August Review

One highlight
By KJ
September 8 2003

The good, The bad, and the Ugly. Thats my take on August for Kiddy. Depsite a reasonable start Harriers have fell away a bit. And there still no sign of bigger crowds.

THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Lets take a look back at August.

THE GOOD

There were a few good things:

a reasonable pre season campaign, good displays against Leicester City and West Brom.

a good opening day victory over Mansfield, with a super Bomber Bo finish

a great trip to Ipswich in the lager cup, great defensive display, which really lifted the spirits. For many Kidder fans, just to watch us play at grounds like Portman Road, was good enough

Brocky. Keeper Stuart Brock had a good month, particularly in the opening 2 games.

Mainly a good start for summer signings. Very impressed by Adam Willis and the rejuvenated Kenny Coleman. Graham Ward looks like he could be a good un as well and he made us proud with his international call up.

We doused Mr Reynolds’s bonfire at Darlo.

Referee Trevor Parkes, a rarity in our time.

THE BAD

The defeat at Nam, despite Danny’s thunderbolt, you could tell we were going to get bullied out of that result.

The ref at Nam, Hedgley the ginger clown. From the start he was intent on being noticed. Unfortunately probably the first of many impotent fools this season.

The home crowds. I’m not going to harp on about it but we’ve still only got 2000-2300 home fans. Some are fed up already and have given up coming. The regulars then slag them off for not coming( rightly so), it’s a viscous circle. What can we do ? I think there is someway of attracting bigger crowds, not loads more, but someway. Not sure how, but there must be some way looking at these facts, I believe to be true.

when we were in the Conference, we got around 2000. roughly this would be 1700-1900 home fans. So since promotion, ignoring the first season blip, we get about 300-500” new “fans. I don’t think we’ve got that number of “new” fans, I think we’ve got more. I bet we’ve got an extra 700-800 new fans and those have replaced some who no longer come now were in the league. Why don’t they come ? Some still long for the Allner days, and some probably for Molby. For some its is purely financial. Ther may be other reasons. Perhaps they fell pushed out by the new guard? I don’t know exactly why, but I’m convinced that these rough figures are correct.

So is Kidderminster in a football area ?

probably over 1000 people (maybe more??) leave the town to watch other teams, mainly the bigger local teams, some further, eg Man Utd etc.

The Kidderminster and District football league is one of the largest of its kind in the Midlands as is the Stourport Boys League. The Kidderminster League produced such non league teams as : Stourport Swifts, Bewdley Town, Bridgnorth, and Ludlow. In must run around 10 divisions on a Saturday and Sunday, someone must be interested.

Yes, we are in a football area. Think how many times a week you talk football to someone, normally someone who doesn’t attend games. I don’t know how Kidder can get better gates, but there must be something. Lets hope for a cup run and a big game. A real big un to get everyone there, queues at ungodly hours where the club will have to beat them off with a “smelly stick”. If this happens though, don’t let us complain of bandwagon jumpers, I know some have in the past, this time, encourage em to stay!

THE UGLY

So after that outburst, a bit of a laugh.

Mark Yates and Grant McCann. McCann is known as our divisions Beckham. A good player, but by a bag for the head son.