Rage Online

Well, that's a fair response - and who knows, maybe we've even found common ground(!).

I'll take up your generous offer of the last word by simply adding that you're right: it's not a battle I'm going to win. 3,700 people attending on Saturday, our biggest away attendance since before the gods that made the gods were born, ably demonstrates that us boycotters are in a dwindlingly small minority. But I still think it's the right thing to do, as I still cannot in all conscience hand over money to a club who have no moral claim to their league place and whose continued existence undermines the whole idea of football as a hierarchical meritocracy.

Here's to resuming normal service against Charlton 'Flettic.

I just hope that, given so many of our fans are going, we give the home fans absolute hell about the team they have chosen to support, and how it owes its origin to killing a perfectly decent south London club. That's another valid form of protest, just not the sort of protest I choose. Please, Yellows fans, give em hell and give it loudly.

I'm going, not because I agree with what happened years ago, but because my AFC friends have gone to their stadium and were very happy with their team winning.

To me that is the best way of banishing them down to where they belong, by beating them on the pitch. I would argue that the more that go along and support OUFC in doing that, the more likely that will happen.

Jimski wrote:I just hope that, given so many of our fans are going, we give the home fans absolute hell about the team they have chosen to support.

How about "Where were you, where were you, where were you when you were Bletchley Town?" That should kill 'em!

Kairdiff Exile wrote:On the stadium point, I'm not defending Grenoble Road, which is a horrible ground (despite the Yellow Army's best efforts). But Franchise's is little better, and I'm not sorry that I won't ever see it.

Sorry, but have you even been to Stadium MK (I guess not from the last 9 words of your post)? I went a couple of times last year for the World Cup of Egg Chasing and to my mind the facility simply blows Grenoble Road out of the water.

I have no doubt it's better than Grenoble Road; it'd be hard not to be. That wasn't really my point. My point is that I wouldn't want Oxford's next ground to be a soulless all-seater concrete bowl, which is what Franchise's ground seems to resemble (and I'll defer to your greater knowledge, as you're right in saying I haven't been there).

It may well be the zenith of what a modern ground is supposed to be and what modern football fans are conditioned to like, but for me it has nothing in common with the grounds in which I grew up watching football, which lacked the facilities but were a damned sight more interesting. Frankly, the new identikit stadia all look rather boring. That's not just a Franchise thing - I think the same about Bolton's ground (which will probably be my next away game), Shrewsbury's (which I also plan to tick off this season) and plenty of others at our level. In contrast, Brentford last year was a pleasure: a lovely tight ground, with a mix of seating and standing, different architectural styles, in the heart of its local community AND with a pub in each corner!

Yeah but one of the pubs was closed down so it doesn't really count.

It was visiting Fratton Park that made me realise how shit most grounds are these days. Oh they are lucky to have a "proper" ground still.

Very impressed with stadium:mk

In my view one of the best new stadia outside the Premier League
and better than Swansea City and Stoke City.
I prefer it to St Mary's. I like the two tier effect rather than a
single tier bowl. Great seats and plenty of leg room and only
20 minutes to get out of the car park.

It's all set up for the top flight but the fan base
is simply not there at present. How did Winkelman pull off that
deal to construct a top class 30,000 all-seater stadium
and ancillary developments? The construction and design is excellent.

Decent point overall in a tight affair
that had its moments. We could have won it
and we almost lost it at the death.