No one interested in either of these teams, it seems.
Look across the threads, no one interested much in Round 7 at all!
Go Tiggers.

Yes, pretty sad state of affairs.

But at least the Crocs got more than the 50 over cricket match.....

Looks like sacking Gruber has made the Hawks better?????

Only reason any interest in those teams is which one will fold first. The black curtain is up in the Gong and the Crocs are playing in a tin shed and charging more and getting less than the TEC.

Bridges burned (John Rillie sacked after singlehandedly eliminating Perth with 10 threes in a playoff game instead of retiring with the club, Rob Rose sacked instead of retiring with the club, Corey Williams sacked after winning league MVP) combined with exorbitant ticket prices and then this year the obvious fact that people don't want to go watch games at RSL stadium. I think that Smythe regime really did a lot to hurt the club in terms of community disconnect.

I think the rise of the Cowboys as a successful club didn't help either. Local sponsorship dollars are naturally going to go to them over the Crocs.

While I disagree with aspects of his coaching approach, off the court Shawn Dennis has done a really great job of recruiting, which is such a shame given how poorly the crowds have turned out. That shouldn't be understated: forget the record, this is the deepest, best balanced roster we have seen in Townsville for the better part of a decade, which is a coup coming off a community restructure and with limited funds, and Dennis needs get credit where it's due.

Having such a poor home court advantage is going to cost you a few wins IMO, so all things being equal, this team could have been a contender with the right public support and a home court fortress. There have been terrible Townsville teams over the years that have had great home court records, which is a testament to the power of a good crowd IMO.

Basketball is probably THE most crowd-affected team game in the world that I can think of, so home court advantage is huge (basketball is a huge confidence game + referees are such a large factor).

The season gets worse for the 'Gong. Can't remember them ever being this bad, and yet they have some decent players on their team.

Shame the Crocs can't get a crowd to turn up as they have a pretty good team this year and playing well together.

Sun didn't quite shine for Hawks as road trip ends in disaster

Mick I definitely hear what your saying and its all reasonable, however there has got to be a time when people need to get over this and start supporting the club. Every club does things to piss off its supporters at some stage in its history. Unfortunately some clubs do it more often than others.

But the point is, the supporters need to stop holding a grudge because of a few shitty decisions and get behind this current team, which is a very likeable and obviously competitive. The alternative is that there will be no club to support in the future. Im sure there will be a few regrets from supporters that bailed on the club if that was to happen.

The RSL ticket prices are a joke, and hopefully the Crocs wake up to this and lower the prices before its too late. But I think that in Townsville, the people there either want the team or they don't. Right now it looks like they don't.

There are lots of people who want the team and consider themselves fans but have grown disaffected, and from talking to people it seems like the ticket prices this season are just one more slap in the face that they couldn't take sitting down so they voted with their feet. The move to RSL Stadium was a hard enough sell to the fanbase, the brutal pricing system made the move twice as difficult.

The whole "holding grudges for burned bridges" thing aside (that was more responsible for downturn in crowds from the Rose era onwards and then immediately post-Rillie), Townsville were still getting 3k+ to all of their games last year (not great, but not 1370 people either, which is what they got last night). That can be overcome with the passing of time and good management.

But in the meantime, it's impossible to make this work in this market because:

a). Some people don't want to go to games at the new, inferior stadium, regardless of ticket price.
b). Most people don't want to go to games at the new, inferior stadium BECAUSE of the ticket price

The Crocs haven't had the basketball side of the operation in such tip top shape in over a decade (great roster, young talent with high ceilings), but the business side is sorely lacking vision.

The trouble is season ticket holder numbers alone from last year should have sold out rsl. But whoever was responsible for the original ticket pricing didn't allow for enough reasonably priced ($25) tickets for past season ticket holders or walk-ins. Which pissed of loads of season ticket holders who weren't willing to pay $37 to $50 a game.

The majority of spare seats at every game are in the $37 to $50 range and the crocs needed to move on this after the first two games at the most and let the public know they made a mistake and make more cheap seats available. Each game that goes by that we are are 500 seats short, at $25 is $12500 in lost revenue. $12500 x 14 games = $175 000 a year that a community club could really use.

If you make a mistake with the pricing own up and fix it asap, don't let it drag on and expect it to change sheesh!

That said I'm with Mick this team has all bases covered and has the potential to be something special, just need back of house to improve.

pfft nonsense.

never had any trouble finding a park at the TEC. A 10 minute walk isnt the end of the world.

No, of course I wasn't, and I never pretended to be.

"Yes, thats right Mick, you were privy to the crocs dealings,sponsorship deals, balance sheet, P & L's in the past. PPffft....."

I have never heard Mick make any such claims.....