WHO IS TO BLAME

[gp543]

Neither - the owner, CEO and his team of marketeers for creating the 'matchday experience'

I don't wish to defend the *word censored* in charge of our club, but this is surely not exclusive to Arsenal. I'd love to know where it began. My guess would be United or Chelsea, where they built a hotel attached to the ground.

[Dodgyknee71]

[Dodgyknee71]

I blame all those match day supporters, season ticket holders, tourists..... The ones who buy fanzines like oh oops the gooner for instance, blah blah blah I mean does the gooner object to these irks buying there fanzine?

I mean seriously this blaming all season ticket holders is getting beyond a joke. At least 500 of us left from the 70,s & 80's still try I think we all know where the blame really lies,

i much prefer the away games for Arsenal support but that's never changed since I've been following the Arsenal ..... But come on nothing's different from Highbury, which was known as the library in the later years well since sky TVs got involved etc etc, I mean even winning the league at home was nothing like anfield, old Trafford, the swamp ....

[Dodgyknee71]

Neither - the owner, CEO and his team of marketeers for creating the 'matchday experience'

I don't wish to defend the *word censored* in charge of our club, but this is surely not exclusive to Arsenal. I'd love to know where it began. My guess would be United or Chelsea, where they built a hotel attached to the ground.

bore off tourist boy

[Chippy]

Neither - the owner, CEO and his team of marketeers for creating the 'matchday experience'

I don't wish to defend the *word censored* in charge of our club, but this is surely not exclusive to Arsenal. I'd love to know where it began. My guess would be United or Chelsea, where they built a hotel attached to the ground.

bore off tourist boy

That was unnecessary.

[Dodgyknee71]

Neither - the owner, CEO and his team of marketeers for creating the 'matchday experience'

I don't wish to defend the *word censored* in charge of our club, but this is surely not exclusive to Arsenal. I'd love to know where it began. My guess would be United or Chelsea, where they built a hotel attached to the ground.

bore off tourist boy

That was unnecessary.

Remind me to give a fuck eh

[DB10GOONER]

The answer is in the question.

By numerical comparison alone, it has to be the season ticket holders/regulars. I would estimate that there are no more than 2000-3000 pure "tourists" (i.e. coming from outside Britain/Ireland) each match. That's barely 5% of the ground.

How do we fix it? Friendlier stewarding and the introduction of rail seating are two ways. The squad could also help by winning more than two home matches since March.

TBH those overseas tourists aren't the problem, because as you say, they are a minority. It's not just the Asian daytripper or the Norwegian supporters clubs to blame. The problem is there are a huge number of tourist fans from Britain/Oireland (and especially London) that are "pure tourist" too. There are Londoners that view a day at the football on a par with a day at the cricket or a day at the rugby - it's a trendy day out that they can brag about at work but that they don't emotionally engage with. I have work colleagues here in Dublin that would have gone a couple times a year to see Manure when they were successful, then went a couple times to us, then it was the chav, now it's Citeh.

And tbh, that is their right. We can't force them to love the club obsessively. It's just sickening for us genuine fans that have been going for 10 or 20 or 30 years to be priced out in many cases - all so the club can entertain these tourist customers.

Also, let's not forget that even in the "good old days" Highbury was not called The Library for nothing. Arsenal fans are, in general, quietish. It takes a bit to get our lot going. But when we do, it can be magical. We've all been at huge games at Highbury and the place was rocking. Then you would go the following week and nothing.

[Herd]

Actually since I have 2 tickets there are 39,999 Season ticket Holders !
Im struggling to offload them for Sunday ,now thats a laugh !

[gp543]

On a tangent, let me ask this then:

How can foreign (outside of UK/Ireland) fans improve their reputation? Does it come down solely to behavior at matches or is it something more systematic?

There may be a varying scale to this as there are foreign fans that come once (largely from Asia/Middle East) and never again, but there are many people here from North America who try to make a trip each year.

Will the systematic bias (which is sometimes justified thanks to those who raid the club shop or film all 90 mins on their iPad) ever be changed?

Speaking personally, I find it difficult to toe the line between being a foreigner yet fully integrating into local fans. A situation along the lines of: "well yeah, you're here with us in this shit student uni bar on a freezing December morning in Stoke but since you're an American, we're going to treat you differently".

I don't want to sound like I'm casting dispersions on our entire fanbase, that's not my intention. The hospitality and friendship of those I've met on away days at Palace, Stoke, Orient, Munich etc. has been incredible and could not be more unlike people here in the States. Simply trying to understand how the gap can be bridged.

And if there's no interest in bridging it, understood and respected.

[Chippy]

On a tangent, let me ask this then:

How can foreign (outside of UK/Ireland) fans improve their reputation? Does it come down solely to behavior at matches or is it something more systematic?

There may be a varying scale to this as there are foreign fans that come once (largely from Asia/Middle East) and never again, but there are many people here from North America who try to make a trip each year.

Will the systematic bias (which is sometimes justified thanks to those who raid the club shop or film all 90 mins on their iPad) ever be changed?

Speaking personally, I find it difficult to toe the line between being a foreigner yet fully integrating into local fans. A situation along the lines of: "well yeah, you're here with us in this shit student uni bar on a freezing December morning in Stoke but since you're an American, we're going to treat you differently".


I don't want to sound like I'm casting dispersions on our entire fanbase, that's not my intention. The hospitality and friendship of those I've met on away days at Palace, Stoke, Orient, Munich etc. has been incredible and could not be more unlike people here in the States. Simply trying to understand how the gap can be bridged.

And if there's no interest in bridging it, understood and respected.

Seriously old chap, don't listen to the knobs. If you support the Arsenal and travel thousands of my miles to support the team, you are a gooner and deserve probably more respect than those who travel 2 stops on the tube.

[Chippy]

On a tangent, let me ask this then:

How can foreign (outside of UK/Ireland) fans improve their reputation? Does it come down solely to behavior at matches or is it something more systematic?

There may be a varying scale to this as there are foreign fans that come once (largely from Asia/Middle East) and never again, but there are many people here from North America who try to make a trip each year.

Will the systematic bias (which is sometimes justified thanks to those who raid the club shop or film all 90 mins on their iPad) ever be changed?

Speaking personally, I find it difficult to toe the line between being a foreigner yet fully integrating into local fans. A situation along the lines of: "well yeah, you're here with us in this shit student uni bar on a freezing December morning in Stoke but since you're an American, we're going to treat you differently".


I don't want to sound like I'm casting dispersions on our entire fanbase, that's not my intention. The hospitality and friendship of those I've met on away days at Palace, Stoke, Orient, Munich etc. has been incredible and could not be more unlike people here in the States. Simply trying to understand how the gap can be bridged.

And if there's no interest in bridging it, understood and respected.

Seriously old chap, don't listen to the knobs. If you support the Arsenal and travel thousands of my miles to support the team, you are a gooner and deserve probably more respect than those who travel 2 stops on the tube.

[Ed Hunter The Gooner]

On a tangent, let me ask this then:

How can foreign (outside of UK/Ireland) fans improve their reputation? Does it come down solely to behavior at matches or is it something more systematic?

There may be a varying scale to this as there are foreign fans that come once (largely from Asia/Middle East) and never again, but there are many people here from North America who try to make a trip each year.

Will the systematic bias (which is sometimes justified thanks to those who raid the club shop or film all 90 mins on their iPad) ever be changed?

Speaking personally, I find it difficult to toe the line between being a foreigner yet fully integrating into local fans. A situation along the lines of: "well yeah, you're here with us in this shit student uni bar on a freezing December morning in Stoke but since you're an American, we're going to treat you differently".


I don't want to sound like I'm casting dispersions on our entire fanbase, that's not my intention. The hospitality and friendship of those I've met on away days at Palace, Stoke, Orient, Munich etc. has been incredible and could not be more unlike people here in the States. Simply trying to understand how the gap can be bridged.

And if there's no interest in bridging it, understood and respected.

Seriously old chap, don't listen to the knobs. If you support the Arsenal and travel thousands of my miles to support the team, you are a gooner and deserve probably more respect than those who travel 2 stops on the tube.

Spot on! It's absurd to blame the tourists. For most of them going to Emirates is a once in a life time experience so what do you expect them to do? Booing to the team or the manager? They are the minority anyway, especially in away matches.

[OneBardGooner]

Third option; BOTH.

4th Option Wenger

[g88ner]

who is to blame for the shit atmoshere at the arsenal, the football tourist or the 40000 season ticket holders who sit in silence

All seater stadiums. All grounds are quiet in the Premier League for all but the biggest games.