Welcome to the cheap seats

I once heard that absolute plank Alan Green declare that the people of Wigan don't deserve Premier League football because Wigan Athletic's gates were so low. This is about par for the course for Green. Take a look at the complaints section of his wikipedia entry if you need any more evidence of his idiocy.

Anyway, as a supporter of a club that gets a nosebleed if their home gate tops 5,000, I'm hardly likely to have much sympathy with his view that playing in the Premier League is somehow dependent on attendances, but the Wigan set up is a strange one I must admit.

I know it's mainly a rugby town and that in many ways, Wigan doesn't have much history (it only entered the league in the late 70s), but what always amazes me is that the ground doesn't even fill up when Liverpool or some other big name comes to town. You would have thought some of the bigger local clubs would fill up the JJB Stadium on their own but there always seems to be empty seats when you see the ground on TV.

But hats off to the club for trying to do something about it. One of the dads at Newton-le-willows FC U7s showed me a leaflet he had been sent by the club, detailing special offers for half season tickets.

I had to go to the website to check it out because it sounded too good to be true but, sure enough, you can buy half season tickets for dads and lads for £95. That's £14 per game for two people to watch the likes of Man Yoo, Everton and Spurs, all of whom still have to visit Wigan over the next four months.

Bearing in mind that I regularly have to pay six pounds just for a six-year-old to suffer the pain of Tranmere Rovers v Leyton Orient or some other such titanic clash, that's unbelievable value in anyone's book.