Match Thread: June 15, 2019 - York9 FC v. Pacific FC

[Ams1984]

1 hour ago, TFC07 said:

Empty stadium? 

Not at all. Decent turnout. 

[Ams1984]

1 hour ago, Big_M said:

NATHAN INGHAM WHAT AN UNBELIEVABLE KEEPER WOOWWW

He really is a great GK!

[Ams1984]

25 minutes ago, Bison44 said:

Cripes, as soon as I saw the stands I wondered how long before some smug ******* posts a reddit thread about lack of fans on our thread about the game.  Why wait for official attendance or real fans that are at the game like Ansem when you can jump on the **** train before the game is even over?  

Anyways I had a nice start to super saturday socceropolis with my son, switching back and forth between Spongebob and CBC.  Where was Ingham hiding before this?  Wasting away on a USL bench? 

That’s one of the things I find so cool about this league (not the negative loser posts), guys like Ingham get a shot, and boy is he making the most of it!

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

25 minutes ago, Ams1984 said:

Not at all. Decent turnout. 

You can claim that with a straight face after the pictures Ansem posted? Bear in mind this league said it wanted 6000 to 8000 at one point. There aren't even enough seats in use at York Lions stadium to get close to that but still there are acres of empty seats. Pretending on here that things are going well on crowds when they clearly aren't where York 9 is concerned isn't going to change anything in the big scheme of things.

Like the Lynx back in the day, the soccer is of a decent standard, but that isn't enough to get people in the GTA to show up for some reason. If the owner is gung ho about owning a pro soccer team there will be plenty of opportunities to turn it around just as there was with the North York Rockets. Finding an owner for something like this in the GTA is usually doable. As long as things continue to look promising elsewhere on crowds this is only a localized problem.

 

Edited June 15, 2019 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[Bison44]

go back to reddit.

 

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

I've been posting on the various incarnations of this forum for around twenty years.

[Ams1984]

6 minutes ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

You can claim that with a straight face after the pictures Ansem posted? Bear in mind this league said it wanted 6000 to 8000 at one point. There aren't even enough seats in use at York Lions stadium to get close to that but still there are acres of empty seats. Pretending on here that things are going well on crowds when they clearly aren't where York 9 is concerned isn't going to change anything in the big scheme of things.

Like the Lynx back in the day, the soccer is of a decent standard, but that isn't enough to get people in the GTA to show up for some reason. If the owner is gung ho about owning a pro soccer team there will be plenty of opportunities to turn it around just as there was with the North York Rockets. Finding an owner for something like this in the GTA is usually doable. As long as things continue to look promising elsewhere on crowds this is only a localized problem.

 

There were just under 3k people there. Note that I used the word “decent” when describing the turnout, not “stellar”. It wasn’t “empty” or anything close to it. 

[Gopherbashi]

Ingham is a god, they would've nailed one for sure on that deflected cross in the 77th if he hadn't made that amazing save.

We were honestly unlucky not to get a couple in the first half, we had a ton of good attacks but had trouble finishing close to the net.  Best half I've seen from the team so far, and that includes the 3-1 win against Edmonton in the cup last week.

People are dumbasses if they thought there were only 100 people there.  The centre sections on the west stand (camera-side) were about 1/4 full (about 8 people in each row of 30).  Allowing for some tapering off to the sides, I'd say about 700 total in the west stands, 150 in the east stand, 80 in the SG, and let's assume another 70 in the corner suites, club seats, etc for an even total of 1000.  We're all from the suburbs though so we like a lot of space around us; I didn't mind the atmosphere or thought it was lacking at all.

It's possible people just saw the ~150 in the camera-facing east stand and thought that was the whole thing, but like I said, they're dumbasses.

[Aird25]

I haven't been able to watch the game yet. Was the result fair? It looks like a poor penalty from Fisky. We need him to start producing

[Gopherbashi]

6 minutes ago, Aird25 said:

I haven't been able to watch the game yet. Was the result fair? It looks like a poor penalty from Fisky. We need him to start producing

Pacific weren't happy with some foul calls in the second half but nothing game-changing.  The occasional good chance but your midfield was weak and there was never really sustained pressure or follow-up chances.

[Aird25]

2 minutes ago, Gopherbashi said:

 Pacific weren't happy with some foul calls in the second half but nothing game-changing.  The occasional good chance but your midfield was weak and there was never really sustained pressure or follow-up chances.

I was hoping Gonzalez might help in the midfield. It sounds like we're still in need of reinforcements

[Shortdutchcanuck]

24 minutes ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

You can claim that with a straight face after the pictures Ansem posted? Bear in mind this league said it wanted 6000 to 8000 at one point. There aren't even enough seats in use at York Lions stadium to get close to that but still there are acres of empty seats. 

 

It is concerning but nothing to get worked up over this early.  The league always knew GTA would be a challenge.  The CFL has kept the Argos alive for years and I think this owner and CanPL will keep York going for some years even if it struggles.  A GTA team is important for optics and media visibility.

The break-even number mentioned was not 6 to 8000 but 5000 but that's still just a number.  Doesn't mean it is the same for every team or that it stayed the same after the deal with MediaPro.  Maybe York have less salary burden and in addition York Lions Stadium is probably much cheaper to operate out of compared to some of the bigger stadiums.

 

[Ansem]

[Ansem]

@Ozzie_the_parrot

Go back to reddit, you troll

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

Your pictures are proving the point I was making and when things have been going well as in Halifax I have been one of the first to say so. For the crowd to genuinely be 2900 that stand would have to be almost full. It clearly isn't even close.

Edited June 15, 2019 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[Ansem]

I have you on ignore so I dont know what you're saying but "ZFG"

[yellowsweatygorilla]

11 minutes ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

Your pictures are proving the point I was making and when things have been going well as in Halifax I have been one of the first to say so. For the crowd to genuinely be 2900 that stand would have to be almost full. It clearly isn't even close.

I was at the game, and have been very critical of turnout and york 9 marketing. This was a decent turnout. Does it match the levels of Halifax and Forge? Of course not. But it's an improvement and shows that we can get crowds at a more sustainable level when the weather is a little better. 

The ownership just needs to hire more staff and put more money into marketing, instead of relying on volunteers to take on some of the tasks.

[Ansem]

Just now, yellowsweatygorilla said:

I was at the game, and have been very critical of turnout and york 9 marketing. This was a decent turnout. Does it match the levels of Halifax and Forge? Of course not. But it's an improvement and shows that we can get crowds at a more sustainable level when the weather is a little better. 

The ownership just needs to hire more staff and put more money into marketing, instead of relying on volunteers to take on some of the tasks.

That's what got to me. I was telling myself

-Imagine if they went to Yorkdale, Sheppard Centre, Fairview Mall, Sheppard-Yonge station, Sheppard West, Both Eglinton Stations, Both Lawrence Stations and Mel Lastman Square putting up booths at strategic time.

The turnout would be much bigger. Unfortunately, at the very least, 90% of North York has no idea that York 9 is happening or a thing. 

[SoccMan]

I’ve stated this before I think York9 should actually stay at York U and try to make that stadium even more soccer friendly. You can’t beat that location and having that subway station right there . That stadium is connected by subway and even by bus to most of York Region and all of Toronto by subway you can’t beat that. Look yes attendance has not been great, weather, and even today’s start time sucks, 12PM sucks for a start time too. Look the owner has major money if he really likes owning a team loosing some money on this team is not going to make hardly a dent on his pocket book .

[Ansem]

14 minutes ago, SoccMan said:

I’ve stated this before I think York9 should actually stay at York U and try to make that stadium even more soccer friendly. You can’t beat that location and having that subway station right there . That stadium is connected by subway and even by bus to most of York Region and all of Toronto by subway you can’t beat that. Look yes attendance has not been great, weather, and even today’s start time sucks, 12PM sucks for a start time too. Look the owner has major money if he really likes owning a team loosing some money on this team is not going to make hardly a dent on his pocket book .

I'm a CPL enthusiast as everyone know...

I have a hard time seeing their 15k stadium in Vaughan happening...unless ownership group are willing to dump that much cash.

I think you call yourself "York" identifying with both York Region and North York. Quadruple down on marketing in North York and convert more people. Instead of spending cash on the Vaughan stadium, use the cash on beautifying Lions Stadium, upgrade it.

North York+York should be the goal in my opinion. You'll never get better location than this.

Add some roofing structure.

I have no time for those talking folding...Worst case scenario for York 9 is to stay put and make North York work

Edited June 15, 2019 by Ansem

[Ams1984]

10 minutes ago, SoccMan said:

I’ve stated this before I think York9 should actually stay at York U and try to make that stadium even more soccer friendly. You can’t beat that location and having that subway station right there . That stadium is connected by subway and even by bus to most of York Region and all of Toronto by subway you can’t beat that. Look yes attendance has not been great, weather, and even today’s start time sucks, 12PM sucks for a start time too. Look the owner has major money if he really likes owning a team loosing some money on this team is not going to make hardly a dent on his pocket book .

If anything, it’s a tax write off, but it’s pretty hard for clubs to lose money in this league in my opinion; let’s assume that the annual expenditures are below $2MM per club, With the broadcast deal and sponsorship deals, they probably don’t need much in terms of attendance to break even.

I really don’t think that any of these owners expected to turn a profit any time soon, (most new businesses struggle for years) and I’m fairly sure that some learning curve in terms of operations and ticket sales was expected. There are always going to be negative people trying to paint things in a negative light, but this league is an amazing achievement, and I really think that it’s going pretty well.

I genuinely believe that these 7 clubs will be fine, and that things will only grow from here. Once the league becomes entrenched and financially stable (which won’t be hard given the low overhead of the clubs) more and more ‘casual’ fans will buy in. Especially if the league can get into the video games and be taken seriously by the kids. 

[TFC07]

2 hours ago, Zem said:

As per @Ansem's post, the main stand is below the camera. Attendance is 2,914.

Good to know.  I only watched 2nd half on CBC and saw an empty stand and supporter section didn't look full either.  

York U is a great location, but owning your own stadium is better option financially in the long term.  Hopefully York9 able to build their own 15,000 stadium with grass turf ASAP.  

[Bdog]

2 hours ago, Ansem said:

I’m somewhere in this pic. Obviously a lot of empty seats but I wouldn’t say the attendance was terrible or anything. 

[Gopherbashi]

Considering that our "break-even" calculations don't include bundles of Mediapro money, having a paid attendance of 3000 isn't the end of the world by any means.  Especially at York9's prices.

If this is what we've got for the rest of the season, I'll have less reason to worry than I did a few weeks ago.

The worry would be if 2000 of those tickets were given away as unclaimed freebees to various companies, or if they're held by people who don't feel like coming to the games.  Could spell trouble for fan retention next year.

[Gopherbashi]

2 hours ago, TFC07 said:

Good to know.  I only watched 2nd half on CBC and saw an empty stand and supporter section didn't look full either.  

York U is a great location, but owning your own stadium is better option financially in the long term.  Hopefully York9 able to build their own 15,000 stadium with grass turf ASAP.  

Might be better financially but I'd rather stay here and have it feel somewhat full rather than go to a 15k stadium and have it feel empty.