davetscfc
Steaming Bovril
......and it's Salisbury City......
Posts: 457
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Post by davetscfc on Nov 5, 2006 1:38:46 GMT
Right.....I was going to write this regardless of what happened in the 93rd minute today. Sorry, but the Eastbourne drum kit and bells made it one of the least enjoyable non league games I've ever been to. We had a 3 hour train journey, arrived for opening, couple of pubs, all going well. Soon as we were into the ground all we had was the thump thump thump for 100 minutes or more. Surely, non league is about a bit of banter, bit of abuse.....no chance.....for me the whole 90 minutes was ruined by a bunch of 30 or so idiots who's knowledge of football is - Sky/Chelsea/Morinhio/Milan/Madrid with no clue as to what IT is all about. Where's the laughter, and jokes, not a chance, may as well have stayed at home, or at least in the pub behind the seafront. Eastbourne..hope you get promoted....cos I don't want to go back.
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Post by medibot on Nov 5, 2006 1:59:21 GMT
Welcome to the world of the rapidly promoted club. Martello was there when they were sh*t though so he doesn't count
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davetscfc
Steaming Bovril
......and it's Salisbury City......
Posts: 457
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Post by davetscfc on Nov 5, 2006 8:51:50 GMT
Welcome to the world of the rapidly promoted club. Martello was there when they were sh*t though so he doesn't count Yes, must say there was a very Eastleigh feel to attitudes down there.
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martello
Steaming Bovril
I used to be indecisive...now I'm not so sure...
Posts: 371
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Post by martello on Nov 5, 2006 12:15:34 GMT
Right.....I was going to write this regardless of what happened in the 93rd minute today. Sorry, but the Eastbourne drum kit and bells made it one of the least enjoyable non league games I've ever been to. We had a 3 hour train journey, arrived for opening, couple of pubs, all going well. Soon as we were into the ground all we had was the thump thump thump for 100 minutes or more. Surely, non league is about a bit of banter, bit of abuse.....no chance.....for me the whole 90 minutes was ruined by a bunch of 30 or so idiots who's knowledge of football is - Sky/Chelsea/Morinhio/Milan/Madrid with no clue as to what IT is all about. Where's the laughter, and jokes, not a chance, may as well have stayed at home, or at least in the pub behind the seafront. Eastbourne..hope you get promoted....cos I don't want to go back. You wait til you go to Cambridge, that'd blow your mind. Needless to say, if you didn't enjoy your experience then obviously I'm disappointed. But I'm also very perplexed. I'm not sure of the connection between the drums and stuff about Sky, Chelsea, Mourinho, etc. I'm also disappointed you seem very keen to generalise thanks to 30 (out of 745) people and then decide you don't want to go back. Thanks. If you have particular examples of what p*ssed you off I'd be interested to hear them and certainly wouldn't defend people just because they're EBFC fans. But the indictment you've given is extremely rare indeed amongst visiting fans, which is why I'm surprised and disappointed - in fact, I've not even seen the same sentiments on the Salisbury forum. One post on there is particularly praising of the day out as a whole. Obviously you've had a different experience. We will do our best to get promoted for you, but if we are both still in the same division, I'd be happy to welcome Salisbury City back to Priory Lane. Both games down there (including the 0-0 in 2002) have been enjoyable and if you wanted laughter and banter, you should've been in the main stand - plenty of it exchanged between Borough fans and their (not entirely original) quips toward Widdrington, which were returned with interest. The Salisbury fan sitting behind me seemed to enjoy the experience. Obviously you can only speak for yourself and I appreciate that. I'm not even going to cloud all Eastleigh fans with the same attitude, but we probably do have quite a lot of supporters who have only known us as a Southern League/Conference South side - that is the effect of success. It'd be silly to be a Conference South club on County League attendances (sorry to Hayes, Thurrock, Yeading, etc ) In fact I'm sure you wouldn't be on crowds of 1200+ (kids get in free apparently) if you were still in the Southern League Eastern Division. But yesterday was our highest home crowd of the season...surely the Chelsea/Mourinho mob of which you speak would prefer to stay at home watching Sky instead of being down at a tinpot ground with relentless drummers on a freezing cold day? There are plenty of other people down at Priory Lane who would no doubt have made your day more enjoyable - just a shame you didn't seem to meet any of them. Oh, and the game was a bloody good one, and would have been so even if it had have been 0-0.
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Post by stretfordendling© on Nov 5, 2006 13:53:53 GMT
Dave, your not doing my confidence any good for our next away game with a post like that I'd like to think that, amoungst all conf south fans, we can enjoy a bit of banter and all that. I'd like to think that Hayes away fans can give as well as receive the fair share of insults and banter with oppo fans. Eastbourne is one of only a few conf south grounds i ain't been to but i'm lookig forward to it. When we went to Cambridge both last season (When only 3 of us were singing against a shed load of their fans and we were at other end of shed) and this season we liked the atmosphere apart from last seasons trip when some scottish thingy started an argument with one of us because some old guy started on us when making our way round pitch at half time. You people might know him as the supporters club main man. The number of times our away support has been heavily outnumbered by the home chanting i've lost count but we still carry on and don't let it get to us. This included on a few occassions drummers.
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Post by ambersalamander on Nov 5, 2006 16:10:13 GMT
"Scottish thingy"? -thank you swear filter- I believe I know exactly who you mean, Stephen. That lot seem to like us for some reason, so we never get any trouble from them but I do know people from several different clubs in our league who have been extremely disappointed with the reception they've received there. Going back to Eastbourne though, I have to say that going there does give me a headache. I know that the drum lot do mean well- they are trying to create an atmosphere and make their presence known to show their team that they are behind them. They are supporters who make an effort to support their team and obviously enjoy doing so. However, it can be extremely irritating to those who don't feel the same way, or are simply a bit tired at the time! I always try to block it out by shouting very loudly in support of Sutton, but sometimes that doesn't work. Especially when Sutton aren't there at the time, because then I look silly as well Dave, I don't think it's fair to assume that just because people are using loud musical instruments, they don't know anything about non-league football! That lot have been there every time I've visited Priory Lane. But I can see what you're trying to say- you prefer an atmosphere where your fans and the oppo fans can actually hear each other's banter. Fair enough, and I'd agree with that. But I've always found that if you make the effort you can make yourself heard over the drums. And if you can't, then it doesn't make the perpetrators any less knowledgeable of non-league football: what IT is all about, as you say, is pure opinion on your part, even if it's an opinion most of us would agree with. I don't want to go back to Bromley because I find their fans AND stewards arrogant, obnoxious, rude, abusive and generally objectionable. But I don't think this necessarily means they know nothing about football! And, I fear, I WILL be going back I would not compare such behaviour to what I see as slightly over-zealous support that might irritate other people, which is what's going on at Eastbourne. I'm quite surprised that you feel so strongly about it, Dave (although I was also surprised by the strength of martello's response- cor that wound you up a bit didn't it?!) and I would certainly urge you to try and get to know the less noisy Eastbourne fans when you play them again, because then you might not let a bunch of silly noisy (but perfectly well behaved) people ruin your day. Eastbourne fans are nice I like them so much that I let one of them be my boyfriend ;D
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Post by Giggy of Telford on Nov 5, 2006 16:14:53 GMT
It seems to be that the average fan will sing/cheer louder at an away ground then when at home. Possibly because in a non-familiar environment they have to work harder to make their atmosphere. Clitheroe fans were very noisy when they came to the New Bucks Head a couple of seasons back.
Our trip to Burscough was a fine exapmle of this, often when we travel away our away support outnumbers the home fans. Burscough seemed to have a fire balance of home & away fans, was a nice ground, nice people but also the quietest fans I've ever heard (or in this case not heard.)
The Telford fans were singing their hearts about (for the lads) constantly, the Burscough fans made next to no noise at all, there was one disgruntled shout when we got a goal kick which they thought should have been a corner to them. Other than them they were silent, even when we invited them to sing (Burscough! Give us a song!...)
There was no real atmosphere at the beginning but we made our own atmosphere which if you do at an away ground turns the tables to make it seem like a home match for your team as they're the ones being cheered.
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Post by ambersalamander on Nov 5, 2006 16:15:57 GMT
Eastbourne are clearly the opposite Giggy! Their noise is mostly at home.
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Post by Giggy of Telford on Nov 5, 2006 16:29:49 GMT
We seem to be noiser away even with far less people following us away than we have at our home games everyone seems to be twice their volume when they go away and people who don't make much noise at the home games suddenly become as loud as everyone else.
At home games even with an average of over 1800 at home games and 2124 for the game against North Ferriby most of the noise comes from the centre of the stand we're attacking the goal infront of. A lot of these people travel to away games and drag everyone else into it in the progress.
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martello
Steaming Bovril
I used to be indecisive...now I'm not so sure...
Posts: 371
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Post by martello on Nov 5, 2006 16:36:19 GMT
Eastbourne are clearly the opposite Giggy! Their noise is mostly at home. Not true, certainly not at Oxford last season where the OUFC official match report says the noise inside the ground was mainly being made by the 703 visitors from the south coast. However I do wish we'd sing more and use the drums less but I don't have that much of a problem with the drums, the kids banging them enjoy it. And a lot of clubs at a higher level than Eastbourne's use them.
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Post by ambersalamander on Nov 5, 2006 18:09:29 GMT
Well you lot never make a noise at our ground Anyway, your example is highly biased- of course you're going to make more noise at a high-profile FA Cup game, whether it's at home or away, and if you're at the ground of a team in the League or one that everyone expects you to lose to, then you're going to make more noise than at home because the very fact that you've had the chance to visit that ground and you're watching EASTBOURNE BOROUGH at a FOOTBALL LEAGUE ground is exciting enough to make a hell of a lot more motivation for noisemaking. I've seen Eastbourne Borough play six times at home and twice away, and they've been much noisier at home, even when you take into account that one of the home games was FA Cup (which is surely cancelled out by the fact that one of the home games was against Thurrock )
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Post by malxscfc on Nov 5, 2006 21:57:41 GMT
My nephew used to have a Fisher-Price toy which had a drum and a bell on it. Now he's 5 though, he's grown out of it. Eastbourne away for me, too, was the most useless, soulless and pointless non-League experience to date. You can stick your f***ing drum up your b*m! What a waste of a day! And I don't mean the football, which was more than adequate. We enjoyed our time in the Town - the Buccaneer did us proud, complete with a Bar Billiards table, which is always good to see! The Taxi there was cheery, the Club Bar itself was excellent, with good facilities and friendly people having a chat to us. The Bar staff were the most professional and efficient we've met all year, without peers!! [The Pier was good, too! ] The Ground is fine, if lacking in Terracing, like ours and so many others at this level. But the interaction between our (say) 100+ fans and the (say) 600+ Boro fans was never allowed to take place, in the round. We enjoyed 5 seconds from a bloke near the end of the first half at a distance of 40 yards, and got a decent 10 minutes from a Downs Syndrome lad who had the guts and nous to come down near us, near the end of the game, [top boy, by the way! ] but ever else we were ALL drowned out by the flipping 10 year-olds with the poxy drums. That just killed off any atmosphere whatsoever. It was even worse than Eastleigh, or the Fiestas I've been to in Bolivian villages over the years..... We lost, clearly, in the last minutes of the game, and not unfairly since Boro made most of the running, and we sat back, and made too few attempts on their goal. Fair enough. But PLEASE shoot the drummers!! This weak performance thing is an annual problem with our lads - they always eye the big Cup games and our League form suffers - happened last year with the Trophy, so a defeat was not unexpected. Our lot have an eye on the FAC 2nd Round just now. Nice Club, nice people, tidy team, but for f*'s sake - and we're NOT over-reacting - those tw*ts with the drums completely ruined the 'fun' element of the game. Even if you're an Eastbourne fan you must get totally fed up with the incessant "bum, bum, bum" going on for 90 minutes every week. I can hire a pneumatic drill if I want tinnitus.... It's a terrible high-profile, tinny, tinpot anti-advert for your Club. It's the tiny minority ruling the roost, by simply trying to drown out the ones who have something to say. Even the Labour Party doesn't use drums in the House of Commons to drown out the discussion, and Gawd knows they use every other tactic to deflate the discussion! ;D Let the real fans get a word in edgeways in future, Eastbourne, please?
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Post by stretfordendling© on Nov 5, 2006 22:24:27 GMT
Can this all stop please? otherwise i might have to recruit Scott as an extra singer for us!!
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Post by frankiegth on Nov 6, 2006 19:06:08 GMT
Very emotive suject with some people, musical instuments in football grounds. ;D
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Post by ambersalamander on Nov 6, 2006 19:17:33 GMT
As he isn't on at the moment, I'd like to speak up on martello's behalf and point out that he does not stand at Borough games banging drums. Well, not when I'm there, anyway
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