Saints Finish 2011 With Double Pompey's Average Attendance
The fans of the Championships 18th Best supported club will be distraught.
After yet another virtually full house at St Mary's with just about the only empty seats being in the away section or corporate areas, Saints finish the year with an average attendance that is just about double that of our near neighbours at Fratton Park.
The average at St mary's so far is 25,744, only bettered by West Ham with 29,430, in third place is Derby County with 23,961 closely followed by Leicester City on 23.476, fifth is Leeds United who have 23,409 on average, after that only Nottingham Forest, Cardiff and Brighton (just) have avaerage gates over the 20k mark.
The self proclaimed "Best fans in the World" are sitting in 18th place in the championship, with 12,881, as near as dammit to half the number who attend St Mary's, this is well behind Bristol City, Burnley and even rock bottom Coventry City, the Sky Blues showing that adversity is no excuse for abandoning your team.
Indeed if we take all 92 League Clubs, Pompey lie 42nd in the attendance stakes, whilst Saints lie 14th , with eight Premiership clubs with a smaller average than ourselves. a tremedous achievement.
This is all great news for Saints and hopefully the figures will only get better, certainly after the win against Palace the team deserve another full house for the visit of Bristol City even though its on a Friday evening.
What to read next:
Southampton V Birmingham City The PreviewA big game for both clubs, to kick off a big week for Saints who really need to keep winning if they are to mount a genuine push for the play offs, but there is good news pre match and Saints should have a strong squad out.
Southampton On Verge Of Managerial Appointment Saints could announce the appointment of a new manager as early as 9am Friday morning, although reports suggest that there are a few things to iron out before the announcement is made, will the press conference this morning be that announcement or just the normal pre match briefing.
Southampton At Millwall The VerdictSaints fell to their first defeat under Tonda Eckert at Millwall, in a game where they never really got going and looked to have fought for a hard earned point until with just about the last win of the game the home side scored a winner.
Southampton At Millwall The PreviewSaints travel to South East London for the second time in a week hoping for a repeat of the performance at Charlton Athletic, but Millwall who will start the weekend in 4th place will be a tougher challenge than any of our 4 wins in a row so far.
German Club Considering Raiding SouthamptonWith the transfer window about to open in a months time, the season for speculation is starting, the latest reports from Germany suggest that one Bundesliga club has identified someone at St Mary's.
A Rough Guide To MillwallIt was late drama in our last visit in a competitive game two years ago and a bit chaotic afterwards due to issues with the trains between London Bridge & South Bermondsey, hopefully there will be no such issues this time around.
Southampton V Leicester City The VerdictIt was 4 in a row for Tonda Eckert & his Saints side, another polished performance that pushed us up to 11th but more importantly to the fringes of the play off spots, posing the question how a team and it's players who were so poor just 3 weeks or so ago can be so different now.