I wanted to write similar but you have expressed my sentiments exactly! Ipswich are a very strong team - our lads worked so hard - things didn’t go for us - must have been discouraging for Michael Duff and the team to see all those empty spaces!
There are always some people who choose to leave early to try and beat traffic or get earlier busses or trains. You don’t know where they have to get back to. Midweek games there are always more examples of this. The ones with younger kids tend to leave earlier and a lot more do it than in weekend games. Hardly surprising when it’s a school night and the game won’t finish until about twenty to ten. You don’t exactly want to queue in a load of traffic til well after ten pm then drive home with kids who need to get to bed. I’ve seen people leave after an hour or seventy mins for example. Being responsible, getting their kids home to bed at a reasonable time. Why should they miss the whole game by not coming at all? They’ve paid their money. I choose to not bring my youngest midweek. It’s not a ten minute jaunt home for us. She’s happy enough with that, she understands and she likes her bed and school so it doesn’t upset her. She’s ok coming to Saturday games. I only bring the fifteen year old boy midweek - and no we don’t leave early. If I did have the eight year old with us then we’d be leaving before the end of the game. I’ve to get back to donny. Will some fans have just gone in a huff because we were three nil down? Yeah probably. But don’t tar everyone with that brush. Besides, the time to stay back and show appreciation is a week on Sunday. I wouldn’t be too pleased with folk leaving that game early, but again some will. I do like these ‘better fan’ threads that pop up. If we are having a go at the ponty end fans for last night, a lot of them leaving early wouldn’t be where I’d start. Chucking bottles on to the pitch, singing the Leeds ira song (again) and the definitely not homophobic bilge that a small number gave to Christian Walton would though. There are idiots that frequent the ponty that will get this club into trouble. Furthermore they don’t care, they think it’s funny, as it’s all about them and they don’t actually really care about the football club as long as they can get tanked up (or worse) and show off with their little mates like Tommy ten men. I’m aware at least one of the bottles seems to have been chucked by a kid, so that doesn’t apply to them of course, but the repeated issues are coming from the same people in the same area of the stand.
Not necessarily hypocrisy, some may live many miles away and can't travel for a variety of reasons, some may be very financially challenged in these cost-of-living-crisis times, their opinion is no less valid for that.
For me there's something about building the relationship between the team and the fans. They gave it everything last night, the defeat certainly wasn't about a lack of effort or commitment. Imo they deserved being clapped off at the end last night and it felt important to me for them to know that we're still with them. I was thinking about whether it matters to the players as I was driving home. I think it does, we saw last season how a fracture between the team and the fans impacted performances and I think we've seen on occasion this season how it can spur them on to even greater efforts. When lots of people were leaving early I considered it for a moment but stayed because I felt it was important. And my journey home is a long one - the A38 was closed (again) south of Burton, meaning a 15 mile detour so my son and I didn't get home until just before midnight. This isn't intended to be a 'better fan' post, just my view on whether it matters.
I think your post is pathetic. I never leave because I can walk home in 40.mins or 10 mins in the car. There were 13,000 home fans giving their vocal support all game . No one booed the players or got on their backs even at 2-0 down. After the penalty save, there was another surge of belief. Once the third went in it was obviously game, set and match and that's when the exodus began With 17,000 fans departing the stadium, it was obvious there was going to be chaos so I dont begrudge any one leaving early. The show was over, most Barnsley fans wouldn't have got home before 11:00 on a school night.. Nor all fans are like you, cut them some slack. Look how many Wednesday fans were still in the stadium at the end of their 23 game run
I’d normally agree with sentiments like this, I fully understand people who can’t get to any or all games - but in fairness a fan who was not in attendance at all, whatever the reason for that is, having a go at someone who did attend and paid to do so, but left early (or straight away at the final whistle) and didn’t stay back to applaud the team - that very much is hypocrisy.
I stayed in till the final whistle - despite having a 10 minute walk to the car and what turned out to be an hour and a half journey home due to Woodhead being closed - because my 11 year old wouldnt let us go any earlier...
I don’t disagree with this - I stayed myself and applauded the team off. In fact me and my lad were just about the last two out of the far end of the east stand upper, our st’s are in the family stand and there weren’t many up there with us by the time we went. However there are reasons for this as I’ve already given and whilst I see the benefit of showing appreciation after games I’m not going to dig out those that don’t. I’m sure Duff and the players are clever enough to figure that out too so I’d hope they aren’t too put out by it. It was magnified last night by the fact that no or very few Ipswich fans had left - but that was hardly surprising given the situation and an extra five or ten minutes wouldn’t necessarily make much difference to them given how far they’d to travel. To be honest I’m just pleased none of the idiots stayed and booed them off. I’ve seen stranger things happen.
Well i shall be leaving just before the end after the Peterborough game to get back to Featherstone for the rugby, and i don't give a stuff what anyone thinks.
We always stay and applaud and yesterday I was half hoping to see Duff or Disco launch the ref at the end too but MD just gave the twit the most cursory of handshakes and came to applaud the fans. It's our choice to stay just as it is anyone else's to leave for whatever reason and circumstances that are relevant to them, nowt to do with me. Anyways the alternative is just an even longer wait in the car park, presumably last night's being even longer than usual due to having to wait for the ref to get his tractor started.
I once walked out of a London theatre production of A Streetcar Named Desire. I left at the interval because it was so crushingly bad that I couldn’t stand another minute of it. Tennessee Williams Bad Fan Alert!! I left on 85 minutes last night which is unusual for me, but it was for the same reasons as others have said. My usual hour-long drive was a bit longer because of an M1 closure north of Leeds so it was well after 11 when I arrived. It was horrible hearing the whooping and screaming coming from the ground as I went up Oakwell Lane. It was a decent game but I wish I’d stayed at home on a cold night, like many others did, watching on iFollow.
I agree with your first sentence, I sit in in East lower and there are people (same people every week) that leave at the same time every week,some of the older end who are obviously going so as not to get caught in the crush (my mates one of them) others have kids, some to catch buses, trains etc. I have no problem with that, totally understandable but last night the ponty was three quarters empty when Duff went to clap the fans, probably the east stand was as bad but I couldn't see from my seat. A lot of those fans that went early would have stopped if we had been 3-0 up, those are the ones I'm talking about. AS for you'r last paragraph, once again I agree, if I put in print what I think about them I would be banned, they need weeding out and banned for life, nothing but scum that spoil it for everyone. Just to clarify this isn't a better fan than you thread cos I ain't better than anyone else either as a fan or a human being, my original thread was born out of frustration at seeing Duff clapping a three quarter empty Ponty end. Sorry if that upsets people.
It still doesn"t matter if they are living on the moon, anyone who was not at Oakwell should not be having a pop at anyone who was there & chose to leave before the final whistle for whatever reason , its the same when those who do not attend for what ever reason & then watch on the t.v & then bang on about how sparse the crowd looks , its hypocrisy .
Not feeling this, having a dig at fans for leaving the game. All kinds of reasons why people choose to leave early. Their choice really. By and large our fans have been outstanding this season. Don't think they need to justify themselves tbh.
