Socially Distant AFL Crowds

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witsend

witsend

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It seems like there MIGHT be a return to Season 2020 in July and one would presume that it would be similar to Rd 1...ie without crowds.
Considering how apparently successful social distancing has been in Australia so far, is it feasible to allow spectators to be in the stadiums at a safe distance. Perhaps one every 4th seat per row, with staggered seating in each subsequent row. This would create at least some atmosphere and allow some people to attend. Seating would need to be strictly allocated. Just putting it out there...


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witsend said:
It seems like there MIGHT be a return to Season 2020 in July and one would presume that it would be similar to Rd 1...ie without crowds.
Considering how apparently successful social distancing has been in Australia so far, is it feasible to allow spectators to be in the stadiums at a safe distance. Perhaps one every 4th seat per row, with staggered seating in each subsequent row. This would create at least some atmosphere and allow some people to attend. Seating would need to be strictly allocated. Just putting it out there...


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social distancing would require empty rows (1, prob 2) between each active row. otherwise you have the person in front/behind less than 1m away from you even with staggering
 

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witsend said:
Fair enough. So every second row, every 4th seat?
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Ignoring MCC/AFL/reserved seats/corporate, that means you have 12500 spread throughout a 100000 stadium. Having been at games like that during Richmond's nadir, the atmosphere sucks
 
offtherails9 said:
Better than 0 though?
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no

the cost of hosting that crowd would be prohibitive, because you would need the same staff and security in place as for a full house game (because all tiers are filled up and need to be serviced

also its impractical because good luck keeping families and mates from sitting next to each other
 
I had this thought as well. Running with Ned's thought, one patron every three seats, every second row vacant would equate to a fan roughly every six seats. That's 16k at the MCG, 7k at Marvel, 10k at Optus, 8k at Adelaide Oval, 5k at the SCG and Gabba and about 4,500 at Spotless/Metricon. The biggest issue I can see is people travelling to and from the games rather than the games themselves. I'd love to fans enjoying the footy this year though.
 
Could they combine zoom with the led advertising which rings each ground?

and have permanent live vision of each coach on the big screens - one each screen
 
JackFlash said:
It will be many years before we see a capacity MCG again. They will play with no crowds this year unless something goes horribly wrong, footy played in front of a packed house might not happen again until 2022 or 23....
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That’s if you get a successful vaccine which is not guaranteed.
 
JackFlash said:
It will be many years before we see a capacity MCG again. They will play with no crowds this year unless something goes horribly wrong, footy played in front of a packed house might not happen again until 2022 or 23....
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Lol

At the VERY worst, round 1 next year. Also, there will be no vaccine.
 

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We are looking at allowing 100 people in a pub or in a nightclub - which are indoor venues

If that's ok then I don't see the problem with a 25% full stadium

Trickiest part will be managing the crowd if it buckets down with rain and people are supposed to be sitting in the rain

Do you make it a bag free venue? Reduces time getting into the stadium, cost of bag checking staff and the interaction with the bag checkers

Put more trains on than usual. Encourage use of car parking for venues that support it.

Or looking at the numbers, we might find there's crowds allowed in some states but not others

The number of cases in everywhere except VIC/NSW are trending pretty well at the moment
 
They played footy from 1968 to 1970 during the Hong Kong Flu pandemic which had a far greater death rate than Covid19 with no lockdown...It affected mainly the elderly and caused about one million deaths worldwide. We should have full fan attendance by round 1 2021, but this is a different world we live in now and footy is no longer a priority. Nothing is going to be the same again.
 
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Posted it in another thread, but for this year I’d give up on actual patrons.

Could consider filling some seats with players and staff not occupied at the time. Might mean social distancing is not such an issue if they’re training and playing together. Would work better in a ground with few seats. Supplement with artificial crowd noise.
 
JackFlash said:
They played footy from 1968 to 1970 during the Hong Kong Flu pandemic which had a far greater death rate than Covid19 with no lockdown...It affected mainly the elderly and caused about one million deaths worldwide. We should have full fan attendance by round 1 2021, but this is a different world we live in now and footy is no longer a priority. Nothing is going to be the same again.
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All flu deaths were counted in the Hong Kong Flu numbers which were estimated at 1m, although the infection rate was not known, but far greater than what COVID has been. COVID deaths whilst officially at 280k currently are widely accepted to be much higher.

Just because something was done one way in the past doesn't mean we should do it the same way this time.
 
The thread is also wrong. It’s ‘Socially distancing crowds’
About that ‘12500 at the MCG’
I had an idea,
The AFL can allow families to sit next to each other. This would be allowed because families are sitting next to each other at the dinner table, and this should be allowed outdoors as well.

The government hasn’t even allowed 1000 people outdoors yet, allowing the sports crowds to continue is not even the 3rd step.
 
As much as it would be good to have 12,500 at the G it would just be an organisational nightmare when you try and fit different sized families in.

More practical would be one family per bay, can you imagine the pie boy walking down the aisle to personally serve you :sweatsmile:
 
Jonathan Macca said:
The thread is also wrong. It’s ‘Socially distancing crowds’
About that ‘12500 at the MCG’
I had an idea,
The AFL can allow families to sit next to each other. This would be allowed because families are sitting next to each other at the dinner table, and this should be allowed outdoors as well.

The government hasn’t even allowed 1000 people outdoors yet, allowing the sports crowds to continue is not even the 3rd step.
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how do you do social distancing at the gates, with the required security checks?
 
The Great Slattsby said:
i guess the stadiums would do what they do at Bunnings, make people queue at a distance.

i feel like the men's urinal is the riskiest, merciless competition over a space at the metal wall.
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This is where math is your killer

12500 to get into a stadium via six gates, 1.5-2 metres between each punter. You will have queues going for at the very least 500m, potentially a kilometre
 
Ned_Flanders said:
This is where math is your killer

12500 to get into a stadium via six gates, 1.5-2 metres between each punter. You will have queues going for at the very least 500m, potentially a kilometre
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yeah lets be clear, i don't think they will get 1,000 let alone 12,500 for the foreseeable future
 
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