Would we be a big club?

Alfie Conn

Alfie Conn

Well-known member
Watching players being interviewed stating Watford are a big club for this division,to me they certainly are not even for the Championship and amazingly even little Bournemouth are being branded as big due to the fact they have the spending power we can only dream of. Higher up the ladder money has enhanced the status of Man. City although I would argue they have always had big and loyal support,it's certainly elevated Chelsea who I can remember getting 16/17 thousand in the nineties against the lesser clubs. Question is would we be considered big if we started splashing the cash? or are little northern town clubs just not the thing with the national journos?. What would happen if say Layton Orient suddenly found a wealthy benefactor?.
 
Alfie Conn said:
Watching players being interviewed stating Watford are a big club for this division,to me they certainly are not even for the Championship and amazingly even little Bournemouth are being branded as big due to the fact they have the spending power we can only dream of. Higher up the ladder money has enhanced the status of Man. City although I would argue they have always had big and loyal support,it's certainly elevated Chelsea who I can remember getting 16/17 thousand in the nineties against the lesser clubs. Question is would we be considered big if we started splashing the cash? or are little northern town clubs just not the thing with the national journos?. What would happen if say Layton Orient suddenly found a wealthy benefactor?.
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I think you’re trying to rationalise a throw away term. People say big club, sometimes to mean lots of fans, or sometimes to mean lots of history, but probably more often these days to mean lots of cash, or some combination of these things. Sometimes they probably couldn’t even explain why they say it.

If we were rich and spending, and were regularly playing in the prem like Watford recently, then when we were in the championship people would say Blackpool are a big club for this division. Others, like you’re doing, would question that. End of the day, it doesn’t really matter.
 
Would you consider Blackburn a 'big club'?. They won the league title in '95 and were the first real club to start splashing the cash on big name stars. However, the cash has run out(their benefactor died) and they're back in the Championship (going well though this season admittedly 🤷‍♂️), but their crowds aren't huge and they get relatively poor away followings. I look upon them as similar in size to ourselves, a medium sized club, who 30 years ago got lucky...very lucky.
They're now back though at their rightful level(imo).
 
You don't become a big club by spending money. You do become a big club by a sustained presence in the Premiere . Blackburn Rovers were never a big club even when they won the league ,same as Leicester City . If Leicester stay in the Premiere for lets say 5 to 10 years then I think they get a reputation of being a big or at least bigger club . I don't look at Notts Forest being a big club at the moment . I think they are a championship club that has waisted a lot of money.
 
Ive also been wondering how we shake this small club tag that the press and players seem to label us with, but teams like Hull are seen as big clubs. Their away following is poor and they were crap until they got a new stadium similar to Swansea and Wigan.

Look at brentfords reputation now they are in the prem with a shiny new stadium, i always thought of them as small when we were in league 1 with them.

I think we are slowly building are reputation back with the stuff being done off the pitch like the new training ground and East stand but it is going to take time.
 
WIZARD OF TANGERINE said:
You don't become a big club by spending money. You do become a big club by a sustained presence in the Premiere . Blackburn Rovers were never a big club even when they won the league ,same as Leicester City . If Leicester stay in the Premiere for lets say 5 to 10 years then I think they get a reputation of being a big or at least bigger club . I don't look at Notts Forest being a big club at the moment . I think they are a championship club that has waisted a lot of money.
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Leicester are a decent sized club that have spent a lot of their history in the top flight.

Blackburns problem is their crowds fluctuates. Easily got late 20/early 30k once. Now don't get anywhere near.
 
The amount of Clubs that can be considered BIG in the UK?... you can count on one hand.

Our Crowds,just the same as ALL the other Lancashire Clubs fluctuates with success and failure.

We can never be considered a BIG Club but Rovers History and Success is outstanding compared to some 'bigger' City Clubs.
 
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It’s an interest question. Brentford will be coining the cash in, will no doubt stick around in the Prem for a while and will probably never be a club that is refereed to as “big”. Burnley had plenty of years at the top but aren’t “big” in the eyes of the media. Yet a fashionable club like Fulham for instance is often cited as a “big club that should be doing better”.

We will never be a fashionable club so irrespective of money or success we just won’t be quite big enough in the bigness ratings!
 
clappers said:
It’s an interest question. Brentford will be coining the cash in, will no doubt stick around in the Prem for a while and will probably never be a club that is refereed to as “big”. Burnley had plenty of years at the top but aren’t “big” in the eyes of the media. Yet a fashionable club like Fulham for instance is often cited as a “big club that should be doing better”.

We will never be a fashionable club so irrespective of money or success we just won’t be quite big enough in the bigness ratings!
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Not having that. Fulham are a fashionable club but will never be, nor ever have been a 'big' club.
 
There’s so many different metrics to measure so called club size and 99% of fans will use the metric that better suits their club. Personally I think it’s a mixture of everything including history, fanbase (match going fans, not hypothetical fanbase), and recent success.

Look at Wigan, they weren’t even a football league club until the 70’s but after 10+ years in the Prem and an FA Cup win, a lot of younger fans consider them a big club. Personally they will always be on the same level as Chorley for me.

I think the 4 main Lancashire clubs are all much of a muchness with Rovers’ recent success probably putting them top of the pile but Burnley are now getting consistently bigger crowds than them.

Historically, Preston have had larger attendances than Blackpool so I would probably put them very slightly above Blackpool into 3rd but like I say, they’re all very similar.

Meanwhile my team Barrow are probably the smallest team in the FL (maybe with the exception of Fleetwood and Forest Green)!
 
It's subjective though.

What even defines a big club?

History? Having a large stadium? An international fanbase? An abundance of money? State-of-the-art facilities?
 
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Unfortunately I don't think we have enough regular fans to ever succeed in the Prem.
You need big gates, and we won't get them.
I would love to be proved wrong though.
 
I would say that overall success,Historical average Crowds and Historical average League position determine the size of a football Club.
 
ROVERS F.C. said:
The amount of Clubs that can be considered BIG in the UK?... you can count on one hand.

Our Crowds,just the same as ALL the other Lancashire Clubs fluctuates with success and failure.

We can never be considered a BIG Club but Rovers History and Success is outstanding compared to some 'bigger' City Clubs.
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Good post
 
Davepick said:
Don't doubt that, but how many?
Not enough to survive with.
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Compared to our last season in the premier league, we had an average attendance of 15,780, last season we had 12,018.

I think we're nowhere near built for the premier league until we have a fit-of-purpose away stand where we can have it full every game without the police/ground safety interfering.
 
fcblackpool said:
There are only 3 big clubs in the UK, Man U, Arsenal and Celtic. Even the likes of City and Liverpool are 'successful' clubs which isn't quite the same.
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🤣🤣wind up merchant. There is no basis you can possibly use to exclude Liverpool, Rangers or Spurs from being in the same bracket.
 
fcblackpool said:
There are only 3 big clubs in the UK, Man U, Arsenal and Celtic. Even the likes of City and Liverpool are 'successful' clubs which isn't quite the same.
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Liverpool and United are the biggest clubs in the country, followed by Arsenal.

I'm guessing the post is a wind up though!
 
Depends what you class as big?

Crowds or success? It's up to the individual to decide really. For me it's based on consistent success.

Take Villareal for example. Villareal in real terms is a tiny club. 22,000 seat stadium and an average in La Liga of 16,500 attendances despite being in La Liga and having won European silverware and often in the mix latter stages. Prior to getting into La Liga in 1998 their attendances would have been pitiful. Are they a big club in my eyes? Yes I think they are. Due to their ability to compete at such a high level despite having small attendances over multiple decades.
 
The town's historic outward migration from the late sixties onwards is Blackpool's main handicap + we are a three-sided town.
Once you get to Kirkham which is split with us and the knobbers, it's more likely they will be knobbers after that(may the Good Lord help them).
 
Lewis_Winthorpe said:
Leicester are a decent sized club that have spent a lot of their history in the top flight.

Blackburns problem is their crowds fluctuates. Easily got late 20/early 30k once. Now don't get anywhere near.
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They would if they were still in the Prem ,but your right about Leicester ,that was a bad example.
 
ste said:
Compared to our last season in the premier league, we had an average attendance of 15,780, last season we had 12,018.

I think we're nowhere near built for the premier league until we have a fit-of-purpose away stand where we can have it full every game without the police/ground safety interfering.
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I believe that the new East Stand will not increase the capacity much more than it currently is.
If I was Simon Sadler, and eventually wanting Premiership football here, I would go for a two tier East Stand.
A very large police presence made it a shambles for the whole crowd leaving the ground both this season and last year. There was only a couple of thousand Preston fans both matches, so I can't imagine how we could cope with six or seven thousand away fans. All they had to do was hold the away fans back for 15 or 20 minutes to allow the home fans to peacefully disperse, and everybody's happy.
🧡 UTMP 🧡
 
Henshman said:
I believe that the new East Stand will not increase the capacity much more than it currently is.
If I was Simon Sadler, and eventually wanting Premiership football here, I would go for a two tier East Stand.
A very large police presence made it a shambles for the whole crowd leaving the ground both this season and last year. There was only a couple of thousand Preston fans both matches, so I can't imagine how we could cope with six or seven thousand away fans. All they had to do was hold the away fans back for 15 or 20 minutes to allow the home fans to peacefully disperse, and everybody's happy.
🧡 UTMP 🧡
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Even if it's a 1 tiered stand, having a fit-for-purpose away stand would increase the away attendance if it means that the 2 stand segregation can be removed.
 
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