EPL Move to Friday Nights

sullo-bohs wrote: http://www.irishtimes.com/sport/national-league-may-get-more-money-from-sky-television-1.75760 Here's an article from 1996 about potential money to the league cause of Sky's impact. I'm sorry I sound like a typical LOI fan but there's a similar thread in the rest of world section that's celebrating EPL football on a Friday night as now there's football live on tele every night. Customers...not fans. Would make you sick sometimes this country.

That customers, not fans malarky doesnt wash with me. Football FANS are now happy that pretty much every night of the week there will be high level football on TV. They like football, they are a fan of football and like to watch it on TV. These are fans of the sport and not just fans of <insert club> or league.

Landon Donovan wrote: That customers, not fans malarky doesnt wash with me. Football FANS are now happy that pretty much every night of the week there will be high level football on TV. They like football, they are a fan of football and like to watch it on TV. These are fans of the sport and not just fans of <insert club> or league.

Rubbish. A huge number of Irish football 'fans' are consumers of an idea that is often a soap opera. The strength of the EPL is it tapped into that market. The weakness of the LoI is they can't.  They are unlikely to even be able to point to Manchester on a map, never mind Tolka Park. I am not convinced that we will lose many paying punters to these games unless there is a huge, title deciding, game on.

There used to be regular 5 figure attendances back in the 70s and earlier when English Football wasn't readily available on the television. 

Don't just ban it on Friday Nights, Ban it altogether i say.

Our attendances seem to be up from last year with Saturday afternoon football, lot of that down to away fans but win win, more people in the gate, more time to socialise beforehand, more money for the club. Not for everyone bur think it's worked well for us.

Jason Kelly wrote: There used to be regular 5 figure attendances back in the 70s and earlier when English Football wasn't readily available on the television.  Don't just ban it on Friday Nights, Ban it altogether i say.

The decline of league attendance also coincided increasing the amount of games per season. The late 60s had 22 games per club, mid to late 70s went up to 26, by the start of the 80s it was up to 30 games a season and the 90s was 33 games.

Ok there are a lot of other factors such as home entertainment to account for but slowly taking the intensity and importance out of each game had to have played a big part.

A big part of a league like the NFL is that with only 16 games a season, the teams and fans know that every game is crucial. The games get played with a huge amount of intensity and the attendees and TV viewers feed off that.

Abolish league cup
Cut back on league games to say 22 or so games
Best team after first round gets into play off.
Same after second round.
After that best 2 highest placed league sides get into a play off.
Play the play offs semis and final as one off games in RDS with a view to eventually playing the final or both semi and final of them in Landsdowne if crowds are good enough.

Market the hell out of them and make such a weekend in X month, LOI play off weekend.
The league is crying out for occasions to appeal to the event junkie.
May be a need for a shield cup for teams that didn't get into play offs but done properly attendances/interest may well compensate.
At the beginning of the year we played Derry at home in the cup and the next weekend they were back playing us in the league. I understand you'll have that in a league of 12 teams but it happens far too often. It's killing any chance teams have to make an occasion out of games.
How many people would be in dallymount if Shams only came once a year in the league?
Suddenly we start building derbies which we don't have now. Cork and limerick. Limerick have a one off chance to knock Cork off their perch.
The same for drogheda against dundalk.
That's what we need.

Not the current system of a muddle of games where teams constantly seem to be trudging through a congested fixture list.

Edited by Bitored - 11 Aug 2015 at 6:58pm

Not really. In fairness we'd have the FAI cup and the league which is all a 20 team league structure needs.

I didn't take my ideas from the Gaa or NFL. It's actually a mix of the celtic league in rugby and believe it or not the first division in the Netherlands.

If we are to improve the league then we need to radically change it. If people don't want to do that then we'll be forever sitting around giving out about what the EPL are doing.

We have to think outside the box and a monotonous 33 game league season won't bring in any crowds.   

Edited by Bitored - 11 Aug 2015 at 7:45pm

Bitored wrote: Abolish league cup Cut back on league games to say 22 or so games Best team after first round gets into play off. Same after second round. After that best 2 highest placed league sides get into a play off. Play the play offs semis and final as one off games in RDS with a view to eventually playing the final or both semi and final of them in Landsdowne if crowds are good enough. Market the hell out of them and make such a weekend in X month, LOI play off weekend. The league is crying out for occasions to appeal to the event junkie. May be a need for a shield cup for teams that didn't get into play offs but done properly attendances/interest may well compensate. At the beginning of the year we played Derry at home in the cup and the next weekend they were back playing us in the league. I understand you'll have that in a league of 12 teams but it happens far too often. It's killing any chance teams have to make an occasion out of games. How many people would be in dallymount if Shams only came once a year in the league? Suddenly we start building derbies which we don't have now. Cork and limerick. Limerick have a one off chance to knock Cork off their perch. The same for drogheda against dundalk. That's what we need. Not the current system of a muddle of games where teams constantly seem to be trudging through a congested fixture list.

I like the basis of this I do think the Eerste Divisie is a good model to follow for ideas

Less games (well cutting them by over a third)= less money = less quality = less fans

Edited by Nah Nah Nah Nah - 11 Aug 2015 at 11:13pm