There are a number of reasons that has brought about the erosion of our gate. I go back to Jimmy Hills days when as kids if you weren't in the ground by 1 o'clock for a 3-15 kick-off, you wouldn't be able to see. Of course there were big differences, paying on the gate, reasonably priced and we had success, but i'll tell you were it started to go wrong, when Jimmy Hill the then chairman decided to go all seater, not by building new stands but converting terraces, reducing our capacity from 35000 to 21000 including away fans, that made it a capacity of around 19000 home fans, having to sit when they wanted to stand and sitting in the open on a cold rainy November night, whilst Hill and his coherts sat in the posh seats drinking their sherbets. Fans stopped going and got out of the habit but of course turned up for the big games FA cup etc.
In all our Prem years the home capacity was only about 19000 and about 2000 of those seats were restricted viewing because of stancheons in the way hence a regular home gate of about 17000 not that bad. Move it all on a few years and we have what we now have, the poorly thought out move from HR to the Ricoh, poor team, little sign of improvement, shite owners who ideally don't want to be here, a con-man as c-e-o with a grinning geordie side-kick spouting yarns and bullshit basically taking the piss and it costs to a lot of people too much. Anyone on minimum wage has to decide if spending 10% of their weekly wage on a poorly performing club in dire straights is appropriate. Our hope, only hope really is success sustained on the pitch, i am sure would move gates forward 5000, still only about 17/18000 though. The club needs a boost from somewhere and a massive one at that. The writing is on the wall regards our very future.
