Boxing Day Attendance

Humpty said:
Maybe I’ve interpreted what you’re saying wrongly @HolgateCorner but I’ve lived in Headingley, Kirkstall, Chapel Allerton and Moortown. There is no doubt Rugby League is a very popular sport in Leeds, they love it, but Leeds is a football city first and foremost. In my experience they’re as mad about their football as any area of the north east; much to my annoyance might I add.
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Fair comment if you’ve lived there, when I lived there I just thought the football side was diluted by the rugby league following because they didn’t seem to support both.

I‘m not knocking Leeds United fans by the way but I do think it should be a much bigger club when you look at the population and catchment and I seemed to know a lot of rugby league followers, one was even a referee, compared to football watchers.

I had a spell in Kirkstall as well, my local pub was the Vesper Gate opposite the Abbey, good pint of Stones in there 👍
 
30,000 Boro fans = more home fans (or as many) as the Premier games at:

Brentford
Crystal Palace
Leicester
Southampton

and all of the English Football League except Sunderland.

Plus we are the most expensive club in the Championship, in one of the poorest regions of Western Europe. (according to Board experts)
 
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Gutted I cant be there to enjoy the atmosphere and hopefully the game.
Give my ticket away though so seat will be filled
 
Redwurzel said:
I am not an expert on the City of Leeds, but get the impression the middle class and lower middle class areas are into Rugby and Cricket. The clear working class areas are more into football. LUFC developed later than many other Northern Clubs, by 1900 many Northern Clubs were professional, but Leeds United had not been formed till 1919. The Revie years made Leeds a much wider supported team, with coaches regular going to games from Lincolnshire, all parts of Yorkshire, even South Wales. Most of the wider fans tend now to be in the 55-70 age group. Yorkshire is about 5.3 million people, more people than Scotland.
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This season is Leeds 53rd in the top flight....still 8 seasons behind a small club like us. Their 3 seasons in the 3rd tier is worse than us as well
 
HolgateCorner said:
Fair comment if you’ve lived there, when I lived there I just thought the football side was diluted by the rugby league following because they didn’t seem to support both.
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When I lived there in the 90s, only 1 person in an office of 60ish was a vocal Leeds fan. I never been to any town with such apathy about it's team
 
MU are not dissimilar to Leeds - when in Manchester (1980s) I would say there was more support for City, but MU got nearly double the crowds - over 50% of the MU support was coming in to games from areas outside Greater Manchester. Before 1958 I think MU were seen as the smaller Manchester club.

What seems to happening since the early 60s is a power drift to the Big City clubs.
 
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Redwurzel said:
30,000 Boro fans = more home fans (or as many) as the Premier games at:

Brentford
Crystal Palace
Leicester
Southampton

and all of the English Football League except Sunderland.

Plus we are the most expensive club in the Championship, in one of the poorest regions of Western Europe. (according to Board experts)
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It shows just how much a part of the fabric of life the football club is. I could sense the bond when I got off the train at Middlesbrough Station in 1978. If anything, its got stronger over the years through thick and thin.
 
The Town and Football club almost grew up together. That didn't happen in many other places. Places like Newcastle and Sunderland existed well before their football clubs.

Middlesbrough railway station must have been a little like Ellis Island (New York) in the 1860s - with very poor people carrying their life possessions as they came off the train, looking for work in a town of 100 new furnaces. They came from all over the UK and Ireland and were starting a new life. Supporting the local team helped give them a greater sense of (new) identity and bound different people together as one (although I sometime wonder reading some threads and posts on here :) ).
 
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