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Number of Newcastle v Watford tickets still unsold is revealed

5 years ago
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With 10 days to go until the game, I have been looking at the number of unsold Newcastle v Watford tickets.

Against Arsenal on the opening day, the official crowd was announced as 47,635.

However, that included everybody who bought a ticket, so with that game being specifically targeted for a boycott, it still included those season ticket holders who stayed away.

Estimates of actual people inside St James Park ranged from 42,000 to 45,000, I reckon it was probably around the 44,000 mark.

Over eight thousand less than the capacity but of course that is just the tip of the iceberg because if the club had new ambitious owners and a credible manager such as Rafa Benitez, St James Park would be sold out, all season tickets gone and a waiting list for them. So it isn’t eight thousand fans staying away, it is actually tens of thousands who in other circumstances (if Mike Ashley left) would want to go.

So what about this next Premier League match in 10 days time?

The club’s online ticketing website shows details of all the sections of St James Park, which allows fans to pick their Newcastle v Watford tickets.

What that also allows is somebody to then count up how many are still unsold for this next match.

I went around every section to total them up, you didn’t need to count the seats one by one, there is a total of unsolds for each section.

So at 9am on Wednesday 21 August the unsold Newcastle v Watford tickets are:

East Stand – 544 seats available

Gallowgate East Corner – 120 seats available

Gallowgate Stand – 1,214 seats available

Gallowgate West Corner – 348 seats available

Leazes Stand – 1,684 seats available

Leazes East Corner – 577 seats available

Leazes West Corner – 1,436 seats available

Milburn Stand – 2.244 seats available

By my calculations, that adds up to at least 8.167 unsold Newcastle v Watford tickets in normal ticketing areas.

However, this doesn’t include the approximate 4,000 or so seats in corporate areas, Watford at home certainly not a must go to game for many of them you would imagine.

To a large extent, Mike Ashley hit very lucky having Arsenal as the first game.

Attractive opposition for home fans and corporates alike, plus of course the Arsenal fans bought all 3,200 tickets in the away sections.

In counting up empty seats, you can’t access the unsold areas where away fans would normally be. Watford rarely bring many more than 1,000 and so safe to estimate that at least 2,000 of the seats in the away section are unsold, seats which would then usually go on sale to Newcastle fans…if there is the demand.

I think looking at the 8,167 empty seats outlined above, plus at least 2,000 unsold in the away end, plus corporate ones currently unsold, I would guesstimate that only around 40,000 seats have been sold so far for this Watford match.

You have to ask yourself just how many tickets are going to be sold in the next 10 days…

The two clubs have lost their combined four games so far and both are in the relegation zone, after the debacle at Norwich and Spurs away on Sunday, you have to think only a massive surprise and turnaround at Tottenham is going to lead to many more tickets being sold.

All the noise was about the Arsenal game but I always thought that it would be this Watford game when we would have a clearer picture of St James Park is going to look this season.

With at least 10,000 empty seats it isn’t going  to be pretty.

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