It's nothing like having the FA Cup final at Blackpool. You should stay off the grog this early in the morning ;-)
Its looking like The Jest or Smurfs wont be in the Grand final. The way the crowds have been this season, we will be doing well to fill bluetongue for a game with an interstate rival. If its in Sydney, there will be reduced Mariners crowd and many more neutrals.
Lets just say we get 30,000 (unlikely), thats only 2/3 of the 45,000 capacity. Way to take the passion out of the game and strike another blow to the Central Coast faithful. It also fails to take an opportunity to generate significantly increased interest in the game on the coast. I have no doubt a packed bluetongue for a grand final would be a boon for memberships the following year.
A couple of points:
1) If we're not even confident of filling Bluetongue for the GF, that's a very good argument for having it elsewhere, even though many spectators would not be core Mariners fans.
2) I reckon FFA will take the view that inspiring a (currently uninterested) big market like Sydney through hosting a GF would be more attractive than inspiring a (partly interested) small market like the Coast. And that's even if Sydney FC aren't in it.
3) If it was at Bluetongue, I would expect that after all sponsor and other commitments are met, there would be about 5K tickets for sale for each Club (wild guess), and the cost of those tickets would be high to recoup the losses of playing in a small stadium. As we have around 7K per game, I'm not convinced that it is a good idea to lock at least 2K of our core support out of attending the GF.
4) I definitely take your point about taking the 'passion out of the game' by having a crowd with neutrals, if you mean by this the crowd atmosphere, not the passion of the players. I attended the World Cup Final in the US in '94, and atmosphere-wise it was rather subdued compared to something like our own Aussies v Uruguay qualifier in '05. But as per the point above, you can expect that any GF in a small stadium will have a higher percentage of neutrals as there are less tickets available for locals.
5) After a season on top of the table and a whisker away from the Premiership, and the Major Semi to come, I doubt a single Grand Final game in Gosford would do all that much for those stay-aways that have yet to get the message that our Club is worth following.
6) Is there any premier comp in the world where a provincial team with a small stadium gets to host the final rather than it being held in the national or major regional stadium?
7) If Brisbane did not qualify for the GF, holding it in Suncorp would indeed be ridiculous. I'm assuming MM meant Suncorp only should it be a repeat of last season - us v Roar.
8) From an absolute purest's point of view, yes, we SHOULD host the game should we qualify first. Sadly there is nothing pure about football politics and practicalities.
9) If we could get Bluetongue to add two tiers at the north and south end to raise our capacity and make it an all enclosed arena, maybe we would be in with a chance. Dreaming I know!
