I’d penciled in 30k. Don’t know where that number came from.
My only explanation is that being a school week, there were less country people up for the holidays.
Either that, or Peel have more supporters that we all thought, because that was about 5 less than last year.
for some strange warped reason the WAFC decided to start the game 50 minutes later than is the accustomed bouncedown time
they obviously do not comprehend that game time and leaving the ground time is important to families and difficult to work around
and to play the Colts game before the reserves just panders to another league’s recruiters there is not one single logical other reasoning to that dickheadedness
it just lurches the comp downwards this shit planning
Only 3 clubs represented yesterday. Another 2 or 3 may have bought in another 3 or 4 thousand but still poor. It is clear from yesterday the traditional eight are not as well supported as we all thought and hoped.
Crowd was an absolute shocker, how do we go from 31,000 tickets sold as told to a poor 23,000 on a perfect day with 3 clubs having two grades in?
23,000 was poor and the atmosphere in Optus was ordinary, an entire wing was empty on ground level, looked terrible. 23,000 is not even the break even point for covering the ground costs, 2000 short, I think this should be the death knell for future games at Optus.
Price hike in entry didnt help either, $52…time to rethink !
Why did it start so late, impacted club after as well, not that many back there, most went home.
Where did this imaginary 30k+ tickets sold by Wednesday or Thursday come from. It’s not like those that bought tickets didn’t realise it was a later start or that it was on a Sunday, like it has been for years. I agree the start time should have been earlier. The reversing of the Colts and ressies games has been so for a number of years so that had no impact. Maybe the WAFC should look at cutting back some of the BS thats done between games and focus on the medal presentations. No reason the ressies cant start at the normal colts time, therefore bring forward the other 2 games. the league finished around 6pm so really thats not all that late even for families, most of who would be back home well before 8.30 on a school night. No real excuses for a pathetic turn out by two teams that claim to have 2 of the best followings in the WAFL.
Not sure where the WAFL goes from here. No excuses for such a poor crowd. Can’t really justify playing the game at Optus when two so called well supported teams draw such a poor crowd
Can someone tell me why we cant play WAFL @ The WACA in late September. We have all heard of The MCG and they seem to be able to fit both AFL and Cricket into the grounds schedule.
I would like to see The WACA become our States ground of excellence and history. Similar to how the MCG is to Melbourne/Victoria.
Also how many will the new development fit 25K?
TFAF the WACA was a huge lost opportunity. WA was crying out for a boutique stadium with around a 25-27k capacity with good weather protection. Multi use like Optus for footy, concerts, cricket etc. it would be the venue for all finals and would be packed out for a GF.
it would be a year round use venue rather than sitting there vacant between cricket seasons. Drop in pitches are used all over the place so thats not an excuse. Massive lost opportunity IMHO.
Unfortunately none of the current suburban grounds can hold more than around 17k which was the case for the GF at Leederville, but that was a very fortunate circumstance with perfect warm weather. If it was a wet day it would likely have been less than 10k, so local club grounds are not the solution and until a boutique stadium is built we are stuck with Optus. There wont be any state government money spent an a new stadium, they are too busy trying to spend $220mill on a bloody car racing track around Optus stadium which they think is more important than health and education, no care for people sitting in Ambo ramping for hours on end, no, lets build a once a year use race track FMD.
Time - I agree a WACA /WAFL share deal would be ideal..I think Capacity of 20,000 would probably be enough for WAFL GFs going forward with a ageing WAFL fan base the numbers are not going north any time soon.
A revamped boutique well catered WACA with great lights and facilities and a $30 max entry fee would be the go.
The 30K ticket story is really bizarre was that just a rumour or a false flag or something? Maybe it included 5000 freebies who did not turn up.
Mate I reckon 6pm finish was pretty bad for families by the time we left the ground it was nearly 7pm couple that with mum and dad at 52 bucks each plus kids it’s a bit of an ask…especially if you only have a vague interest in WAFL.
If Claremont has made it we would have been looking at 18K.