Sorry but this really upsets me

[BestOfBrede]

The club are offering free travel to Brighton, as apparently we can act as a 12th man ! If that's the case and a decent away support can play a big part in securing the points, why then do we continually shoot ourselves in the foot and allow our relegation rivals have over 4000 supporters at Craven Cottage !
The Club can't have it both ways it's either a big advantage or it's not !
In my book it makes an enormous difference and I don't think Craven Cottage will ever become a fortress again until we restrict away supporters and start to help ourselves  :dft007:

You know, you have just given me a great idea. I concur with you by the way. I know the argument against is finances but I reckon it costs us 6-8 points a season and why have we still got the neutral section that allows even more away fans in?

Ok, my idea. I have always thought the ends are the wrong way round. The players come in at the Putney End, our iconic structure is at the Putney End and it would seem the acoustics are better.

If we make the PE the home end there will be many fans who, on principle, will stay at the Hammersmith End. Great. Having vocal fans at both ends can only help can't it? 12th man and all that...

So where do the away fans go?

Also the Putney end is smaller by about 500 I think

Stick them in a side somewhere - like they do to us at many grounds.

So you would have them in the JH stand or riverside then?
Out of interest would you put a max number of spaces?

We put the away s'porters in the JH during our Europa games, why not again?
And yes, give them around 4-5k depending on who we are playing.

[mullers]

I stand to be corrected on this, but as a kid I always thought the Putney End was the 'home' end until the Hammersmith got a roof. There weren't really home and away ends then, a lot of supporters would change ends at half time with the teams.

It is easy to blame a large away support for changing the atmosphere, but it must have some sort of effect. An ex-Sunderland player was talking about the effect of their supporters  being so far away at St. James' Park had, but then the Makems usually get e result there. I know this post contradicts itself, but I don't like away fans enjoying themselves too much at the Cottage, and it seems worse the more of them there are.

[Riversider]

So lets say we restrict and then other clubs do the same when they have room. Its tit for tat stuff and in the end its fans who lose out.
At this level the club can make around 100K+ on seats alone if 4K turn up. Over a season away fans are accounting for around £1-2M per season to us. 10-15% of ticket income. We cant afford to throw that away.

And as I will always say, we win with a large away fan section at the cottage and we have lost when only 50 were there. Its not such a big deal.

All this is mere pennies compared to the price of relegation !
Anyway my original point was the fact that if taking 3000 to Brighton gives us any advantage over say taking 1200 to Brighton, then by the same taken we MUST have given Bristol City the same advantage in a must win game , it must cut both ways, no ?

[Jack Fulham]

Do you really want to deny football fans the chance to watch their club because they make more noise than us?

[HatterDon]

Lighten up on the Fulham travelers. They always sound loud and proud, even in places where they were quaranteened high up into the clouds -- Yeah, I'm looking at you, St. James's Park.

The noise these folks make regardless of the weather deserves nothing but applause.  065.gif :clap_hands: 049:gif