6,000 Unused Tickets on Wednesday!

I could have put this in the empty seats thread but thought it should have a thread of it's own. A quote from Delaney:

"50,000 tickets sold for a mid-week match against Georgia is still very good, even if the crowd was 44,000. Those who were not there wanted to keep their block booking."

I was defending Irish fans against claims of fickleness as I don't think a lot of people that fill the stadium for the big games are actually fans. More just Irish people going to a big event to support their country. But those on the block booking are obviously fans. Anyone that just threw €50 to keep their block booking and sat at home to watch the match is the ultimate fickle fan.

But I really doubt there's anywhere close to that 6,000 people that would do that. I'd say the vast majority of those tickets are tout tickets and something has to be done about that before we move back to Lansdowne.

I know one guy who has a group booking for a club, and he was left with 12/13 tickets on Wednesday. I'd imagine that was the case for a good percentage

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Originally Posted by Dodge

I know one guy who has a group booking for a club, and he was left with 12/13 tickets on Wednesday. I'd imagine that was the case for a good percentage

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Alright. Not good for the club losing 600 quid.

As yer man says, these are mainly tickets held through clubs, football or supporters'.
There's nothing that fickle about the many fans who can't afford to travel or get out of other commitments on Weds, especially as many are based miles from the venue!


And 'the product' on show doesn't always encourage your floating fan.

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Originally Posted by eirebhoy

Alright. Not good for the club losing 600 quid.

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Absolutely. They use some of their booking for raffles etc so they obviously feel it worthwhile to keep the whole booking.

Lets face it for some fans that travel from the outside Ireland It could mean taking a couple of days off work and others like myself who don't live in Dublin can manage to get away with only taking a half day off and at best the whole day did cost me somewhere around Euro 120 . But all said and done it ended up a great day and all the talk was about are you going to SA :):ball:

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Originally Posted by Claret Murph

Lets face it for some fans that travel from the outside Ireland It could mean taking a couple of days off work and others like myself who don't live in Dublin can manage to get away with only taking a half day off and at best the whole day did cost me somewhere around Euro 120 . But all said and done it ended up a great day and all the talk was about are you going to SA :):ball:

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If they're only going to 1 in every 2 games or so it's an expensive 90 minutes. :) I know plenty of Dubs with Celtic season tickets but they share them. Someone will use the ticket for almost every game. If people know they're not going to games maybe make arrangements to give the ticket to someone.

Funny you should say that Eirebohy as when we were in a pub a couple were looking for tickets . :o

I think very few would be touts. I know of bbers from outside Dublin who couldn't take the half day from work not to mind travel costs etc.

While tickets may be easy to come by now once we go to the Aviva they will become a problem.

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Originally Posted by eirebhoy

But I really doubt there's anywhere close to that 6,000 people that would do that. I'd say the vast majority of those tickets are tout tickets and something has to be done about that before we move back to Lansdowne.

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It's simple enough to solve.

They need to issue block booking cards which you swipe on the way in, one card for each seat on a block booking (groups leaders can worry about the logistics of handing out and collecting cards). The benefit for the FAI is that there is no need to send out tickets anymore, the ticket is preloaded onto the card. Upon entry a swipe is taken and that registers that block booking seat used for that particular game. At the end of each campaign the block booker (or individual seat) has to have attended say 80% of games (incl friendlies) to be entitled to renewal for the next season.

The FAI can put a system in place where block bookers can resell their seats a limited number of times a campaign online in the same way that English premier league clubs facilitate their fans, say twice in a campaign (incl friendlies).

This will help reduce the reselling of tickets we see facilitated here and on other other fora which allows people to keep a hold of block bookings as people are less likely to trust a stranger with a block booking swipe.

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Originally Posted by gspain

While tickets may be easy to come by now once we go to Lansdowne Road they will become a problem.

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There; fixed it for you.

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Originally Posted by Bluetonic

It's simple enough to solve.

They need to issue block booking cards which you swipe on the way in, one card for each seat on a block booking (groups leaders can worry about the logistics of handing out and collecting cards). The benefit for the FAI is that there is no need to send out tickets anymore, the ticket is preloaded onto the card. Upon entry a swipe is taken and that registers that block booking seat used for that particular game. At the end of each campaign the block booker (or individual seat) has to have attended say 80% of games (incl friendlies) to be entitled to renewal for the next season.

The FAI can put a system in place where block bookers can resell their seats a limited number of times a campaign online in the same way that English premier league clubs facilitate their fans, say twice in a campaign (incl friendlies).

This will help reduce the reselling of tickets we see facilitated here and on other other fora which allows people to keep a hold of block bookings as people are less likely to trust a stranger with a block booking swipe.

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The idea for a card for BB's is not a bad idea. I agree with gspain that once we go back to LR, tickets will become a problem again, initially at least. Like the Croke Park factor, people will want to go to the new stadium etc etc.

The recession and the fact that the game was on a wed night had alot to do with smaller crowd imo. As mentioned above, its expensive for a BB down the country to go to a game on a wed night.....cost,time off work etc.

I think a 50k capacity stadium is about right for football (Obviously for the more glamour and bigger games the demand for tickets will always be higher), it means that the vast majority of games will sell out and more times than not we will have a crowd where the vast majority attending actually care about the team and wont decide to do a mexican wave half way through cos they're bored :mad:

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Originally Posted by eirebhoy

If they're only going to 1 in every 2 games or so it's an expensive 90 minutes. :)
I know plenty of Dubs with Celtic season tickets but they share them. Someone will use the ticket for almost every game. If people know they're not going to games maybe make arrangements to give the ticket to someone.

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Sadly people didn't want to go Weds, mainly for economic or work-related reasons.

And sadly, 50k at Lansdowne is looking pitifully accurate for most soccer games?
:-(

50,000 capacity seems fine if it was 50,000 seats available to Joe public, but the fact of the matter matter is that there will only be 35,000 available, not far off what the (over subscribed) block booking was in Lansdowne.

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Originally Posted by Bluetonic

50,000 capacity seems fine if it was 50,000 seats available to Joe public, but the fact of the matter matter is that there will only be 35,000 available, not far off what the (over subscribed) block booking was in Lansdowne.

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In most cases the away fans won't take up their allocation. They had 3,500 of the seats at the old Lansdowne too.

I can't see the corporate seats selling out. Therefore they'll be available on a match by match basis. They'll end up going to league officials etc and freeing up ordinary seats.

I think 51,000 is spot on for football. Sure the bigger games could sellout ten times over but better to have the stadium full or almost full for all games.

Still going to be a disappointment to those who have been catered in Croke Park whilst on the block booking waiting list, while those on the main block booking sold on their tickets (facilitated through good meaning websites) regularly and did not attend yet will be guaranteed Lansdowne Road tickets.

36,000 Old capacity
3,600 away allocation
32,400 block booking allocation


50,000 new capacity
5,000 away allocation
10,000 premium level
35,000 block booking allocation*

*obviously some of this will be waiting list as existing corporate block bookers from the old Lansdowne take up premium tickets. My guess is up to around 2,000 on the waiting list should be catered for if the average is around 3 tickets per block booking waiting list number.

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Originally Posted by Bluetonic

Still going to be a disappointment to those who have been catered in Croke Park whilst on the block booking waiting list, while those on the main block booking sold on their tickets (facilitated through good meaning websites) regularly and did not attend yet will be guaranteed Lansdowne Road tickets.

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How big is the waiting list? The figures on threads here indicate an attendance of 44,000 on Wednesday with 6,000 tickets unused. That's a total of 50,000 tickets sold so the capacity of Lansdowne should come very close to covering everyone on the waiting list.

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My guess is up to around 2,000 on the waiting list should be catered for if the average is around 3 tickets per block booking waiting list number.

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Only two tickets per block booking unless they've changed it since I got on.

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Originally Posted by eirebhoy

I'd say the vast majority of those tickets are tout tickets and something has to be done about that before we move back to Lansdowne.

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How could touts make money out of a game like this? surely they would make a loss on the tickets?

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Originally Posted by stiffler

How could touts make money out of a game like this? surely they would make a loss on the tickets?

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Thats his point.

They lose money on this but won't give up their block booking because they know they can make their money from the Italy games etc

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Originally Posted by Bluetonic

Still going to be a disappointment to those who have been catered in Croke Park whilst on the block booking waiting list, while those on the main block booking sold on their tickets (facilitated through good meaning websites) regularly and did not attend yet will be guaranteed Lansdowne Road tickets.

36,000 Old capacity
3,600 away allocation
32,400 block booking allocation


50,000 new capacity
5,000 away allocation
10,000 premium level
35,000 block booking allocation*

*obviously some of this will be waiting list as existing corporate block bookers from the old Lansdowne take up premium tickets. My guess is up to around 2,000 on the waiting list should be catered for if the average is around 3 tickets per block booking waiting list number.

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I think the corparate is 11000 meaning BB allocation of 34000. I also reckon/hope the first 2000 should be OK say additiinal 4000 tickets (2 per WL)due to transfers/extra etc (I believe there are 6500 on the waiting list)

However the FAI can virtually guareentee an additional 3000 tickets due to the way allocation not being used. They tickets should be offered to the unusccessfull waiting listers on a formal basis - similar to the arrangement that was in place for the friendlies where with the terracing the fist 2000 were offered tickets.

You would then be a conditional block booker -guarenteed tickets subject to the away fan allocation. Cant see Italy taking more than 2000 so those 3000 tickets go to the waiting list not public sale. If this campaign was at the new LR you could practically guarantee an additional 3000 tickets to BB's.

There are only 6 or 7 teams who would take 5000 or more to a game against us,