Too many Dublin Clubs?

[monkey magic]

Tiktok ...Arsenal, Chelsea, Spurs, Palace, Fulham, Charlton, West Ham, Millwall, QPR, Orient, Brentford .. that's 11

...watford, wycomb,rushden & diamonds, gillingham even conference clubs like barnet, and daganham & redbridge could be counted, and if were counting bray as dublin, then why not reading and luton.

fact of the matter is that it isnt a case of there being too many clubs, or even where there positioned in the city, the clubs that r dere must do more to promote the game and the fact that there is live football available weekly in this country, at a reasonable price

look at the likes of fulham, and charlton in london,who dont have huge fan bases and have embarked on large scale drives to get more fans through the turnstiles, if my memory seves me, charlton even got into trouble with gillingham for actively trying to entice fans from their catchment area by offering them special discounts and running advertisements in the local rags about the chance to watch premiership football. while im not encouraging that - i seriously doubt if rovers fans could be converted to bohs its this kid of proactive approach that needs to be taken be ALL clubs in the land to grow the game here

[BohDiddley]

i seriously doubt if rovers fans could be converted to bohs

Perish the thought!
Though an amnesty for the aforementioned Shels folk, based on their diminished sense of place and a tendency to be over-impressed with short-term gains, could be considered.
Now where did I leave that bullet-proof vest?

[Buller]

There is easily room for five clubs!
Rovers have the SouthWest
Shels are going to have the entire North..
Bohs will have the CityCenter
Pats will have the West/CityCenter
UCD will have the SouthEast
And eh, dublin city/home farm can just... eh... yea..

[sonofstan]

Now sligo town has a rough population.

very rough, some of them

[ollie]

very rough, some of them

[ollie]

My English geography is poor but do Blackburn and Burnley not fall in there too?

they are in lancashire(spell?)they are a nice bit north of manchester

[rebs23]

There no further out in relative terms than Bray is.
Be consistent and compare like with like.

6 clubs / 1.2millions people breaks down a 200,000 people per club, only Shels and Bohs are regularly getting more than 1% of their 'cut' out to support them, but you're going to insist that it's the saturation of clubs that's the problem?

200,000 is pretty much twice the population of Cork (123,000) where there is one club, that regularly attracts 4,000 (3% of their 'cut')

No matter who you compare it to, or how you write it, attendances in the EL is down to lack of interest, and there are plenty people in Dublin to support 6 clubs if they got off their backsides.

TikTok
Along time since you have been in Cork! 450,000 in the county of whom 300,000 live within 10 miles of the Kinsale Rd Roundabout in the city.
Saying the pop of Cork city is 123,000 is the same as saying the pop of Dublin city is 500,000 (the number living in the city council area).
Percentage wise Cork City FC is doing as well as most of the Dublin clubs. No better no worse.




o

[BohDiddley]

Shels are going to have the entire North..

In your dreams and theirs ...

[Gerrit]

There is easily room for five clubs!
Rovers have the SouthWest
Shels are going to have the entire North..
Bohs will have the CityCenter
Pats will have the West/CityCenter
UCD will have the SouthEast
And eh, dublin city/home farm can just... eh... yea..

I live in the city centre, and no way I'm gonna convert to being a Pats or Bohs fan


I think there are not too much in Dublin given the fact that those teams all (maybe apart from Dublin City) made their way to the top flight on a fair way: on the pitch. Can someone help it that different teams from the capital have good results and go in the top flight ? With a bit of less luck Bray and UCD hadn't promoted, and then it was a different story...

The only sad thing is that I like away games outside of the city as I love the bus drives that allow me to see a share of my new home country. Without Shels, how the feck was I ever likely to go to places like Longford, Drogheda or Newbridge ?? People moving to Ireland go to Belfast, Galway, Cork, Limerick, Dublin, maybe Derry. But thanks to soccer I've also seen less famous places such as Drogheda, Portadown and Longford, plus the towns we cross on our way.

So I would like a less concentration of clubs in the capital, but rather than ditching UCD or Dublin City or Rovers or so... If we make it an all-Ireland league we have a much less concentration... I'd say: add the best 3 teams from the North, plus add Galway to have a west coast team in the top flight as well, then you get this:

Cork City
Waterford
Shelbourne
St Pats
Shamrock Rovers
UCD
Bohemians
Finn Harps
Longford Town
Derry City
Bray
Drogheda
Galway Utd
Portadown
Linfield
Glentoran


This would mean: 5 teams out of 16 (30%) from Dublin, two near Dublin (no, Bray is NOT in Dublin), two in Belfast, and then one in other parts of the country that happen to be well-spread.

5 in Dublin, 2 in Belfast, seems logical given the fact we're dealing with the biggest cities in the country. Then there's Galway to serve the West, Cork to serve the South, Finn Harps and Derry for the Northwest, Longford for the central counties, Waterford for the Southeast.
Maybe only Portadown would have problems in finding decent crowds because they're a bit stuck between Belfast and Longford that both have their teams already.

Plus, 16 teams is ideal for a good league.

[Gerrit]

Cities with a huge concentration of clubs:

Athens (ca 50% of the top division: AEK, Panathinaikos, Olympiakos Piraeus, plus approx 4 smaller teams if I'm not wrong)

Reykjavik (Vikingur, Fram, Fylkir, Reykjavik, Breidablik in second div.)

Istanbul (Istanbulspor, Fenerbahce, Galatasaray, Besiktas, plus in second div. Zariyer which is a southern suburb)

Vienna (Rapid, Austria, Admira Wacker - 3 out of 10 teams)

Prague (Slavia Prague, Sparta Prague, Bohemians Prague, plus some smaller ones)

Moscow (Spartak Moscow, Lokomotiv, CSKA Moscow, Dinamo Moscow)

Buenos Aires (mentionned earlier)

London (mentionned earlier)

Tokyo (not sure though which clubs exactly, but there are at least 4 or 5 in the top division)

Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo



and my knowledge of Scotland is not that good, but doesn't Glasgow also have at least 5 or 6 clubs in the higher divisions ?
There's not just Rangers and Celtic, there's also Partick Thistle and Queen's Park in the nationwide divisions. And if I'm not wrong the outskirts also have several teams (help me out with the names please...)



Largest concentration: San Marino, all clubs in the country play in the wide capital area

[Slash/ED]

The way to reduce the amount of Dublin clubs is for other clubs to produce better teams and pass them out.

[A face]

The way to reduce the amount of Dublin clubs is for other clubs to produce better teams and pass them out.

You said it in one sir !!

That is about the size of it .... it is up to the other clubs to get it together and pass them out.

[Da Real Rover]

. Then there's Galway to serve the West.

I don't know why you are putting Galway in for the west, cause i know its a way bigger town but the team, club and stadium are way behind Rovers. Is the population about 60000 are so (correct me if im wrong) and yet they only attract crowds up to 550. We pull nearly 3 times that crowd, so i think we all know who has the fanbase and pedigree to serve Connaught. Dont take it personnally Galway fans because if you look at the facts we have the greatest amount of honours (have ye ever even won the league), ye are second bottom of the first division while were 3rd from top and we bet ye 2-0 in Terryland.

[dancinpants]

I don't know why you are putting Galway in for the west, cause i know its a way bigger town but the team, club and stadium are way behind Rovers. Is the population about 60000 are so (correct me if im wrong) and yet they only attract crowds up to 550. We pull nearly 3 times that crowd, so i think we all know who has the fanbase and pedigree to serve Connaught. Dont take it personnally Galway fans because if you look at the facts we have the greatest amount of honours (have ye ever even won the league), ye are second bottom of the first division while were 3rd from top and we bet ye 2-0 in Terryland.

Sligo:
Premier Division: 2 1936-37, 1976-77
FAI Cup 2 1983, 1994
League Cup 1 1997-98
First Division: 1 1993-94

6 honours in 77 years - Woooweee
Galway have 4 in 28 BTW

[CollegeTillIDie]

What about Serbia!!! . 7 of the 16 team top division based in Belgrade

Partizan Beograd
C. Zvezda Beograd
Zeta Golubovci
OFK Beograd
Zemun
Buducnost Podgorica
Radnicki N. Beograd
Hajduk Kula
Smederevo
Obilic Beograd
Zeleznik
Vojvodina Novi Sad
Borac Cacak
Cukaricki Beograd
Sutjeska Niksic
Hajduk Beograd

Great example dancin pants..
But for the record Zeleznik is also a Belgrade club and Zemun is a small town just north of Belgrade a lot like Bray is next to Dublin kinda sorta thing! So you're looking at 9 out of 16 in the current season. Although Hajduk and Cukaricki look set for the drop!

P.S. looks like Crvena Zvezda have blown the League this season. Well done Partizan

[dcfcsteve]

Tiktok ...Arsenal, Chelsea, Spurs, Palace, Fulham, Charlton, West Ham, Millwall, QPR, Orient, Brentford .. that's 11

I would definitely add AFC Wimbledon in as a London team, as their crowds are very similar to the Cheery O's - even if AFC have no away fans at games. Their stated aim is to be a league team again within the next 7 years, and they're on-track to do so (back-to-back promotion and second double in a row this year. 3 more promotions and they're back !).

As someone else mentioned before, Barnet have been promoted for next season, and are a London club (on the tube).

and Watford, Luton Town, Wycombe, Rushden&Diamonds and Barnet make 16, and I'm sure there's probably more

Hang on Tiktok - London's big, but it ain't Tokyo ! Rushden and Diamonds are a Northamptonshire club. That's in the Midlands - not even in the Home Counties, let alone London ! Their ground is 85 miles away from London !! Watford you can just about claim as London, as it's the last stop on a tube line. Wycombe ever-so-vaguely, but again just about. No chance with Luton - it just ain't part of London (no matter what they try and tell you about the airport... )

I don't know how to define where a city technically starts and stops, but to me it's where there's large gaps between the sprawl of development. Bray is therefore essentially part of Dublin as, unless I'm wrong here, it is physically connected to Dublin by continuous buildings/development.

As for the suggestion that Gillingham can be called a London club....??? No feckin chance. There's miles of open countryside between that town and the outer reaches of London. Same for Luton.

Anyways - we're kidding ourselve sif we think chopping and changing the distribution of clubs in the EL is suddenly going to unshackle the masses from their armchairs and see them storming the turnstiles at our grounds. As has been pointed out previosuly - the low attendances in our league are a result of a lack of interest, not geographical saturation. Chopping and changing the number of teams in certain areas as an act in isolation would be as effective as rearranging the seats on the Titanic....

[dcfcsteve]

Short answer, yes. Dublin is about as big , very roughly, as Manchester of Liverpool

Dublkin is waaaaaaay bigger than Liverpool - population c.450,000. The likes of Hull and Sheffield are bigger than Scouseland.

Manchester is c.1m, - much closer to the size of Dublin, but that's only if you include the big sprawl that surrounds Manc (i.e. Bolton, Oldham etc).

[sonofstan]

Dublkin is waaaaaaay bigger than Liverpool - population c.450,000. The likes of Hull and Sheffield are bigger than Scouseland.

Manchester is c.1m, - much closer to the size of Dublin, but that's only if you include the big sprawl that surrounds Manc (i.e. Bolton, Oldham etc).

Liverpool city is about 450, 000 . greater merseyside about 1.5m - manchester city council area has only 350,000 or thereabouts but greater manc. has nearly 2m - equally, I would guess Dublin as defined by the city council area would be about half a million, whereas the 4 local authority areas would give the 1.2 m that everyone quotes - there's really no accurate way of doing this; people who work in Dublin, are from Dublin and so on but go to Clonee to sleep are Dubliners in my book, whereas Bolton isn't Manchester the way Longsight is .... anyway I only said roughly the same size, in a 'bigger than Cork but smaller than Paris or Rome' sort of way

[Ringo]

I think there are not too much in Dublin given the fact that those teams all (maybe apart from Dublin City) made their way to the top flight on a fair way: on the pitch.

We won the first division title & got promoted . This year two teams came second & third & got promoted . get your facts right or STFU

[tiktok]

TikTok
Along time since you have been in Cork! 450,000 in the county of whom 300,000 live within 10 miles of the Kinsale Rd Roundabout in the city.

I wasn't holding City's attendance's up as some Holy Grail for Dub clubs to achieve, we could be doing better too. The figure I got was from the last census, if there really are 300,000 within 11 miles of the cross then we too are only getting about 1-2% out for home games.

The point though was that there are enough people in the country to support the league and fill every stadium every week, but they're not interested, it's the profile of the league that's the problem, not the number of clubs.