100%Red&White

Any positive result tonight sets Saturday up quite nicely with the incentive to finish the job and also give us the opportunity to finish the season top dogs on the south coast. That didn't look very likely a few weeks back. A few early robust challenges tonight to remind them they've got a cup final coming up may help the cause.

Echo says 'with immediate effect'

Incoming? as Virgin have certainly "left the building"

Ooo, let the speculation begin. Wasn't Ralph Krueger linked with a return to Ice Hockey in Canada recently?

Yeah, you're right and I understand. I made a choice and gave up my ST a couple of seasons back after many years and now just pick games. Going a bit off track but read something earlier and it’s even worse for CL club fans, the TV revenue is massive but you have Tottenham charging Man City fans £60 tonight and Barcelona ripping off Man Utd fans for over £100 a ticket for the Nou Camp. Apparently United are reciprocating and charging the same to Barca fans at Old Trafford but using the difference to subsidise the travelling Mancs. A little bit of common sense.

It's the greed in the modern game that's helping kill my love of football, clubs could easily have got on board with twenty-is-plenty for away fans but refused to go below £30. Away ticket revenue is paltry in the big scheme of things but they still creamed it.

Says it all. Good piece with him in Friday's programme.

They're certainly taking a bit of a gamble if prices aren't coming with a decent discount or proviso for a lower cost regards potential relegation. The warning signs have been there for 2 or 3 seasons that fans won't just blindly renew these days. When we went down under Lowe, the prices remained the same as they said we got extra games in the Championship, I don't think that will be enough should the worse happen this time. The fact there's still plenty of tickets left for the Bournemouth game that could be so crucial despite being on sale now to any supporter on the data base, is telling, we'll sell out OK but there's not exactly a clamour to be there. I think we sold out every home game when we were relegated in 2005.

Televised game but tickets moving quite quick for this. Virgin subsidised match, £20.

This has all obviously provoked a bit of a debate but maybe we're losing sight of the increasing probability that this is just a cheap bit of made up journalism. I hope SFC dig a bit deeper as it smacks of being a bit of a malicious slur on the club and its fans, they should ask the Sunday Times to provide the evidence. Contrary to the article, no steward's report, no-one else appears to have heard anything yet they've produced a pretty damning piece for national consumption. And it's just more murky that this offended visitor has to remain anonymous for 'fear of reprisals'. Too convenient.

Compared to who? I'm well aware what we are. The top 6, Newcastle, Leeds and a few others? Yeah, compared to them, (like probably the other 70-odd league clubs) of course we are. But we're a decent 'middle-sized' club, about mid-tale PL sized. 'Small' clubs struggle to pull in crowds in double figures in my world, a club that can regularly get attendances in the 20-thousands in the third division, up to 30,000, is not a 'small' club.

Bit off topic but thought I'd have a search and saw this https://soccer.nbcsports.com/2016/02/04/how-southamptons-innovative-plan-to-break-into-us-market-will-work/ "Saints could be the Premier League team of the U.S. fan" Maybe this got lost down the back of the sofa with the 5 Pledges.

Had we been safe by now Virgin may very well have renewed the sponsorship but I can’t see them wanting to be associated with a club outside of the Premier League particularly as rivals SKY would be seen as PL and Virgin mere Championship level. The club can't wait too long for a decision as the new 2019-2020 kit must be about to go into production so a sponsor would need to be finalised soon. And who knows what Virgin think of our ‘new’ owner and the ambition of the club appears to have changed, it was Krueger who came out with the bombshell that we were now a “small club” after previously trumpeting our path to glory whilst conquering the US! Whatever happened to that?

But they might not want us. When they joined the 'journey' we looked European bound and on the up, ever since........

I'd call his reported £600k+ salary astronomical rather than decent and isn't his role kind of part-time?

Hasenhüttl wants best of players and fans https://southamptonfc.com/news/2019-02-27/ralph-hasenhuttl-preview-southampton-fulham-premier-league-1819 Fans shouldn't really need motivating for a game like this but....

You're right but when you consider the following 2 fixtures it will likely be very short-lived. That's what makes 3 points so important tonight, anything but a win will almost certainly see us back in the bottom 3 after the weekend, and probably the next, and then we have a 3 week break from playing. We could find ourselves down there for weeks to come. Everyone has to be up for this tonight.

Ah, didn't realise they'd stopped that this season. They should kick up then if some home fans are paying less for like-for-like seats, thought that was da rules!

Fulham fans appear to chucked in the towel already, short trip, £20 tickets but struggling to shift a smaller allocation. Looks like they’ll be empty seats all around, plenty left in the home areas too. The club probably should extend today’s deadline and throw this out to more supporters.

In an ideal world. Virgin's sponsorship is up this summer so if they don't renew it will be back to £30 for visitors, so will be interesting to see if it affects away fans numbers for some clubs. This Fulham deal does seem to have been restricted to a select few and hasn't really boosted ticket sales that much, been fairly stagnant for the past week. Such a massively important game, shouldn't really need deals but sign of the times I guess.

Looks like they're targeting members - ST holders obviously don't have friends (not that they could sit with them) but another opportunity to put bums-on-seats.

That message has changed, last week it was: We know we've never met in person. It's a shame, we'd love to show you our place. In the spirit of Valentines Day, we've mustered up the courage to ask you out on a date. Specifically Wednesday 27 February for our crunch match against Fulham. With tickets for Fulham just £20 until Friday 22 February, use your exclusive promo code / / / / / / / / and bring up to six friends.* Hopefully not just randomly selecting a few fans for the offer as it would understandably nark other members. Maybe worth checking your Junk mail.

As long as he's got a customer number I believe you can get a refund for the difference from the ticket office for previously purchased tickets (blocks behind goals/wings only). But you would need the code (emailed out) against a Membership number.

For those who may not be aware - Members can purchase up to 6 tickets for this game for other fans on the database, £20 behind goals/wings. Fulham have only taken a smaller allocation, Block 43 now on sale so a chance to get a big home support for this.

Yeah, I guess the long drawn-out Gao take-over takes some blame?