Pedro gets ready for another trip to the Reebok (from clurr, some rights reserved)

Will the Reebok Stadium be a lonely place for BWFC season ticket holders next season?

I wrote over a month ago about the rather vague positive news coming out of the club regarding season ticket sales this summer. The club seemed extremely keen to reassure fans that they wouldn’t be alone at the Reebok next season.

I was sceptical about the reports, mainly because Bwfc.co.uk claimed that fans had written in praise of the club’s season ticket pricing in their droves, but they failed to actually quote any of these cock-a-hoop fans. Nor did they make public the actual number of season tickets sold to that date.

Since then it’s all gone quiet on the season ticket front, except that is for a rumour on The Bolton News forum in which one fan claims to have heard sales are as low as 7,000.

Of course, there’s no source quite so unreliable as “some bloke on a forum”. It’s the web 2.0 version of “a mate of a mate who met some bloke in a pub” – and the person in question in this case doesn’t necessarily do their credibility any favours by calling himself ‘Pedro’.

But it does beg the question, why have we not been told how many season tickets have been sold? The figures being quoted would be a significant reduction on last season and would require several awkward questions to be answered:

• How do these sales figures compare with other, similar Premier League clubs?
• Given that the club slashed the prices, why are people staying away (credit crunch probably plays a part, but it’s hard not to assume the quality of football played under Gary Megson is just as big as the financial factor)?
• How does this impact on the club’s finances?
• Why has the lack of scheduled Sky TV coverage not encouraged more people to buy tickets, as predicted by commercial director Gareth Moores a few weeks ago (again, the Megson factor comes to mind)?

I’d be delighted to be told that the Reebok Stadium will not be a lonely place for Bolton Wanderers season ticket holders next season. I’d much prefer my team to be cheered on by a full house every week. But until we’re told exactly how many tickets have been sold, it’s hard not to listen to the likes of Pedro and other – probably not very well-informed – internet doom mongers. Let’s have some transparency and honesty for once.

Pedro ends his post by by laying down the gauntlet to his local paper to find out what’s really going on:

Now BN I challenge you to do the right thing and INVESTIGATE!

Given how readily The Bolton News churned out the original season ticket story with little thought for analysis or investigation, we won’t be holding our breath.

If you have any Pedro-esque insights of your own, feel free to comment below…

Image via Wikipedia

Feel free to republish your praise for Bolton Wanderers season ticket renewal schemes here

Bwfc.co.uk reported recently that “Bolton Wanderers supporters have given the ‘thumbs up’ to the club’s fantastic package of prices, which offers significant savings to ALL season ticket holders.”

In the report, the club website claimed that supporters had been full of praise for the season ticket prices.

All very positive, you might think. Except that for some reason the club didn’t actually quote any of these fans or provide their names in the report, meaning that we simply had to take their word for it.

So, where they failed, Manny Road will succeed. If you contacted Bolton Wanderers FC to compliment them on everything they have done to attract season ticket holders back the Reebok Stadium next season, feel free to repeat your praise in the comment box below so we can all read it.

Also, if we can have a head count for how many people have actually renewed their season tickets, that would be useful too because although the report says trade has been ‘brisk’, what is doesn’t say is what that actually means, i.e. how many people have actually bought a ticket?

Answers below please…