Oscar Bobb is going to be insane. FFS they have a gem.
Pre-Season Friendlies 2024
- Thread starter SilentWitness
- Start date
Quickfire double from City. It's 4-0 now. Haaland hattrick. 
There’s nothing friendly about what City are doing to the chavs.
West Ham v Palace playing to a packed out stadium in Tampa I see
Once Gallagher is back in this Chelsea side, things will get better
Chelsea pull one back via Sterling. Fun game to watch.
City are playing half the team with kids, meanwhile Chelsea playing a strong team and getting spanked.
They probably need Chalobah back more. They've tried every other defender they have and all have been leaking goals.
Watching West Ham /Crystal Palace played in Tampa. There can't be more than a few hundred people in the stands.
They also need their frontline to press so Lukaku coming back will also boost Chelsea's chances this season !They probably need Chalobah back more. They've tried every other defender they have and all have been leaking goals.
El Clasico starting. Have a look at Guler and Endrick combination.
100%. Big Rom needs to return!!
It's not great when even an El Clasico at the MetLife can only get this attendance.
Remember when Madrid photoshopped more fans in when they played us in a friendly?
Has El Clasico been cancelled due to the weather?
I've never known a club as big as that with the amount of insecurity they have. Even the public unveilings of players are an attempt to deal with it too!
Suspended for 30 mins, I think.
It's not great when even an El Clasico at the MetLife can only get this attendance.
This preseason has been really weird for attendances in the US. Chelsea, Arsenal, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Liverpool and United are all clubs that have sold out US stadiums for years. Why are there all of a sudden so many empty seats at every game?
Probably lack of demand as all big clubs are in the US every single summer.
Election season. They're at Trump rallies.
It should have the opposite effect then, no? Growing interest, more demand etc. I’ve seen some complaints about pricing from Arsenal and Chelsea fans.
The pricing is definitely an issue.
Yeah it could work that way too, but if you’ve seen one of these games in 2021, 2022 and 2023, it’s perhaps not that tempting to keep going.
My guess would be the cost of living and people having less money to spend. Also we don't really have superstars right now like we have in the Rooney/Ronaldo years.
The prices and the subsequent travel to get there, I looked at prices for all the US summer friendlies and it's all $120+ and flights to arrive anywhere near the time they are playing, $250 at the very minimum then you factor somewhere to stay and for what? Half of the reserves to trott on the pitch?
The only team getting attendances for those prices here in the states is Inter Miami and that's for one player
For the Chelsea Vs Real Madrid game, here's an idea of how much it costs > https://www.tickpick.com/buy-soccer...s-bank-of-america-stadium-8-6-24-7pm/6329552/
The Olympics being on must be a factor, who wants to pay a fortune to watch shitty friendlies with weak squads when there is a festival of meaningful sport going on.
I think we can all agree pre-season results are meaningless.
Scores, yes. Seeing players not progressing and of course injuries are always concerning. I’m not sure playing on these terrible fields to expand a club’s brand is worth it.
3-0 win to conclude the USA tour
Ticket prices maybe. People don't have lot of money to throw around.
Maybe, but scarcity, exclusivity and novelty can cause demand. Just look how people clamour for limited edition releases of things with jacked up prices. Limited edition trainers, or how people went mental for that Prime drink when it came out, paying £20 a bottle or whatever it was, or bog rolls during Covid! They can't shift that Prime drink now.
Keeping it football, a lot of the English women's teams are only playing a few of their home games at the 'big stadium' and get crowds dwarfing where they usually play. They don't often sell out the smaller ground when they're playing there. Think Villa have announced that all their WSL home games will be at Villa Park this season but the other clubs are being careful not over-saturate the market.
Ticket prices on these tours do look excessive from a UK point of view, but having just looked at prices for other events at some of the stadiums where United have played this summer, they don't look out of place for how much Americans are used to paying for sporting events.
LA Rams tickets at So Fi stadium - https://www.ticketmaster.com/los-an..._LAR_SINGLE_GAME_TICKETS_PG_LINK_RAMS_VIKINGS
Univ of South Carolina College football tickets at Williams-Brice Stadium - https://www.ticketmaster.com/univ-o...-09-14-2024/event/2D00602498AD44CD?brand=uosc
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It's not great when even an El Clasico at the MetLife can only get this attendance.
I have no idea about the attendance but the match was suspended at the 11:35 minute mark due to the threat of a thunderstorm and most the crowd left the stadium within a few minutes.
Or at least that's what the news say.
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Didn't stay up for the rest How'd Endrick and Guler get on?
I watched a bit once I arrived home but I wasn't aware the game had been suspended and then fell asleep at some point
The few minutes I watched I thought both looked good but I tend not to reach many conclusions out of preseason friendlies.
My main concern with Guler is whether he will achieve the physique to become a player who can make the difference. From a technical point of view I think he has everything to succeed.
Overcharging. Keep in mind that last year many fans felt shafted because they weren’t seeing the names they thought. That’s probably still fresh in mind. Who is going to pay $200 to watch kids?
Prices and popularity. Americans are now watching more of the PL during the season and are in the know about getting shafted by prices now. It used to be they were getting their once in a lifetime chance to see their team but now that teams have visited numerous times the fans just are not going to pay when they can wait and watch any game showing full strength teams on streaming services and on tv.
It’s like pre season nfl. Half of those fans are not season ticket holders. The season ticket holders give the tickets to friends and relatives for free. Otherwise those stadiums wouldn’t look as full as regular season.
It’s like pre season nfl. Half of those fans are not season ticket holders. The season ticket holders give the tickets to friends and relatives for free. Otherwise those stadiums wouldn’t look as full as regular season.
Because people can’t afford going to games. Normal fans are being priced out. A pre-season game where you need to spend at least €300-400 (that is including transport and those kind of things) is not something people want to do. In best case it should be free. In worst case it should be maximum 1/10 of what I mentioned above.
No paedophile jokes should go without saying but I know what some of you are like.
Maybe. But maybe they felt stung after watching crap preseason games played at walking speed.
College sports and NFL are massive though. Football is a novelty at best.
Novelty in the sense that Americans aren't as much into it so they may be reluctant to pay the same sort of prices? Of course it's not as popular as those although it's picking up, and NBC announced good viewing figures for this past season. https://www.sportspromedia.com/news/nbc-premier-league-record-tv-ratings-viewership-peacock-2023-24/
You also get multiple chances to watch NFL or college football every year whereas the chance to see a Premier League team is limited. That makes it a novelty in terms of it being a rarer opportunity so I guess they try to justify ticket prices that way even though they're only friendlies.
However, it isn't so novel anymore compared to what it used to be. When teams started playing pre-season over there I think many might have seen it as a once in a lifetime thing without having to travel to Europe, but now it's every summer the novelty factor might have worn off. Go once to tick it off your list and that could be enough for a lot fans.
So it's a novelty but not a novelty but a novelty.
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