I might as well ask the question; who you think will win the season and why? I voted Manawatu cause they have Shane Rufer as head coach and I think that they have a very good playing style that is ought to be used more by the national team, but mayber I'm bias. I like to see them show that success is on the field and not by Adminstration. Plus I think that Auckland City FC has their hands full with Club World Cup and OFC Champions league and so their NZFC may be difficult to juggle. Plenty of games and I think that they have very small squad to deal with the long season at this present time. Although Roger Wilkinson is not a pushover as a coach. Canterbury United is going to be a tough opponant this season. Othrer than those three teams, there is not much with elsewhere in my opinion. However Team Welligton has rested most of their players during the winter season and they could be a surprise because of that. The others still could within reach but they have their work cut out. Hang loose
I can't really get all the offical numbers at all the matches but as far as I was able to dig out of most match, I have assessed the following as a really, really a rough estimate for the past season. The range of crowd numbers is about from 250 to 1600. The team order with the best crowd pulls: (rough estimate regardless of home or away) 1. Wellington about 1000 2. Auckland about 950 3. Canterbury about 915 4. Otago about 770 5. Waitakere about 590 6. Manawatu about 560 7. Waitkato about 450 8. Hawkes bay about 365 As for any TV coverage, there is probaby only one hour highlight per week on SKY Sports and not on free on air TV. It's really pathetic turn out. The games had been playing on the Sunday early 12pm or late afternoon 3pm for the past season. However, there is a different playing time format, this season. There is a mixture of Saturday and Sunday games and the kick off times starting from 1pm,2pm,3pm,4pm,5pm and 6pm. There are more than half are 3pm and 4pm starts and there is a number of 6pm starts as well. It be likely that it is depends who plays who in the country and the airline times. Such is the problem of semi-pros in the weekend. So it would be interesting what crowd numbers be like for the different times and days. Hang loose.
http://www.nzfc.co.nz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=612&Itemid=2 Although I have voted Manawatu, Waitakere is amazing strong this year. Manawatu is young with a good coach in Shane Rufer and Auckland city is also very busy in their schedule but still is voted on top. Hang loose
I agree with AllWhitebeliever that the Auckland City schedule may be the undoing of them this season. Whilst I voted for City to win the NZFC this season, I fancy Waitakere are going to push them all the way - they certainly got off to a great start at Waikato on Sunday. Good to see Allan Pearce back and scoring goals again. As for Manawatu, a very good result down at Wellington and they may be a real handful this season. It will be a close finish methinks.
You thought it should be more or less for this rather low-skill, semipro league? The OMG numbers are reserved for the Knights' low attendance, but then again that's nothing new.
I have noticed the crowds going up at Wellingtons home games this season the crowd numbers will only grow.
the knights attendance is still higher than all those teams.. and they will probably tripple attendances next season when they have an all kiwi team with ricky herbert there. exciting times ahead for the knights and the a-league, looking forward to see how it unfolds.
did you go to the game tonight mate? bigger crowd than usual, way bigger actually.. herbert has done wonders! you could even here chants coming from the nz fans. "shake it up baby now, twist and shout" lmfao they were singing that for ages, sounded sick.