Dinosauric.
The 3pm U.K. Blackout
- Thread starter esmufc07
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran discuss a horrific month of December and a depressing FOUR defeats in a row - the latest coming against Wolves and Newcastle.
They discuss how much blame is on Ruben Amorim and rank our squad against other Premier League teams.
Do we have any chance of avoiding defeat at Anfield?
Previous page. My local side average 1300-1500 attendances and when last season was behind closed doors with no 3pm blackout they averaged around 200 people buying the stream. That's about as close as you're going to get to research or a trial period.
I edited my post, no one who works for the Athletic was born before 1990 anyway.
Also, this:
https://www.live-footballontv.com/football-tv-blackout-rule-uk.html
It's genuinely the most ridiculous concept I can think of considering how big club football is in this country . Fact is that for a lot of people their team playing on the weekend is the high point of their week and the fact that you can't watch it without a dodgy stream while the rest of the world can is truly insane
You're claiming the majority of people who would watch a game on TV would currently be streaming it illegally, that's nonsensical. How many millions of subscribers does Sky Sports have already? Why are they subscribed at all if they could just illegally stream it already? There are plenty of match going fans who also have Sky Sports, and would have a decision to make each weekend whether to "have a day out" or stay home and watch the PL at the same time.
I get wanting an end to the 3pm blackout, but denying that allowing PL games to be shown on TV at 3pm would impact attendances on lower league sides is absurd.
It's weird there's a ton of stuff that says it was introduced in the 60s and lots of them mention Burnley like Wikipedia, bit most are unreliable sites, no one ever gives an exact date or even season and they all use similar language suggesting like many things online it's just been copied. If you had asked me to guess I would have said the 60s or 70s, but I will still believe proper journos at the Athletic over Wikipedia!
That isn't a very conclusive demonstration if I'm understanding it correctly. The purchasing of the stream doesn't really tally with going to watch the game. All they are now getting is a poor standard of football streamed to a device. That may not be particularly compelling as a product since they are now missing the direct engagement with the club and the social element of going to a match.
I don't particularly care whether the blackout exists or not. Plenty in this thread would be prepared to do away with it without consequence. How would this be worse than that?
It may not be the best but it's what came to mind when someone explains to me that the reason I, a United fan, interested more in a United than football as a sport, can't see my team play in the hope that I will give up my time to attend a local match of a team I don't support. Try explaining it to me in a rational way.
But no one is preventing those people who still want to do what you describe from doing so. The people that would prefer to watch a PL match and only go to those lower league games as a day out don't fall into your romantic description of the community / hub for whom the lower league club is a huge part of their life.
If the football club is still as important as you describe to that community, then enough people will still attend even if there's one extra alternative they could be doing instead at 3pm on a Saturday. If the football club isn't all that important to the community anymore, and most would much rather watch a PL match on TV nowadays if they had the option, then the romantic description of the community / hub is just nostalgia from a bygone age and being artificially kept alive by non-fans turning up just for a novelty day out and boosting the attendance.
It's hugely ironic that lower league fans mock fans of big clubs for not being 'proper' fans and for PL clubs getting foreign tourists and 'prawn sandwich brigade' types watching - when it turns out that, underneath it all, these lower league clubs rely on that very type of 'day out non-fan' themselves.
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It’s a redundant debate. Get a firestick and a dodgy box and you’re sorted.
Didn't we have guilds along similar lines? I know they don't really exist now either, and are rather archaic now so maybe that's an actual argument that the blackout should go the same way as them but the point is they existed, and were to protect it's members as a whole. So you'd have shoe maker's guild, blacksmith's guild etc. with a focus on protecting the interests who were all part of them. Maybe the FA can be looked at as a footballing guild? I don't know.
Suppose you could look at co-operatives with farms of different sizes and find some similarities in terms of them all looking out for each other to a degree too rather than waging in cuthroat competition against each other. That said, that's more along the lines of collective bargaining and in football terms the closest parallel would likely be the PL TV deal. Even in that of course, the bigger clubs have been pushing for and have been getting larger slice of the pie lately although the smaller clubs within the PL are still better taken care of than their equivalents in many other countries.
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If the choice is watch Chelsea on the telly or go and watch Sutton United, I'll sit on my bum and watch Chelsea. If Chelsea are not one the telly, I'll go to Sutton United.
It does not, but it is as close of a comparison as we are likely to see between non-league clubs numbers with and without a blackout.
On a more general level, they tend to lose 100-150 fans when Wolves are at home on a Saturday at 3pm. They don't lose those the vast majority of those fans when Wolves are away. If Wolves game was televised I'd be surprised if that didn't flip to being the majority of those 100-150 watching Wolves instead.
Spain hardly ever has 2 games simultaneously played because they broadcast pretty much every match over the course of the weekend.
Also, nobody goes to watch lower league matches. The segunda has really low attendances, and anything below that are basically man and a dog.
I wonder how many fans of the elite clubs that are posting in here about helping lower league clubs actually consistently attend lower league games when they’re not watching their team.
The 3pk blackout made sense when football was one of the main live attractions for people to do on a Saturday at 3pm but I highly doubt elite club fans are venturing far from home to support lower league teams in their droves; sure they’ll be some fans who live closely to another club so will rock up there consistently but the theory that a Manchester United fan who can’t get to a game is going to watch Stockport or Bolton simply isn’t the case or they’d be selling out their stadium most weeks.
Yes the elite clubs have responsibility to help the lower leagues but myself & fans I know of other Premier League clubs aren’t heading to lower league games next week because United kick off at 3, I’ll either stream it or do something else.
The 3pk blackout made sense when football was one of the main live attractions for people to do on a Saturday at 3pm but I highly doubt elite club fans are venturing far from home to support lower league teams in their droves; sure they’ll be some fans who live closely to another club so will rock up there consistently but the theory that a Manchester United fan who can’t get to a game is going to watch Stockport or Bolton simply isn’t the case or they’d be selling out their stadium most weeks.
Yes the elite clubs have responsibility to help the lower leagues but myself & fans I know of other Premier League clubs aren’t heading to lower league games next week because United kick off at 3, I’ll either stream it or do something else.
I travelled 229 miles last weekend to watch my hometown team play away last Saturday, went to watch United at Wolves on Sunday and watched my hometown team play at home on Monday, does that count?
It’s not though is it because nobody was attending games as we were in a pandemic. The 1100-1300 people that didn’t buy the stream weren’t choosing not to attend because they were watching 3pm Premier League games.
Using those figures is an awful example. If that’s as close as we’ll get then we’ve nothing to go on but a feeling & if that’s the case, bon the blackout.
No other country can hold a candle to England’s lower leagues both in quality and support.
The 3pm blackout definitely does play a part in that, especially as you go lower down the football ladder where there are fewer passionate supporters of clubs and more local people who turn up for the odd few games a season, but also would stay in and watch their main team Liverpool play Wolves instead if it’s on sky.
Yes streaming exists but it can be a hassle and is a much less attractive option than just throwing on sky.
The 3pm blackout definitely does play a part in that, especially as you go lower down the football ladder where there are fewer passionate supporters of clubs and more local people who turn up for the odd few games a season, but also would stay in and watch their main team Liverpool play Wolves instead if it’s on sky.
Yes streaming exists but it can be a hassle and is a much less attractive option than just throwing on sky.
So you have a tie to 2 teams & a decent level of disposable income; commendable. Would you consider yourself the exception or rule in this instance? I’ve been to watch Birmingham City [local team] play away from home on multiple occasions, I wouldn’t base a 3pm blackout on my own attendance though.
It's been discussed to death on here in the last few years, so I'll just repeat my previous argument:
It's a rule from the 1960s (when TV was still a novelty) and it's ridiculous that it's still in place.
I accept that removing it will have SOME impact on lower league attendances, but I highly doubt it will be significant.
I can't imagine many Doncaster Rovers fans not going to the game because they'd rather stay at home and choose between City v Leeds, Burnley v Crystal Palace and Arsenal v Norwich on TV.
It's a rule from the 1960s (when TV was still a novelty) and it's ridiculous that it's still in place.
I accept that removing it will have SOME impact on lower league attendances, but I highly doubt it will be significant.
I can't imagine many Doncaster Rovers fans not going to the game because they'd rather stay at home and choose between City v Leeds, Burnley v Crystal Palace and Arsenal v Norwich on TV.
I didn't say it was a reasonable comparison (it isn't) but your logic that nobody was attending games at any level helps the argument if anything given they normally lose fans to people going to watch bigger local clubs.
Based on my experience of watching both sides pretty regularly for 20+ years I wouldn't consider myself the exception at all. I have a lot of mates from my local club who have season tickets elsewhere including United, Liverpool, Wolves, Villa, Newcastle, Rangers, Stoke, WBA just off the top of my head. And I wouldn't consider the majority of those to have great levels of disposable income to be honest, some of them make frankly ridiculous sacrifices at times. And that's in one group of mates at the game!
But people generally dont want to watch Curzon Ashton, they want to watch Manchester United, and they sure as hell want to see Ronaldos return. Surely there is another way for the money to filter down to the smaller clubs without forcing people to either illegally stream or miss the match at 3pm on a Saturday. It's not like there are even any tickets available for this one.
Having been to Curzon Ashton multiple times, people may rather see United/City but they still go to watch Curzon. The amount of United/City shirts and coats you see on people (old and young) at Curzon feels like it's half the ground at times. If those people could sit on their arse and watch United/City on TV instead then clubs like Curzon are dead.
And to clarify, there have been tickets available for this game several times.
Is the solution not as simple as having the lower league games at a different time to the premier league games? 2pm and 5pm for example? Not perfect as I understand there's travel time etc. but I think that's the best compromise.
You can see your team play. By going to the match.
If you can’t see the benefit in football supporting all but a small group of teams then there is no rational explanation that will help you.
If you want a more recent and ongoing example of restricting trade to protect its members look no further than EU tariffs.
I get your point but I hate it. As a United fan from Stockport living in London. I just want to watch my club. I dont care about Curzon from a football point of view. I'm sure they do a lot for the community but I really dont like this banning of 3pm kick offs. As an analogy, its like a Cinema not showing any decent blockbuster films to force you to watch some small indie release and support the 'small guy'. Wouldn't happen.
I don't think there are any tickets for this game mate without getting scalped to the max. It's a full house for sure
I wonder why the football league and the lower league clubs are all so worried about it then, but it'll be fine because Bertie from Red Cafe says so. Also there is nothing romantic about a football club being at the centre of a community, I'm a Brighton supporter, but my wifes family are all from Plymouth and when we're down there we'll sometimes go to Home Park to watch Argyle play, they're shit but it's a good crowd and good day out and we meet loads of their friends that they just see it at the footy, if there was a big game on there's no doubt 5, 10, 15 percent may not go especially in winter. That may not seem like much but it's a big hit for small clubs.
You clearly won't understand a club being a place to meet friends, hold a wedding reception or fete for charity on a summer Sunday because you follow a big club that doesn't do any of those things, nothing wrong with that, it's just different.
It's nothing to do with a bygone era, you may view football through the prism of multi million pound transfers, billions of fans across the world, korean tractor sponsors and super leagues, again that's fine, but for the vast majority of clubs football is not like that at all, it is still local affair, try talking to people in Bury and see how losing their club has affected their community, or any another struggling club like a Doncaster or a Macclesfield and see if they think having a club at the heart of a community is a bygone era.
When your gate receipts is your primary source of income you are very happy to take people on a day out, but again you show absolutely no understanding. Not every fan is the same, some are vociferous in their support and wont miss a game others are a bit more meh, and will go if a few mates are going and it's not raining, if you lost those people at United it wouldn't matter too much, but again not all clubs are as big as United and if you take people away in the lower leagues and non league it's a massive issue.
I can not believe I am having to write this after 18 months with no fans at all, as I said in an earlier post it would be madness to lift the 3pm blackout now given the state so many lower league teams are in financially.
Thankfully it doesn't matter too much because there is no appetite at all to remove the blackout, the only people calling for it are people like yourself who can't see beyond what matters to you or begin to comprehend the impact it could have on those romantic small clubs from a bygone era.
No, it's like a cinema not showing a mid-level release at 8pm on a Friday night. You can still watch the movie at 6pm or 10pm. The "blockbuster" fixtures have already been moved to the several slots for TV coverage.
The vast majority of United games are televised, those that aren't are easy enough to find online. Alternatively people can just go and watch them - obviously this particular game is now sold out but there were multiple opportunities to buy tickets for the Newcastle game before the signing was announced.
If you wanted to watch Man United v Newcastle a couple of weeks ago you would probably have found a ticket without too much hassle.
It would lead me to question the loyalty of the fanbase honestly. During lockdown it was Man United vs Chelsea at 3pm every weekend.
Part of the appeal when I’ve attended lower league games is the atmosphere/novelty, that isn’t replicated watching Brighton vs Arsenal on Sky but there are a number of fans who have no interest in going to lower league games, rightly or wrongly. I think simply looking at those numbers as, ‘they could watch bigger teams on Sky’ ignores the appeal some fans find going to lower league encounters; it’s seeing similar faces, the personal feel. A lot of the fans that didn’t stream may just not have enjoyed ‘the football’ half as much as they do ‘the occasion’.
Hope that makes sense, I’m not disagreeing with you per se.
Using a small sample of ‘one group of mates’ to extrapolate the impact it would have on the game in general isn’t reliable. Again, I know people attend games of more than one team, but I also see match day threads on here with [what I assume would be] some English based contingent, who would rather post on a fan forum watch streams than attend other games.
If United play at 12.30 on a Saturday on BT it takes a certain type of fanatic to want to the go from the pub to a lower league game. When I say disposable income I should have also said disposable time. Not many people can avidly follow multiple sides & justify it to family etc. 3 games in 3 days is a lot, I commend you for it but surely you understand you’re an extreme case.
27 million??
its 16 million the difference from what I saw
Uk - 68m
Germany 84m
that’s a 16m difference hardly scandalously bigger, that’s a similar sized nation
anyway I think we are getting into pedantics here
You do understand Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have their own football leagues and rules right? It's not a "UK League" therefore if we are talking about the English pyramid one would look at the number of people in England.
England and the UK are 2 different things. I think that's what people are getting at seeing as it's the English Premier League and not the UK one, with there being separate leagues for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. England's population is just short of 56m according to Google.
Mind you, I suppose the inclusion of sizeable Welsh clubs from it's major population centres in the English football pyramid muddies the water there to an extent.
You make it sound so easy to go to an actual game. I live in London, I cant afford it anyway (PT work dried up due to covid) and if I could and did come up it would be to see the enormous family first, not to go to the game. I have always pretty much been an armchair fan and I am comfortable with that. Apart from taking my nephew to Old Trafford for a game ages ago. Ironically he will be at the Newcastle game so Im happy for him. I also genuinely dont know where to view the match online as I only use Bt sports and Nowtv. Sorry if I sound a bit peeved off but I am just a bit frustrated at this as I would really love to see this match and I had gotten used to last season showing all the games on TV.
It’s all outdated nonsense. Streams have been a big part of football for over a decade now. A lot of fans stream sky games online never mind 3pm and if this generation of fans still go to lower league games then all of this pearl clutching is for nothing.
When half of the 3pm games were permanently moved this entire argument became obsolete.
This. No argument, absolute outdated boll@x
We pay more than anybody for ludicrously expensive subscriptions to watch our own domestic league whilst missing countless games every single week. Pisst@ke.
The example I gave you showed the splits in loyalties, most people I know who follow our hometown team also follow a bigger club. Some go and watch that bigger club, some just rely on TV and get their live football fix at the smaller club. Also a lot of the supporters are older, and simply didn't stream the games - I know a couple of my older relatives didn't bother with the streams. Like I say, it wasn't in any way shape or form a like for like comparison but it's about as close as we have in the modern era.
As for the group of mates, I appreciate that but obviously that is the group of people I am surrounded with so while I'm not saying it represents everyone, what I am saying is that it is not unusual to have those separated loyalties. In a similar sense to watching England, it's good to have a team in common with my mates as most of us have tickets elsewhere. Me personally, I probably am an extreme case but I use the group of mates because I wouldn't say they are particularly extreme, they all have families or less understanding other halves than me and other different commitments.
The part I don't agree with is the 12:30 one, an awful lot of people will watch the 12:30 game before heading down to the ground. In fact some even watch it at the ground, they tend to show the 12:30 and 17:30 games on the bar at the club. In fact I would say the majority of the most last minute "I'll go to the game today" people are folks who have been to the pub for the 12:30 game.
Im abit of an idiot aren’t I
apologies
but I will latch slightly onto what someone above said with the inclusion of Welsh teams in the English pyramid that situate in heavily populated areas of Wales muddying the water Slightly
but yeh I got hung up on the UK and not just England
I’ll go and wobble my head