Dead Duck!

The I.F.A. plans to revamp the C.I.S. cup proved to be a 'dead duck' as a paltry crowd turned up to watch the first leg between Ballymena and Glentoran at the Showgrounds last night. Even the home team's attempt to boost the attendance by allowing season ticket holders in 'free', was largely unsuccessful. It's hard to see what can be done to boost this competition, they've tried to sell it to fans over the years without any great success and I think this just goes to prove what we've known for some time now, midweek football is a 'bridge too far' for most fans. Admittedly it was a bad night and the visitors have an important game away to Cork on Saturday, but football fans will go to the 'ends of the earth' to see their team play under normal circumstances, but not last night. I wasn't expecting a massive visiting support last night, but surely I thought the league leaders will bring 3 or 4 hundred fans with them. The fact of the matter is they couldn't even have made the old O'Kane stand look full, I don't know the official figure of visitors, but I reckon there were no more than 80 Glens fans in attendance and probably half of them were locals. In the home stand Ballymena fans were as scarce as 'hens teeth' and one could argue the point that our fans expect them to lose against top teams and have lost their optimism. What then if the game had been played to a finish last night, with extra time and penalties to decide the winner if necessary? I suppose for one thing visiting manager Alan McDonald may have been reluctant to rest so many top players, but it's only conjecture if the 'gate' would have been boosted or not. There's little point in playing this competition if it costs more to put it on than the income from gate receipts. The away leg next week will hardly excite too many fans either unless the Glens can force an unlikely win in Cork or Ballymena can unearth another 'Paul Malone' or 'Jimmy Martin' (to the uninitiated these were two formidable goal-scorers at the Showgrounds in times past), to give our long suffering fans some hope. Miracles they say happen every day, the impossible just takes a little longer!