RicoS321

Looking forward to the game. Just picked up my tickets. I don't think we've gone into this game in the best frame of mind, especially the way we finished the game against Saints. That said, McInnes has surprised me in the past, with just as many unexpected wins as unexpected losses. Don't know what to expect from the hibees at all, so should be a great game. We're good at fitba, and hopefully that'll get us through on the day. Only changes for me would be Reynolds back in for O'Connor and McGinn for Christie. Back to the winning team that started the year.

Fuck, just as well you mentioned. I'd have felt like a richt tit walking through the hibees with my full strip and shin guards. Think I'll go for the train then, Mount Florida it'll be. Fucking rip off trains these days like.

Fit's wrong wi' hibs like? Also, is that nae the end we're supposed to park at, or have I got it wrong? I haven't actually organised transport there yet. Was thinking of bussing it or taking the wife's car as mine een's brakes are fucked.

Aye, you missed the most important one there Tom, and that's the dons. Re-developed RDS, no relegation, no liquidation, no admin. Of course, there'd be St Mirren and St Johnstone who have been relegated since moving stadium. There's probably no useful evidence either way if we're honest. I suspect most admins were down to huge overspending on players rather than stadium repairs. But I realise you were just responding to a ridiculous suggestion from 100%AK.

No, I missed some words. I meant to say 3K+ for a start tailing off to about +2K after 5 years. I think it'll be heavily front loaded, but I think we'll get that 20% target over ten years. I think we'll regularly sell out in our first 2 seasons and tail off after that. A lean period (on the pitch) after the first 5 years will really see how the location works out.

The question is, is this indicative of the long term natural trend of corporate at AFC? Beyond the initial surge created by a new stadium. I suspect it is. I think we get a good return on our corporate facilities for a city our size.

Nae sure like, probably miss our game, or they'll downgrade to a booking because it's Scott Brown and the ref didnae ken the rules. I was wondering if it was normal though? I'm not suggesting they changed the rules afterwards, I was suggesting that when deciding to re-schedule their easter meetings, they looked at the fixture list and saw a cup semi final weekend - including a scum game - and thought it might be easier to postpone the appeals process so that any team (including Aberdeen and the HIVs) could avoid having an important player missing for such an important weekend. For what it's worth, I don't think league suspensions should carry to the cup (but cup should to league if the team gets knocked out).

Because yer nae really supposed to kick people in fitba.

Cheers. So we're pretty hefty already? My question/point was, perhaps badly put, have we already reached the limit of what we can earn from corporate? In order to answer that, it'd be useful to know the maximum we could earn from matchday corporate and the occupation percentages of the existing non-matchday corporate. I suspect we're pretty close to saturation point as it is based on my experience of the current RDS corporate. I'd doubt we get the RDS and Main Stand facilities used 5 days a week either. I've been to a few seminars and the like at Pittodrie outwith match day and it's been pretty quiet generally, but this obviously entirely anecdotal. To answer 100%NK's concerns, really we just have to determine whether or not the additional corporate, ticket and prize revenue the club feels is possible would cover the cost of the mortgage. We'd probably be looking at about £1M per year over 35 years or something in mortgage. I doubt our prize money is going to increase significantly from the last couple of years. I don't believe we'll get Europa league anytime soon. Sponsorship and advertising should increase, but that may depend on any deals on stadium naming rights, which might prevent other advertiser getting involved (lets say 10% increase for first ten years). Lets say gate receipts 20% (extra 3K fans??) and corporate get 10% increase over the first ten years. That's around £1.5M of increased revenue. Those figures would be heavily loaded toward the first 5 as the shiny new thing becomes less attractive. I think they're ambitious like, but nae impossible. Obviously, there'd be significant reductions in cost too. That'd easy cover the mortgage. We'd really be looking at player sales from our new training improvements to remain competitive and properly improve, which is no bad thing.

I think that vastly over-estimates the ability to pull in corporate visitors. Most offices have the ability to hold small events, with larger ones being hosted in hotels. You get the occasional business breakfast, sales seminar type deal etc. but surely this can't be a huge market? More correctly, surely they've reached saturation point with the existing facilities and they can't expect to get a massive increase in revenue from the stadium move? It seems to me like one of those selling points for the new stadium that isn't really a selling point. Like the sale of Pittodrie, or the training facilities.

Or any of a number of experienced, available managers. It stinks of them trying to employ a former player for no good reason than he's a former player. It'd be interesting to hear what qualities that the Dundee board thought that McCann has that a "time-served" manager like Hartley doesn't? I suspect none. I hope they go down. McCann is a dick.

More importantly, where does that end? All corporate seats? An entire stand devoted to corporate? There's something a bit vacuous about that statement. Arse-licking is probably appropriate, I'd agree. Not necessarily just boss' airse, but at least those of a certain degree of wealth. Basically, the equivalent of the pandering shout out to our "gold club members" that you get on airplanes. We couldn't be where we were today if it weren't for the rich types who turn up to our games once a season in a suit. I enjoy a bit of corporate now and again, don't get me wrong. I'm certainly not suggesting that we remove corporate. But the statement stinks of a sales pitch for the new stadium, and undermines the normal ticketed supporter. It doesn't discuss a percentage of stadium/seat coverage or any other useful measure, nor does it seem to be backed by evidence (it could be, it just hasn't been provided). It also ignores the take-up of corporate at Pittodrie. I think anyone that's been would agree that - despite the state of Pittodrie - the RDS corporate is just as good as you'd expect at a new stadium. Yet, I have been offered in recent seasons (even under McInnes) the chance to take up a corporate table that has not been otherwise filled. This suggests there is a saturation point at which corporate is not only not necessary, but a drain on resource and wasted space, much like our general attendances. The bland "corporate is better" doesn't really count for much without some figures behind it. Nor does it count for anything without the accompanying 12,000 seater design, showing how much corporate we'd be losing or, conversely, how much general seating we'd lose because of corporate. Not to mention the fact that there are two types of corporate: box and general seated. It'd be very interesting to see the margin between the two.

Also, given channel 4's tireless investigation into election spending, I'm surprised they're even allowed to stand in certain seats. This gives them ample opportunity to drop any candidates they think might lose a court case. Wonder if they've had a head's up they might have been forced into bi-elections?

The only new party, will be a UKIP replacement funded by Arron Banks (which will just be UKIP). There's no time for an actual political party to be formed. Haven't heard fae the SNP yet, but a quick regurgitation of May's message that people shouldn't be introducing elections before the electorate have a chance to see what Brexit has to offer will surely be the order of the day. It's a pretty decisive move from the Tories like, with the SNP being their only real opposition I can see them going for Scotland pretty hard. England will take care of itself for them.

I tend to agree. The SNP are running out of time politically. These things come in waves and their time will be up soon enough. They'd have been hoping for an indy ref before any general election, as any drop in seats will be advertised as failure and folk will buy it. They're about as high as they can get at the moment, the only way is down for them. Labour have got no hope. Their policies will be completely ignored. Personality politics will win. They could promise perpetual free cocaine and strippers and that would be ignored.

Hey min, the politics thread nae good enough for ye? Nae that it's a race like, but I announced it first. The tories will get a majority again.

That's not irony.

Jesus. I just said that, that was an irrelevant statistic. I was asking the number of fans that don't go now due to travel issues that would now appear, not how many would get an easier journey. The two are hugely different. No you can't. It'll be entirely about preference and options. Those on the West can currently drive or get a bus. In future they'll just be able to drive. I'm being slightly facetious, but essentially you can dress it up either way, and you've just chosen the argument that suits. The only evidence that we can currently rely on is that many fans turn up from that area of the city currently. Whether more will turn up upon moving is speculation on your part. That wasn't a question I asked, but top straw-man nevertheless. I haven't once stated that support would decrease open moving stadium, because I don't believe it will. It will definitely show a marked improvement from day one. The only point I made, which you've ignored, is that if in 5-10 years prior to the move we have a downturn in performance - as happens regularly with a club of our standing; we will simply never afford to buy guaranteed success in the same way as the tims - would our attendances hold up, or tank. You don't have an answer to that question, for which we have years of evidence of the performance's effect on crowds (Patterson, Mcghee years etc).

Aye, 8th June The 3 girls round me at work didn't know to which party Theresa May belongs. Fuck.

Cunthole making an announcement at 11:15 this morning. Rumours suggesting an election. If true, not quite sure why one didn't happen a few months back. They'll get voted straight back in like.

You can't back that up with anything resembling evidence. "Most fans will find it easier". Even if that was the case, which I suspect it isn't, that isn't a relevant statistic. You'd need to find the evidence of numbers of current supporters who don't go because of the existing location (like you). Not the number who go anyway, but whose journey might be improved by the move. It's not an easy figure to come up with. Just as it is not easy to predict the effect on future attendances of a downturn in performance after the initial excitement of the shiny new thing wears off (for which we have plenty of evidence of at Pittodrie).

Dinna worry, they both look like they're well on the way to a couple of heart attacks or strokes, at which point I'll put up a photae of a lettuce for ye.

That's not really that logical for people who've walked to Pittodrie for so long though is it? Indeed, your argument would stand a lot better if you didn't say earlier in the thread that you currently don't have a season ticket because of the existing location. Logic, by your definition, will mean that those people who currently live in and walk from the city centre, would no longer attend regularly.

Is that normal? Or is it just being done because they don't want to "ruin the spectacle" of their beloved scum games, so they've taken any decisions out of the frame? It seems very strange that they can't arrange one day per week, every week, for an entire season. I guess we'll never get a journalist asking the question so we'll never know.

It's an interesting one like. I wonder if it is deliberately done this way so a player doesn't miss a semi in general, or if it has been done with the knowledge that it was a hun/tim semi and they were covering themselves in case one from either team was sent off. If it's the former, then I sort of sympathise with it. In my opinion, a league sending off shouldn't transpose to the cup, but a cup should transpose to the league if the suspended player's team are knocked out or if the remaining number of rounds doesn't cover a suspension (i.e. if a player is sent off in the semi with a two match suspension with one round remaining, they should miss a single league match too). It's a different competition, and players should be given every chance to play in that competition. I guarantee that whichever team gets through to the final against the jungles (the huns have nae hope in my opinion) they'll suffer a similar fate with different results in their final league game. My suspicion is that they just took this in because it is Scott Brown and the tims (they would have done the same for the hun captain like).