increase those figures? The answer being the same as now - get the early birds etc in and then sit back. If the roll up on matchday policy was as it is now (and there is nothing to suggest it has changed), then no wonder the attendances didn’t change much.
The negative approach seems to revolve around getting the money in up front, so that the club can budget prudently, rather than planning for , and taking advantage of any success.
Exactly. Why didn’t they run some sort of £5 all in deal in the last few home games of 15/16 to get numbers in? Worked last season and that was a fight to stay up.
Short termism. Not interested in gates going up beyond covering the rent.
Yep it was poor , but there was certainly a buzz around the club at the time.
That’s season was the chance , had we got over the line we would of been looking at a 7-8k for an average attendance the following season.
Still baffles me that we didn’t go all out in the January 
Out of interest, where have you got those attendance figures from? They are quite different from those quoted elsewhere:
It looks like they don’t include the away figures, which is another reason why this seasons average will fall dramatically.
No real big games left at home having played al the locals and Sunderland. I expect plenty of sub 4k attendances for the remainder of the year - barely 3.5k there for the Scunthorpe game
Yes there are some differences between the figures @Pingu has found and those I got from the links you’ve highlighted @milansaddler with occasional discrepancies of 200-400. No getting away from the fact they are “disappointing”!
Would be good to have a definitive set of figures for our home attendance and our away followings.
I was led to believe that season ticket holders get counted into the official attendance figure irrespective of whether they turn up. Not sure if that is true.
I guess being realistic we should be comparing ourselves against similar-sized clubs in similar locations (major urban areas surrounded by bigger clubs at a higher level).
Of the top of my head that would be Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Tranmere, Rotherham, Leyton Orient and Brentford, but may have missed a few off.
It would be interesting to see how the attendance trends at those clubs compare to our own. Will look into it if I can find the time.
Stockport are averaging 3.5k despite being in their 6th straight season in the Conference North!
I think part of the problem is that we’ve suffered from too much mid-table mediocrity. If we’d bounced around League One or Two a little that might have actually attracted more fans. You’re more likely to get hooked watching a team earn promotion from League Two than one plodding its way to yet another 15th place finish in League One.
Of course Bonser has a hand in that, as the team is currently run in a way that very much encourages mid-table mediocrity. Other clubs have a more boom and bust approach and while that has its risks, it’s definitely more exciting.
Yes the figures I’ve quoted do not include away fans.
The drop of 1,000 between 07/08 and 08/09 is astounding.
We lost 21% of our fan base (that’s one in five supporters!) in a single summer. They have never really come back, even when we nearly went up in 2015/16 we were still 200-odd fans short.
Understood.
I had interpreted the away figs as the number of away fans at our games not out travelling support. Really interesting stuff.
You can all go round and round in ever decreasing circles,but basically,people won’t pay to watch ■■■■ football games.They will (like me) just wait for something to happen that give’s them a bit of hope.Even if Bonser is still in charge,people will go and pay £20 to watch open exciting football.You can close this thread now…I’ve solved the mystery…
…your welcome…
Hate to rubbish a fellow poster, but that’s absolute tosh lol. Why have other clubs of our size that aren’t doing particularly well on the field gone onto ride the commercial wave and almost double their attendances while we have lost, and continue to lose fans, if that’s the case?!
Well that’s the nicest way I’ve ever been rubbished on UTS…
…thank you…I just wanted to save you all a lot of hassle…you’ve all got lots of theories and questions…but no answers.
Come on Sid, there are loads of answers and suggestions posted on the site.
And another 500 lost the following season.
I would like to know what was done to build upon the golden opportunity of expanding our supporter base, that was Wembley. Taking our average home support at just under 4k over the last 11 seasons, based on Pingu’s stats, that implies 25,000 additional people went to Wembley beyond the hard core support. Another way of looking at it is to say every regular fan took 6 people with them!!
Granted, many of these were family members who were going for the Wembley factor and might have been their only game and others would have been supporters of other local clubs but surely this was THE main chance to be pro-active in reaching out to some of the “extra” 25,000.
Converting just 1 in every 6 to regular or semi-regular attendance would have doubled our league crowds. Easier said then done, but what plan was in place to build bridges with the Wembley “extras” or provide some reward to regulars to bring the Wembley friends along on a more regular basis? Granted the football we served up that day been a turn off for many non regulars but I wonder what pre-planning was done to try and woo the “Wembley casuals” and attract them to the mundane life of L1 footie?
Apart from our almost promotion season, since Wembley, we have added only 200-250 to our average home crowd.
Ok then,give me the definitive answer as to why Walsall’s attendances are so low.
Problem is we do not have the expertise at the club to of exploited it , And this is the problem the wrong people are running the club.
Because the club make little or no effort to reengage lapsed support, generate new support or make the experience of supporting Walsall an enjoyable one regardless of results.