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The cost of attending games - An analysis with europe
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 1:28 amby Dalglish
Hi Guys , I'm not sure how many of us actually attend games Live and pay to watch the Reds but recently was listening to a programme on 5 Live which compared the cost of attaending games in England to those games around Europe and thought it made for interesting comparison.
In GERMANY Bayern Munich home games cost 10 Euro's (Thats about £7)
In France it will cost you 12 Euro's to watch the current league leaders Lyon
In Italy it costs 23 Euro's to see a Juventus League game.
In Spain the current leaders Barcelona will set you back 33 Euro's (about £23)
Tomorrow I'll be picking tickets up for the forthcoming Away game at Birmingham and tickets are priced at £35 Each !
On my travels this season it's cost me £38 to watch Liverpool at Bolton £31 at Blackburn and a mere £23 to watch them against Aston Villa. More recently it cost £32 at Southampton's new ground and £17 to watch the reds play Burnley in the FA Cup.
Why the disparity betwen games ? And also at Bolton and Birmingham they have a tiiered system where they charge more or less depending on who their opposition are.(Apparrently it's £45 at Brum when they play United 
)
How long are fans going to be able to sustain these prce hikes and where is the next generation of fans coming from ?
Liverpool claim to have various incentives to attract new fans and to be fair their Season ticket prices are amoungst one of the cheapest in the Premier League but how can Crystal Palace justify charging £18 for a Division 1 game last season, do absolutly nothing to the ground or the facilities and charge £35 this season !!!!!!
Taking into account inflation and the move to all seater stadium as a reccommendation of the Taylor report post Hillsborough it's apparrent that ticket prices have saored by on average 500 % !!!!!! Even house prices in the last 15 years have only increased in value by 150% so whats happening to football and how can the clubs go on justifying these increases when the rest of Europe source a lot of their revenue elsewhere ?
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 1:56 amby 109-1105722616
i know a few lads who have got season tickets and attend most aways, and following the reds if you include your ale must run into thousands. my mate reckons each away costs him 80 to 100 quid. another fella i know was telling me that he paid around 9 quid for a cup final ticket about 16 years ago, i didnt believe him, think i owe him an apology
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 2:12 amby Dalglish
Hi Mark, the cost of the 1989 Semi Final was £9 (I know cos sadly I was there). Subsequent to that the Taylor report reccommended all seater stadium but within that report Judge Taylor estimated that the cost could stil be amaintinaed around the £10. Even taking into account inflation which throughout the 90's has been quite low the "REAL" price at this present time should be around £18
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 4:29 amby Scottbot
Football was once the working man's game but those days are long gone with the sport becoming so fashionable over the past ten years. Media hype has snowballed, the top players are put up on pedestals like gods and treated like movie stars.
The Taylor Report had an impact in that clubs were able to attract more affluent (and less passionate?) fans with the introduction of all-seater stadia + the Sky boom in the early nineties & the eradication of hooliganism also contributed. All the TV money coming into the game meant the rewards for success became far greater so clubs were willing to pay ever increasing transfer fees & wages in pursuit of titles. Of course it is the supporters who ultimately foot the bill with ticket prices, kit & merchandise prices going through the roof. I'd imagine ticket prices in this country have risen at a similar rate to the players wages.
Funny how it's a cliche to say 'the fans pay the players wages' but that is exactly how it is.
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 5:56 amby supersub
Dalglish you have started a very interesting thread and stolen a bit of my thunder,so too speak.A comment made before xmas caught my attention and me being the keeper of all things,I delved into my box of ticket stubs.I was in the middle of doing a piece on price hikes and exploitation when the stork arrived and sadly it has been shelved.What I will do is post a list of games/dates and prices so younger members can see how my generation were given every oppurtunity to travel the country watching the glory years.
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 7:29 amby azriahmad
Congratulations, supersub, if I caught your drift correctly! Always hectic when there is a newborn in the house and they become fun (really fun to be around) by the time they can walk steadily and follow you around. My youngest one will go with me to the ends of this world until recently when her elder siblings would persuade her not to follow me.
I am overseas (not in England) and the last game I attended was Norwich-Liverpool at Carrow Road in 1990, and it was something like £7 or £8 (I can't exactly remember but less than £10 as we were in the stands, not seats).
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 11:19 amby Woollyback
When I lived in Liverpool 1989-1994 I used to go to probably half to 2 thirds of home games and even at the end of the 93-94 season I was paying I think £8.50 to get on The Kop. Even for the "last stand" on The Kop I only paid £10.50 I think.
That's only 10 and a half years ago.
People are often heard lamenting about how the price of cigs, booze, houses, petrol etc has rocketed way ahead of inflation in the last 10 years but the way footy prices have gone up is startling. Cigs, booze & petrol have all gone up artificially through taxation, houses have gone up cos they're in short supply compared to the number of buyers but football has just been a victim of market forces. Scottbot sums it up pretty well, the game has become "gentrified" to an extent but also Blair's vision of England all becoming middle class is becoming more evident - the so-called "working classes" are more likely than ever to be driving newer cars and living in bigger houses as people's aspirations and expectations rise. When aspirations & expectations rise the so, sadly, do prices.
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 12:32 pmby 109-1105722616
i notice at the game that there are loads of families there(plus it ruins the atmosphere and you cant enjoy the match cos the cnuts keep making trips to the teabar.) its costs too much nowadays anyway for a lot of people. im only 19 so i cant remember the days of cheap entry to games. been to a few but ive resided to having to get a job as a steward( and no im not dapioneer nor do i know of him)
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 3:23 pmby stmichael
good thread this and it's no surprise that a lot of supporters are getting priced out of football these days. last season i had to pay £40 for a ticket for our away game at birmingham. fortunately we won 3-0 and the trip was worth it but the increased pricing is getting out of hand. a lot of clubs offer reduced prices for cup games but the stadiums are still not full.
just be glad we're not chelsea fans. 
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 3:51 pmby Rafa
I'm a student and I pay £530 for my season ticket in the Upper Cent, I'm trying to move to The Kop one for a better atmosphere (if any) and also to lower the price of my season ticket to just below £500.
My season ticket went up £35 from last year, the reason behind that I still do not know, but soon I think the attendances at Anfield will drop becuase people simply cannot afford to watch Liverpool week in and week out.
Take FC Haka, Champuons League qualifier match, my ticket cost £17, and the attendance was 44,000+ or there abouts. The next game think it was Monaco the ticket prices went up to the usual price and the crowd was below 35,000. Correct me if im wrong on that.
Liverpool have stupidly high ticket prices and don't even offer student discount 
But as stmichael said lets be thankful we aint got Chelsea prices £1000 for a season ticket, HA. If Liverpool charged that much I would be waving goodbye to my season ticket as I would be priced out. Not too sure how much i'll have to check when I get home but im sure I paid £60 for my ticket to Chelsea last year. Plus transfer, food and booze the price of the trip cost a stupid amount of roughly £120, good job we f'in won!
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 4:05 pmby stmichael
Rafa wrote:But as stmichael said lets be thankful we aint got Chelsea prices £1000 for a season ticket, HA. If Liverpool charged that much I would be waving goodbye to my season ticket as I would be priced out. Not too sure how much i'll have to check when I get home but im sure I paid £60 for my ticket to Chelsea last year. Plus transfer, food and booze the price of the trip cost a stupid amount of roughly £120, good job we f'in won!
true story
a mate of mine once paid £8 for fish and chips in chelsea village before we played them down there.
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 4:30 pmby Rafa
Thats just stupid that! £8 lol, thats why I always make a packed lunch for myself when I go down south
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 4:38 pmby 84-1106852058
marklfc wrote:i notice at the game that there are loads of families there(plus it ruins the atmosphere and you cant enjoy the match cos the cnuts keep making trips to the teabar.) its costs too much nowadays anyway for a lot of people. im only 19 so i cant remember the days of cheap entry to games. been to a few but ive resided to having to get a job as a steward( and no im not dapioneer nor do i know of him)
Sorry kids at the match spoil your enjoyment.these kids are our future season ticket holders putting money into the club.As prices are so high parents take kids to the match as a special treat birthdays etc.I was lucky my dad took me every week.I know what you mean though it does my head in when I go for a pint and 19 year olds are a pain in the ar.e.
Posted:
Fri Feb 04, 2005 7:03 pmby Woollyback
Kids at the game are a pain in the a*se, coming from a 19 year old
lmfao
