Yeah, Fürth should be higher, but maybe the stadium is crap? Someone will stop by and give us the info
I think the city of Fürth is just too close to Nuremberg. You can't even say where Nuremberg ends and Fürth begins: http://maps.live.de/LiveSearch.Loca...34844&style=h&lvl=14&dir=0&tilt=-90&alt=-1000 I guess it would be different if Nuremberg was similiar in size but since it's almost 4 times as big as Fürth so I suppose most people from Fürth see themselves as "Nürnberger" and support them. Imo that makes Offenbach's attendance numbers even more impressive. They are pretty much in the same boat.
that makes sense- the joys of having so many clubs, also call some of the problems. What can you do? Maybe you guys could have an MLS league, with no promotion and relegation. HAHAHAAA!! I made myself laugh. Nearly spit out my Dr Pepper.
Yeah, I think thats somewhere comparable. OFC have a higher attendance in the 3. Liga then Fürth has as a top team of the 2. Liga. And Offenbachs attendandes arent exactly high anymore either... I just dont get that. Maybe its just because Fürth are so god damn boring... (sorry Borussia ) but the thing is they wouldnt be so boring if they had somewhat of a crowd. Its certainly not missing success or bad play that makes them boring. Any insides @ Borussia?!
I'm surprised as well that there's no real euphoria after their promotion ... but I think that beneath their lack of tradition, there's also other reasons behind this: The DEL icehockey club, the poor stadium (Audi will build them a new one soon) and the fact that there's lots of Bayern & 1860 fans in the city. 115,000 citizens means that it's still the 2nd smallest city of the whole 2 BL (after Ahlen)... In the Vorrunde of last season (under Labbadia), they had an average attendance of about 8,500, I think (even though the 1860 & Köln home games took place in the Rückrunde) ... and this season, it suddenly dropped to 6,800. It's hard to understand ... especially, as they have scored the most home goals of all teams and play a pretty attractive football ... but well, the club has to accept it. The problem is that many "not hardcore" fans don't believe in promotion anymore after another close failure last season ... but I bet the stadium would be sold out in every game if they should manage to finally make it to the 1 BL. Well, we call such fans "Erfolgsfans"... Fürth has a lower attendance this season, but the atmosphere at the stadium is the best they ever had (I'm very surprised) after getting a roof over the Nordkurve and installing a real supporters section.
Unfortunately it's true (just take a look at my brother and a few friends). I'd say that 1/3 of the football fans in Fürth are FCN supporters and 1/3 are Bayern fans. The problem for Spvgg Greuther Fürth is the fact that they lost a whole generation during the 2nd half of the 80's & the early 90's, when they went down to the 5th league. They have many young (most are still at school) and a certain number of pretty old fans (the so-called 'traditionalists' who experienced their glory days before and after WW2) ... but you don't see many at the age of 25-45 compared to Nuremberg. Btw: Did you know that the percentage of Fürth fans from their city is still a lot higher than the percentage of those from Nürnberg? FCN's attendance would be a lot lower if they had not about 70 % of their supporters coming from outside the city (whole Franconia). @ Doc Offenbach's attendance from last 2nd league season wasn't much better than that from Fürth (although they have a better main stand & an almost completely roofed fan section). When I attended the last game in Frankfurt (Eintracht-Gladbach), I saw LOTS of cars from Offenbach parking around the stadium... Unfortunately, 2nd league football isn't much interesting to "non hardcore" fans if you can attend a 1 BL game in front of your house door. Btw: The city of Fürth is absolutely not boring compared to Offenbach. Damn, I'm wrong ... since Kaiserslautern is smaller (and still having the best 2nd league attendance).
Btw: What would the attendance of FSV Frankfurt be if they had not so many guest fans at Commerzbank-Arena (i.e. Mainz brought about 14,000), Doc? Frankfurt is such a big city... And how does it come that the club of a 260,000 city like Mönchengladbach has a better attendance than the club of a big city like Frankfurt?
Yeah thats true. Same goes for FSV Frankfurt, just that they lost like 2 or 3 generations... But Fürth has been around for a while now and have played severall great seasons the last 10 years, so it surprises me that still noone cares about it in their own city... Kickers Offenbach is slowly but steadily dying. There is not much left there at all. But then they have heavily sucked for decades now so its no surprise... Yet they did average 11000 last season and still this season in 3. Liga average more then Fürth... The OF Licence plate is given out for the entire region southeast of Frankfurt and by far not only Offenbach. Even Neu-Isenburg, which is a 10-Minute walk from the Waldstadion. has OF- Licenceplates... No doubt about that. There is no more boring city as Offenbach on this planet. The only "big city" in germany without a theater or a public swimming pool... Oh yeah right, whats the attendance of the "second team" in Mönchengladbach again?! FSV is really only number 5 in the Rhein-Main region (after Eintracht, Offenbach, Mainz and on par with Wehen) They have been in the Oberliga Hessen for 7 years so obviously they have lost what little Fanbase they might still have had. I will say though, that if they were on the jump to 1. Bundesliga for 7 or 8 years and could play in their own stadium, I believe they could average above 10000. Actually Im sure of that.
Yeah that would be nice... Pull up Fortuna, Dynamo, Braunschweig, Magdeburg, Waldhof, RWE, Leipzig (both of them)... I would love to see the attendances of that league!
Of course it's disappointing that they rarely get more than 10,000 fans in a game (actually only if they play against traditional clubs who bring some fans to Fürth) ... but it's not like nobody in the city cares for them. We shouldn't forget the relations, as Fürth is a pretty small city and has to cope with the disadvantage of having Nuremberg (soccer & icehockey) quasi in front of the own house door. IMO, the home attendance of a club like Duisburg (new stadium & big city) is a lot more embarrassing...
what a great thread. some really wonderful memories. Like when PileD called me the "Old Lady Frog." Lets never close this thread