- May 23, 2016
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When you move to the country or city your sense of distance changes, lol. Like I lived in a town 3 hours from Perth, the nearest town was 30 km away and it just seemed like a few suburbs away..
Ballarat - failure
- Thread starter Bunk Moreland
- Start date
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When you move to the country or city your sense of distance changes, lol. Like I lived in a town 3 hours from Perth, the nearest town was 30 km away and it just seemed like a few suburbs away..
A four hour drive is something you do on a Friday afternoon after work. Then you drive back Sunday night
So YOUR HAPPY FOR THE ANZAC DAY GANE TO BE played in Wagga Wagga or say sale
Or .....maybe lorne
Teen Wolf
Norm Smith Medallist
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6,450? Almost twice the size of the Round 1 match in Cairns!
Because the home team wanted to play at their home ground and the AFL said okay.
chiwigi
I’ll make tears from your Wines.
It's annoying) and Hombsch's record shows that Port are usually the team moved, but its far better than when we used to have to play in Darwin and lose a game at the MCG. Also, if a team is willing to give up playing undercover at Etihad to play in the hail at Ballarat, we'd be daft not to!
The Bulldogs are being pro-active in building their support base! It's usually the same people complaining about 'small clubs' that complain when they do something to improve it.
Getting there but still room for improvement. No reason whatsoever for general admission on the hill to be accessible for Dogs members to scan in on the day without having to reserve a ticket and line Ticketmaster's pockets. And ticket pricing for reserved seats in the stands is still too high for Dogs reserve seat members, who need to stump up even more money for a reserved seat away from Etihad.
In the embryonic stages of the relationship, you need to generate packed houses rather than gouge existing members even more.
On a side note, one day it would also be nice for a train station to be built near the corner of Howitt St and Creswick Rd (about 400m from the ground) - there's plenty of crown land around that area available to build for a 'Showgrounds' train station, and I suspect there would be quite some demand for it too from the locals. I think this is far more important than building light towers at the ground - night matches in Ballarat are an absurd prospect.
ManOfClay
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just typical north supporter chip on the shoulder rubbish. Baseless crap.
simba_
sucking a lemon
what kind of fool expected 25,000 human beings to a game in the freezing cold in Ballarat Victoria?
Not even 2 years later, back at the low ebb.
because the Dogs are the club with the relationship with Ballarat.
real question is why wasn't this scheduled between Dogs & Saints, or North or Carlton or Essendon (though we wouldn't turn up).
If anything can be said of North Melbourne's involvement with Ballarat they actively engaged the town.
They would arrive a few days early. Do clinics throughout the town at multiple venues. Sessions carried out at local Aquatic Centre.
They were highly visible and the town responded very positively in return. The same cannot be said for the Bulldogs involvement.
Same. My brother has visited me twice in 10 years.
Was just a really, really stupid idea. 3pm. On a Sunday. Depths of winter. I mean, come on AFL! How was that in any way a good idea?
- Oct 30, 2014
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I went both times this year. It was a $25 ticket the first time and a $54 family ticket the other day. I had a great time both days. The win in the sun was obviously more fun than losing in the arctic conditions but both games had a really great buzz/atmosphere about them that was different to a stock standard Etihad game. I was so close to the action both games. Lots of fun banter in the outer that was good natured between both sets of fans. Life is too short to miss these different events that are so easily accessible.
But this is also about the Ballarat people, do they want AFL in their town? They probably don’t barrack for either team but it’s AFL footy in backyard. I hope they want to come and experience it.
I personally love Ballarat, I live in Geelong, it’s an hour away, same as Etihad. I like going there.
But this is also about the Ballarat people, do they want AFL in their town? They probably don’t barrack for either team but it’s AFL footy in backyard. I hope they want to come and experience it.
I personally love Ballarat, I live in Geelong, it’s an hour away, same as Etihad. I like going there.
- Aug 2, 2007
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Given the ground doesn't hold even half of that, I'm going to say the answer to your question is no one.
- Thread starter
- #169
Good post. I think people enjoy that sort of event but really, probably get it at local footy and enjoy it. You’re close to the play, there’s banter and all that... of course the crowd isn’t as big, though that doesn’t matter too much if they’re packed into one area. And you may actually be a supporter of the club playing.
I think it’s probably a bit arrogant of the AFL to think they can just drop a game anywhere and people will flock to it. Of course it’s the highest level, but if you don’t support either club, perhaps many prefer their local club.
As a Ballarat raised NM supporter, i attended Sunday which was my first time out of the three AFL games that have been scheduled there.
I believe that the AFL in Ballarat can be pretty successful, but they need to pay a bit more attention to how to make it so. A few points :
The ground and facilities itself are actually exceptional and a terrific place to watch it. IMO it'd be a magic venue to watch on a nice day and offers a real point of difference from the MCG and Etihad.
I believe that the AFL in Ballarat can be pretty successful, but they need to pay a bit more attention to how to make it so. A few points :
- Local footy in Ballarat is king. I can't over-emphasize that. The AFL will not be able to compete with it, so fixturing on a Saturday afternoon is definitely off limits. There is an interleague weekend in late May which is probably an ideal weekend to schedule it there if you want to use a Saturday, but otherwise it has to be Sunday.
- Local fans will go watch whoever play, but i dont really think anyone considers the Doggies a second team because they play here. I may be biased, but the Doggies level of fan engagement has been pretty average compared to what the Roos did in their time here. I've heard that sentiment echoed by quite a few.
- Night games in Ballarat are virtually a no-no in winter due to the cold and chance of rain, although if you could do it in the opening couple of rounds you'd probably still pull a sold-out crowd. Lighting obviously needs to be improved first.
- They got crucified on Sunday with the weather. The day before was about 14C and sunny. Sunday had a huge hailstorm about an hour before the game and i saw heaps of locals giving away (or at least trying to) their tickets on social media when that set in. I think they sold around 2000 more tickets than the amount of people that attended.
- Playing a game in June or July in Ballarat is probably not ideal, in that you run the weather gauntlet. People will turn up if its sunny, they'll stay away if its wet. Adding to that, having it at 3.20pm almost guarantees you'll finish in darkness and people will have well and truly felt the cold set in by then.
The ground and facilities itself are actually exceptional and a terrific place to watch it. IMO it'd be a magic venue to watch on a nice day and offers a real point of difference from the MCG and Etihad.
Correct. It was helped that we had an alignment with North Ballarat in the VFL that was very successful and very respectful to North Ballarat's history.NM had a great model going forward for the region, unfortunately we were also involved with Hobart at the time.
The AFL realised the model was sound and the Bulldogs were struggling after selling games to Sydney, Canberra, Cairns, Darwin and not being able to establish a foothold in any of their secondary markets, so they parachuted the Bulldogs into Ballarat.
Unfortunately for Ballarat, this meant an end to the North's VFL allignment any community involvement by a genuinely interested AFL club. North Ballarat's VFL team then floundered and eventually died, leaving Ballarat without AFL and VFL involvement in the city.
The Bulldogs 2016 season was a ripper for them but they crapped in Ballarat's face after the Grand Final. Total disrespect, probably due to the fact that as club they were unaccustomed to success and got ahead off themselves. Results since that game suggest so.
So now, you've got an allignment that has started off on the wrong foot and they have to win back the trust of the city somehow. Making tickets affordable would have been a logical way but they went the greedy option first up. It's going to take a lot of hard work to re-engage Ballarat and make it work. Do they patience? Not sure if you go by their previous efforts in secondary markets.
This.
Sadly also there’s not a huge Bulldogs supporter base here to top it all off. It’s predominantly Geelong, Richmond and Collingwood.
The relationship with the town is fractured but it can be mended with active engagement.
Sadly the perception from many Ballarat people is that the Western Bulldogs don’t seem to really care about that.
Time will tell
ChrisHunt313131
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- Oct 9, 2016
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Why is that? Things take time - does not happen overnight.
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I remember thinking at the time it seemed completely pointless. Mostly because if anyone there wants to see some AFL, they can jump on a V-Line and literally be 200 metres from it within an hour and a half... and see any game they want.
It's also weird to me because Ballarat isn't enticing enough for the average arrogant city dweller, and then there's its notoriously cold.
As for travelling from Melbourne or being a Freo/Eagles/Crows/Port/Lions fan, well it's okay to go to Geelong for a game because you're getting that real tribal, all-Cats fans, shitty ground tribal experience that doesn't exist anymore.
The thing that struck me was what is the point? Everyone in country Victoria already likes footy. It isn't some final frontier like Cairns nor is it on demand but underserved ala Tassie, the Northern Territory, or Canberra.
So I reiterate, what the * is the point?
It's also weird to me because Ballarat isn't enticing enough for the average arrogant city dweller, and then there's its notoriously cold.
As for travelling from Melbourne or being a Freo/Eagles/Crows/Port/Lions fan, well it's okay to go to Geelong for a game because you're getting that real tribal, all-Cats fans, shitty ground tribal experience that doesn't exist anymore.
The thing that struck me was what is the point? Everyone in country Victoria already likes footy. It isn't some final frontier like Cairns nor is it on demand but underserved ala Tassie, the Northern Territory, or Canberra.
So I reiterate, what the * is the point?
Was 16 and sunny the day before, sometimes you get unlucky. Worth staying with
