Let's talk about the Grimsby Town game

[BobG]

Sadly we've seen nothing to suggest we will achieve your ambition Steve. All we can do is hope and pray

BobG

[graingrover]

I see more balls from our players than on some of our weak at the knees fans at this juncture of the season .

[selby]

  Going on Tuesdays defensive display with Anderson and Olowu if that is repeated we need to keep them together as our shape was excellent all the game and we looked far more solid down the left hand side and filled defensive space better stopping a lot of ball coming into our area from that side which has been a repetitive weakness.

[drfchound]

In the first half I actually thought that Maxwell was our weakest link defensively and that Palace got behind him quite often.

[selby]

  They did Hound, and teams have done all season down that side, but Anderson dealt with it better than it has been done cutting the ball out in and around the area and especially crosses into the area.

[steve@dcfd]

In the first half I actually thought that Maxwell was our weakest link defensively and that Palace got behind him quite often.

The way he limped off after the game I’m not sure he will be fit. Ennis may not be ready either.
McGrath will not be ready. Clifton trained since Tuesday so he should be ok. Sterry after is head egg bump should be available all according to GM

[Chris Black come back]

TSL

Maxwell
Olowu
Anderson
Sterry

Bailey
Clifton
Kelly

Gibson
Ironside
Molyneux

[drfchound]

  They did Hound, and teams have done all season down that side, but Anderson dealt with it better than it has been done cutting the ball out in and around the area and especially crosses into the area.

I agree that Tom was very good and I would play him again even if Jay is fit.

[GazLaz]

Data only gets you so far. I suspect Jordan Gibson has some good underlying numbers. That doesn’t help his obvious confidence issues or him being played either out of position or piecemeal.

Without going down the data wormhole again, things like application, mentality and “lifestyle choices” tend to be baked into any data because they tend to be part of a players make up that generally stay consistent over time. Gibson just needs to play btw. He’s good for the level, just a bit inconsistent as all 4th division wingers are. Some are just given more leeway. Ennis and Street have certainly been no improvement.

[Padge_DRFC]

Street up front or not at all for me

[DearneValleyRover]

Is Clifton fit?
I expect Crew to start with Kelly alongside Bailey

[Ryaldinhio]

TSL

Maxwell
Olowu
Anderson
Sterry

Bailey
Clifton
Kelly

Gibson
Ironside
Molyneux

No Crew? Rested in Palace match for this one.

[colincramb]

Would love some of the day trippers from Monday night to get their hands in their pockets and turn back up for this much bigger game. The question for the club is how do we start to entice even just 20% of those people back? Feels like the base is there more than ever in the last 10 years or so, as we are often selling out tickets for the bigger games now, which hasn’t been the case since the glory years.

Looks like we sold at least 7k so far which is decent enough, but as always could be much better for a city this size against a local ish team. If we can shift another 500-800 tomorrow it will look reasonably full again with a decent away support expected

[Nudga]

South stand sold out again.

[ravenrover]

  They did Hound, and teams have done all season down that side, but Anderson dealt with it better than it has been done cutting the ball out in and around the area and especially crosses into the area.

You really don't rate McGrath do you? I wonder why that is

[Ryaldinhio]

Would love some of the day trippers from Monday night to get their hands in their pockets and turn back up for this much bigger game. The question for the club is how do we start to entice even just 20% of those people back? Feels like the base is there more than ever in the last 10 years or so, as we are often selling out tickets for the bigger games now, which hasn’t been the case since the glory years.

Looks like we sold at least 7k so far which is decent enough, but as always could be much better for a city this size against a local ish team. If we can shift another 500-800 tomorrow it will look reasonably full again with a decent away support expected

Mat of mine is Grimsby amd they have supposedly sold 2,869

[Nudga]

Would love some of the day trippers from Monday night to get their hands in their pockets and turn back up for this much bigger game. The question for the club is how do we start to entice even just 20% of those people back? Feels like the base is there more than ever in the last 10 years or so, as we are often selling out tickets for the bigger games now, which hasn’t been the case since the glory years.

Looks like we sold at least 7k so far which is decent enough, but as always could be much better for a city this size against a local ish team. If we can shift another 500-800 tomorrow it will look reasonably full again with a decent away support expected

Mat of mine is Grimsby amd they have supposedly sold 2,869

Not a peep on the clubs socials about ticket sales, trying to drum up more interest.
South stand sells out and not a sausage from the club. It's really slack, literally takes a minute to post updates, should be doing everything they can to get the other 2k floaters back in.

[Chris Black come back]

Would love some of the day trippers from Monday night to get their hands in their pockets and turn back up for this much bigger game. The question for the club is how do we start to entice even just 20% of those people back? Feels like the base is there more than ever in the last 10 years or so, as we are often selling out tickets for the bigger games now, which hasn’t been the case since the glory years.

Looks like we sold at least 7k so far which is decent enough, but as always could be much better for a city this size against a local ish team. If we can shift another 500-800 tomorrow it will look reasonably full again with a decent away support expected

Mat of mine is Grimsby amd they have supposedly sold 2,869

If they have sold that many then we might just be edging towards 10k today.

[idler]

What time does the Belle Vue bar open today? A chance to make some money if it opens earlier. Probably still not as much as most 3pm games though.

[Chris Black come back]

Proper raw old day for weather by the looks of it. Very fitting for a League Two derby.

[DonnyBazR0ver]

Would love some of the day trippers from Monday night to get their hands in their pockets and turn back up for this much bigger game. The question for the club is how do we start to entice even just 20% of those people back? Feels like the base is there more than ever in the last 10 years or so, as we are often selling out tickets for the bigger games now, which hasn’t been the case since the glory years.

Looks like we sold at least 7k so far which is decent enough, but as always could be much better for a city this size against a local ish team. If we can shift another 500-800 tomorrow it will look reasonably full again with a decent away support expected

Mat of mine is Grimsby amd they have supposedly sold 2,869

Not a peep on the clubs socials about ticket sales, trying to drum up more interest.
South stand sells out and not a sausage from the club. It's really slack, literally takes a minute to post updates, should be doing everything they can to get the other 2k floaters back in.

I've had two emails this week previewing the game. When I asked a while ago, there were something like 20k on the distribution list. Rovers Facebook page has 133k followers. I haven't looked at X to see how many followers there are but I would imagine there's alot.

It comes down to the same questions, which haven't really changed over time, about why more folk appear to turn out for the bigger games and less frequently for the bread and butter, routine league games?

[sf9944]

Would love some of the day trippers from Monday night to get their hands in their pockets and turn back up for this much bigger game. The question for the club is how do we start to entice even just 20% of those people back? Feels like the base is there more than ever in the last 10 years or so, as we are often selling out tickets for the bigger games now, which hasn’t been the case since the glory years.

Looks like we sold at least 7k so far which is decent enough, but as always could be much better for a city this size against a local ish team. If we can shift another 500-800 tomorrow it will look reasonably full again with a decent away support expected

Mat of mine is Grimsby amd they have supposedly sold 2,869

Not a peep on the clubs socials about ticket sales, trying to drum up more interest.
South stand sells out and not a sausage from the club. It's really slack, literally takes a minute to post updates, should be doing everything they can to get the other 2k floaters back in.

I've had two emails this week previewing the game. When I asked a while ago, there were something like 20k on the distribution list. Rovers Facebook page has 133k followers. I haven't looked at X to see how many followers there are but I would imagine there's alot.

It comes down to the same questions, which haven't really changed over time, about why more folk appear to turn out for the bigger games and less frequently for the bread and butter, routine league games?

It is true in my opinion that the proportion of Rovers fans that actually turn up to games (except the big ones) is low as compared to other clubs.  We all know people that call themselves Rovers fans but rarely if ever attend.  I agree that the questions haven't changed over time.  Unfortunately, in my view, too little effort has gone into providing answers to those questions.  I do believe there is a level of complacency around marketing and other stuff. Yes we might send lots of e mails and use social media.  But if those things aren't working what else are we going to try?

[Chris Black come back]

You can always improve marketing but that isn't the big picture. There is a multi decade, consistent, low level of engagement from the population of the town / city. Not just the last few years, not the last few decades, but over many decades.

The club has been relatively successful in the last couple of decades, and in the period of Bramall / Watson ownership has invested hugely in the community profile of the club / Club Doncaster. Probably more so now than any other point in our history the club touches the lives of more people in Doncaster, yet we still cannot get people to consistently turn up in numbers for the only professional football club in the city.

Shoving a few more quid into the social media marketing budget isn't going to change that. What will, I am at a loss.

[andy didcott]

2-0.

[philsky]

My main concern today is my journey home to Tring has me leaving at 88 mins :-0

[IDM]

I don’t think matches need to be aggressively marketed unless there is a specific ticket price offer.

If floating fans or neutrals are interested in coming to see a football match, it only takes a couple of minutes to check online for fixtures, and to navigate to the club website to buy, or find the TO number.

In my student days in London if I wanted to go to any game, I’d look at the fixtures in the paper in the morning, and just go.

Don’t forget many can’t afford the travel/tickets or even the time, for regular fixtures, but can make a bit more of a sacrifice for the big games.?

[Nudga]

Loads of Grimsby fans in town, heard some of them in red lion planning g trouble.
Avoid town if you don't need to be here.

[Filo]

  Going on Tuesdays defensive display with Anderson and Olowu if that is repeated we need to keep them together as our shape was excellent all the game and we looked far more solid down the left hand side and filled defensive space better stopping a lot of ball coming into our area from that side which has been a repetitive weakness.

We played Tuesday as well?

[Prez]

Would love some of the day trippers from Monday night to get their hands in their pockets and turn back up for this much bigger game. The question for the club is how do we start to entice even just 20% of those people back? Feels like the base is there more than ever in the last 10 years or so, as we are often selling out tickets for the bigger games now, which hasn’t been the case since the glory years.

Looks like we sold at least 7k so far which is decent enough, but as always could be much better for a city this size against a local ish team. If we can shift another 500-800 tomorrow it will look reasonably full again with a decent away support expected

Mat of mine is Grimsby amd they have supposedly sold 2,869

Not a peep on the clubs socials about ticket sales, trying to drum up more interest.
South stand sells out and not a sausage from the club. It's really slack, literally takes a minute to post updates, should be doing everything they can to get the other 2k floaters back in.

I've had two emails this week previewing the game. When I asked a while ago, there were something like 20k on the distribution list. Rovers Facebook page has 133k followers. I haven't looked at X to see how many followers there are but I would imagine there's alot.

It comes down to the same questions, which haven't really changed over time, about why more folk appear to turn out for the bigger games and less frequently for the bread and butter, routine league games?

Kind of answered your own question there Baz. Every club in the country has a “floating fan base”. We are no exception to this. The hard core such as ourselves will be there no matter what but the floaters given the choice of watching Crystal Palace at the eco or Accrington will naturally go for the former. Look at leeds for example. Look at their gates in league 1 and the championship between 2008 and 2014 ish. Nowhere near sold out their home games, but now they have 22k on the waiting list as they set to return to the premiership. And sadly there will be a fair few on that waiting list from Donny.

[mushRTID]

Like the look of todays team, come on!!