DCU Masters Project Idea

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Originally Posted by Mr A

The rugby provinces show that it is possible to build up a decent following across league games. Ulster had 16483 for their game against Zebre last weekend for example, and Connacht built crowds impressively even while they were still pretty rubbish.

It's not easy, and certainly a complex issue, but the event junkie thing can be overcome. Just keep making small improvements to the product, make people feel part of it and valued and slowly but surely we can build it up.

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Indeed.

I remember going to watch Leinster play Glasgow Caledonian (as they then were) in a European fixture of some sort in 1999 (I think) at a club ground in or around D4 (Old Wesley's ? You can tell I'm not a Dub ! :) )

Anyways - there were no more than about a thousand at it. At that stage Ulster and Munster were getting decent crowds, but Leinster weren't and Connacht were woefully supported.

About a decade after that Leinster were selling out Lansdowne and the RDS for matches, which shows that things can change.

P.S. I'm not trying to be one of those 'I was in the GPO in 1916' bandwagoners I mentioned above with this story :)

You should get a copy of and read "Who Stole Our Game?", deals with a lot of these issues addressed.

Came across a brilliant article on this subject on These Football Times. It was published just a few months ago - http://thesefootballtimes.co/2016/02...ue-of-ireland/

It doesn't mention any national lack on confidence due to post-colonialism, but explains many other very valid societal reasons that contributed to the steady decline in attendances once the 50s (the golden age for LOI attendances) ended.

by the way, it seems that only in v rare instances were crowds anywhere near 30k. The big crowds were mainly at the big derby matches.

"Shelbourne and Shamrock Rovers played at Tolka Park in August 1954 in front of over 11,000, earning gate receipts of £850. The 1955 FAI Cup semi-final between Drumcondra and Waterford drew a crowd of 28,504 at Dalymount Park, and a gate of £3,002....

....By the late 1950s, demand to see the games had surpassed stadium capacity. This led to the first all-ticket fixture in Irish club football in January 1958, when 19,053 crammed into Tolka Park."

The main reason cited for the large attendances in the 50s seem to be:
- The absolute lack of other entertainment in 50s ireland
- Overpopulation in Dublin city centre meant that huge populations lived within walking distances of grounds.

In fairness, aside from the big attendances for a few high profile matches the attendances aren't mindblowing - "In January 1953 a game in Cork between Evergreen and Cork Athletic recorded an attendance of 8,317." There were 7 thousand ppl in Turners cross in April 2015 to watch Cork Vs Dundalk, and many were unable to get tickets, and our attendances for FAI Cup finals in the Aviva are usually in excess of 20k these days.

It continues by describing how the 60s saw the birth of contemporary Irish society when we joined the institutions of global capitalism, which yielded major economic improvements for the country, but also contributed to declining LOI attendances due to:
- the advent of television and subsequent latching onto British teams who did v well in Europe, in comparison with irish teams
- ppl had more money and so could afford other past-times, like going boozing in the pub
- government initiatives depopulated the inner city slums and moved ppl to suburban housing estates

it's important to remember though that the attendances of the 50s are an anomaly.

"When one looks at the high attendances in the 1950s it is as though they were something of an oasis on an otherwise desert-like landscape for the league. It required little effort on behalf of the clubs to attract spectators, and the matches offered an escape from the destitute environment of urban life in 1950s Ireland. However, it could be argued the large attendances were merely a product of their time, and times change.

Just as contemporary Irish society was born in the 1960s, the reasons why the league stopped attracting large crowds is the same now as it was 50 years ago. Television, Manchester United and the population shift to the suburbs, in addition to the structural and administrative problems, poor facilities and fractured nature of Irish football, meant the league has never been able to regain the mass following it once had."

It's a great article, bit I think it lets itself down by viewing Dublin in isolation as if it was an anomaly at that time, when it was just part of a wider shift in Western Europe.

The 1960s had the same impact in every town and city in Britain as well - rising accessibility of TV, shifting populations to suburbs, higher disposable income etc. Yet people didn't stop supporting teams like Scunthorpe, Grimsby and Charlton Athletic there as a result. The working class population of east and south east London was shifted wholesale out to the borders of Essex and Kent, yet they didn't stop supporting the likes of Millwall, West Ham and even Leyton Orient. Same in Glasgow, yet people still supported Partick Thistle and Clydebank.

So why did those factors cause Irish people to desert their own relatively crap teams when English and Scottish people didn't stop supporting their relatively crap teams ? Why was Ireland/Dublin different ? And why did the Irish League retain its decent crowds for about a decade longer than the LOI did - even though both were arguably of similar standard and facilities ?

This touches on another interesting comparison. Why did Scots continue to support their league - despite facing the same socio-economic factors and being located next door to a stronger English alternative - whilst the Irish didn't ?

This is all nice information, but what in the feck is a ppl?

"Are a people" you mean.

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Originally Posted by EatYerGreens

This touches on another interesting comparison. Why did Scots continue to support their league - despite facing the same socio-economic factors and being located next door to a stronger English alternative - whilst the Irish didn't ?

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Maybe they had that validation that their league was v good (and worthwhile following) by Celtic winning the European cup in Lisbon for eg. We on the other hand had confirmation that our league was one of the weakest in Europe by usually getting knocked out in the early rounds.