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What's the most Grecians have taken away ?

Oldsmobile-88

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In RaWZ we trust....Amen.
I wrote an article about this for Some Sunny Day a while back. Many more people travel.

As for the visit to Torquay on 8 April 1977, I was there and the away end was certainly jam-packed, but the total attendance was 'only' 8,171 and I'm not sure if we made up a quarter of the crowd. We'll probably never know!
Torquay were averaging about 2,700 that season.Even allowing for the interest in a local derby & it being a Good Friday KO.There must have been a large % of Grecians at Plainmoor.
No official away end as such in those days,every one was scattered around iirc.
The Torquay home Mini Kop(the end that rivals always ‘took’)was packed with Grecians by 2.30pm.
I remember when Alan Beer scored it seemed like a home game with fans celebrating on all 4 sides.

I would be interested to read your article on the number of fans travelling to away games(the demographic is certainly different now) that was in SSD.

Any chance of posting it on the Memories sub forum ? ?
 

Tim Long

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I remember going to Port Vale once back in the 80s..there was only about 5 or 6 of us in the away end that day the Police put us all in the back of one of there vans and taxied us back to the station.
This is going to get a like from most of those who were there... Lowest I can remember on an away end was five at Hull once. Usually there were a few in the stand too though.
 

Jason H

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This is going to get a like from most of those who were there... Lowest I can remember on an away end was five at Hull once. Usually there were a few in the stand too though.
Lowest I've been a part of that I can recall was the 74 at Grays on a Monday night, live on Sky, a week or so after we'd been there in the FA Trophy and with promotion mathematically impossible.

I remember in 96/97 passing a car on the M5 with a Hartlepool scarf on the rear parcel shelf and four people on board. That turned out to be the sum total of the away support.
 

LOG

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I would be interested to read your article on the number of fans travelling to away games(the demographic is certainly different now) that was in SSD.

Any chance of posting it on the Memories sub forum ? ?
If euro's happy to have it put on there but doesn't have a copy i've still got it.
 

Tim Long

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This is going to get a like from most of those who were there... Lowest I can remember on an away end was five at Hull once. Usually there were a few in the stand too though.
Oh, and five at Donny on a Friday night. Two of the others were my brothers.
 

LOG

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Here's the article. I've had to play with the formatting so apologies if it comes out a bit wonky. I'll leave it here as i wasn't sure where to put it on the Memories forum but feel free to move it:

Gazing over the heaving masses at the Anfield Road end during our Cup replay with Liverpool led me to look into the other great City migrations over the years. I took 2,000 travelling fans as a starting point and expected some key games from the distant past to feature comfortably. The promotion party at Lincoln in 1990? No, only 1,500 there, although admittedly this was according to the Express & Error. The “last ever” City game at Northampton in 1995? No, just over a 1,000 City there according to the Northampton Chronicle on the following Monday. Funny how the memory plays tricks on you.

So what were the biggest turnouts of City fans on tour? Well, comfortably out in front was our first appearance at Wembley in the play-off final in May 2007: 30,000 fans – or maybe I should say 30,000 people bought tickets in the City end. The combination of circumstances means that we will surely never see a City away following like that again. The play-off final the following year bought
rather fewer tourists, with 19,650 City there.

After that we come to the Cup games against the First Division/Premiershit teams. The top one, of course, is the Manchester United game that saved the club in 2005. I’ve found two figures quoted here: 12,000 and 9,000. Either way, it stays at the number three spot. After that comes a series of other Cup games against showbiz opponents:

7 Mar 1981 Tottenham (FAC6) 7,500
20 Jan 2016 Liverpool (FAC3R) 6,400
4 Jan 2003 Charlton (FAC3) 3,000
30 Oct 1979 Liverpool (LC4) 3,000

It’s only in 8th place that we get to get our first League games, all famous occasions for one reason or another:

2 May 2009 Rotherham United (L2) 2,454
11 Dec 2010 Plymouth Argyle (L1) 2,230
8 Aug 2008 Leeds United (L1) 2,108

What surprised me was that for some of the mega Cup games of yesteryear, the City turnout was actually pretty modest by today’s standards:

5 Jan 1986 Everton (FAC3) 2,000
21 Dec 1999 Everton (FAC3R) 2,000
14 Feb 1981 Newcastle (FAC5) 2,000

For a couple of other games (Liverpool for the League Cup 2nd round 1st leg and Leicester City in the FA Cup 4th round, both in 1981), I couldn’t find stats for the City following. However, the total crowds for these games were 11,478 and 15,268 respectively and as I recall the City following was noisy at both, but certainly did not appear big in relation to the home support. I doubt that either of those topped the 2,000 mark.

Perhaps I missed off a few games, but it does seem that improvements in travel logistics, increased disposable income and the availability of the internet to buy tickets and make arrangements all seem to have conspired to make City on tour outings bigger affairs these days than they were in the past.

I’ve attended most of the above games myself and it certainly was impressive to see such an army on the march. The stadiums are often magnificent and there is a sense of occasion but, speaking personally, give me a thousand hardcore City fans at Crawley or Pompey any day!

Note: * All figures are based on contemporary press clippings or records kept at the time from official sources.
 
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Oldsmobile-88

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In RaWZ we trust....Amen.
Oh, and five at Donny on a Friday night. Two of the others were my brothers.
Beats my 7 at Colchester 😎....Loads at Darlington for the midweeker in 87/88 by comparison.13 on the minibus.You were on that one Tim.
In fact I think I can name most of them 😁
 

Grecian2K

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"What's the most Grecians have taken away?"
Sadly sometimes during the worst of the last 60 years I've supported us "the will to live"
(Mind you, it does at least make the periodic golden eras that much more delicious!)
 

Tim Long

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Beats my 7 at Colchester 😎....Loads at Darlington for the midweeker in 87/88 by comparison.13 on the minibus.You were on that one Tim.
In fact I think I can name most of them 😁
Had it in my head it was 14. Mitch getting shit from everyone for saying that he had to be back in time for his paper round. Stuck in a corner under a floodlight pylon because they didn't think anybody was coming from Exeter. Each of us trying to sing like ten men. I couldn't speak the following day. Had to sing for the Darlo fans too as they were very quiet even when they scored.
 

Grecian2K

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What about THAT legendary fight back at Barnsley all those years ago (in our 76-77 promo season)

I'm sure that I read once that the actual number could be counted on the fingers of one hand but the claimed number seems to have increased exponentially with each passing year until even the combined capacities of Old Trafford, Wembley and the Nou Camp would not have been sufficient to contain the vast throng that have subsequently claimed "I WUZ THERE"
(Perhaps our old friend Sturtz can clarify here - after all, as far as I recall, he actually was there!)
 
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