I think the potential for trouble is overdone, there hasn't been any real trouble between rovers and bohs fans for years bar a few eejits outside on the streets. Not much more than an average Friday night in Dublin City centre
But the difference is the location Sbgawa.
A few burbery uniformed (complete opposite of casual! ) pavement dancers in ballsbridge will have the D4 locals lobbying Joe Duffy & their local TD.
These people, don't forget, got the landsdowne stadium plans upended so the stadium now looks like a plastic chamber pot that's been melted at one end.
Why boez would seek to give up home advantage for this game is beyond me, and I'm assuming that isn't the case.
Fair point. He's probably too busy talking to a woman from clontarf.
After watching Bohs in the Aviva again tonight, and think there's actually something in the idea of the Rovers-Bohs derbies being held there.
Get both teams to agree in advance of a new season that they'll play all their league games there, so that no-one loses or gains any advantage from it. Then have a big marketing push around each of the fixtures, and decent ticket prices for them too (€10 per adult, €30 for family of 4 etc). Try it out as an experiment for a season and see what happens. All going well it should increase ticket sales for both clubs, and then have a positive knock-on effect on the interest levels for their other fixtures (and potentially for the league overall). Plus increased merchandise sales, sponsorship etc.
It would also be worth the FAI doing the clubs a deal for a season to encourage the experiment, as if it worked out it would mean another 3 day's worth of rental for them every year too.
It could even be bundled up into a league-wide 'derby day', similar to what they do in the Irish League on Boxing Day.
Things like this should definitely be tried. The crowds for Bohs-Rovers games leading up to Covid were really strong, so would be good to see what could be achieved with a good stadium, lots of capacity, some solid marketing and a bit of hype. The upsides would massively outweigh any downside from it (not that I can think of any genuine ones).
The aul bed pan isnt great but the other option is worse
Obviously talking Tallaght or Aviva! Bedpan or worse...
Not sure. The barrage of flares ( each one costing the club money), gardai with dogs on the pitch in Dalymount a couple of years ago. Idiots running onto pitch to have a go at the other side but to be fair no trouble afterwards. No reason it should not be tried but I assume the crowds would have to be substantially bigger to justify the rent and additional costs.
Well worth a try it could lead to something positive across the league.
We have to be prepared as a league to try things like this IMO. Do it for one season, with each game hyped to the ballix, and then review afterwards.
We've not exactly been innovative in the LOI over the years (beyond constantly p!ssing around with the number of teams in each tier).
Fair play to Cork, they have given Pats a 10% allocation of tickets for Friday. 90 away fans, first proper away trip in well over a year.
On the game, there is a decent chance of an upset. Pats are missing
John Mountey
Lee Desmond
Paddy Barrett
Sam Bone
Shane Griffin
Robbie Benson
The only leaves Bermo as a first choice defender, Christ knows what our back 4 will look like. Our new RB who only signed last week will probably start and then it is anyone's guess, Jay McClelland has played left back a couple of times this season so he might go in there and SOD might push Bermo into center back with 16 year old James Abankwah or even throw Jamie Lennon back there who played RB against Derry earlier in the season but got sent off that day.. A really good chance for Cork to go and beat us.
Here on a technicality.
Bohs have managed to get approval for increased attendance for Sunday, Dalymount now will hold 650 instead of 400
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