R6 v Adelaide United | 7.30pm Friday 13th Nov | #SaveTheNix

Agree about Goodwin; I shifted over to Aisle 9 half time so my son could see the game without having to stand up and I saw him clock a few with late challenges. When he clipped Ridenton I could contain myself no longer and jumped out shouting "you little shark!". Sat back down, apologized to the good folk of Aisle 9.....  

we've had only once before in season 3 or 4 when a group of drunken yobs turned up and on idiot chucked his cup. Red Badge on him soon enough but I agree we should keep our own house in order so if you see that sort of thing, give em shark. This is our zone and we don't have that sort of crap.   

Haven't been on since the game. What a fudgeing great night that was. Couldn't have asked for a better game or result for the situation and great to get a good croud too. An exciting game and good win will hopefully get some of the extra 7000 people saying "this is great, we should be coming more often" whereas had it been terrible weather, a boring game and a loss a lot would have said "no wonder we never bother." I took a friend who thought he hadn't been since the Galaxy game and even after the first 5 minutes he was saying it was awesome and a lot more exciting than when he used to go. By the end he was saying he'll get his girlfriend along to join us for the next game.

Edit: Also, moment of the night was definitely "metrics" up on the screen.

Agreed about the odd cup. At this game there were several plastic bottles being thrown. That's what got by back right up.

I'm glad to be proven wrong by Wellingtonian fans. Good stuff and I hope December 19 is the same..

Friday's game was by far the best I've been too in a long time, both on and off the pitch. I normally sit around the edges of the Zone but this time I was in the middle. And it was fantastic. Big ups to the team on the pitch and to the folks behind the scenes that did all the work during the build up. 

TV Ratings for the match  http://www.throng.co.nz/2015/11/tv-ratings-13-november-2015/

Most watched on SKY Sport 4

1. Hyundai A-League: 19,790 (7:30pm – 9:30pm)

Up against cricket was always going to be tough, but interestingly there was no rating for the Breakers game..

Most watched on SKY Sport 1

1. Intl Cricket Test: 30,660 (6:10pm – 11:00pm)
2. Intl Cricket Test: 28,200 (2:30pm – 5:30pm)
3. The Cricket Show: 24,830 (5:35pm – 6:05pm)
4. The Cricket Show: 13,570 (11:05pm – 11:30pm)
5. Darts Grand Slam: 9,970 (8:00am – 11:55am)

The real buggar is that its so long till the next game at the stadium. 

like last season in part..and that its a week out from Xmas.

Open Rant: 

OK so I may be a traditionalist on this one, and may be in the minority, but i gotta get this off my chest. For home games, wear the club's bloody home kit, for fudges sake. I'm already on record as saying i don't especially like searchlight, but that is not the point. Yes, traditions are there to be broken, and yes one off kits have their place, but there is a good reason for this tradition...

The club is trying to build a following. So in a home game where we knew there would be a lot of new/casual/returning fans at the ground and on the telly - we should have proudly flown the club's colours; which at it's core is the yellow and black stripey playing kit. It's about presenting a consistent image and reinforcing that every opportunity you get the chance. It's about these 'new' fans identifying with what turned out to be a pulsating victory with players wearing yellow and black stripes at home. We missed an opportunity in my opinion. It's marketing 101 stuff. Long term, fans identifying with the club's home playing kit (it's visual identity in marketing terms), is more important than short term marketing and merchandising revenue. 

Close Rant.

Was I the only one to see the irony in somebody promoting tradition and recognisable symbols.........by somebody who is promoting a new national flag? Delicious

I want four red stars with white trim .......on our kit.

Or...you could play the ball not the man. However there is no disconnect here. I want our visual identity to reflect who we are. I believe the current flag no longer represents all New Zealanders and I believe the stripey should be our home kit. If you have a view on the importance of wearing the club's home strip at home games, please share your views.

I think for a change the Export Lager jersey sould make a great Home top. However, the semi stripey is our official home kit and should be worn.

The searchlight kit seems to have been a massive success from what I've seen on social media. Something to promote black friday, etc.

Im a stripey person through and through and was disappointed like many others it wasnt there in our first season but thats another story. You cant really call it tradition as its not as if we have used the same stripey kit for season after season and this season isnt really a stripey either.More than happy for the searchlight shirt to be used i rather like it.

As for the flag, the real shame is that like many other things its the vocal minority who are being heard while most of the polls i have seen clearly come out that most dont want a change.

Sticking to the subject, this is about building loyalty to a football club. In football, the home shirt is the pinnacle of your visual presentation. If you are trying to create a deep connection to that, in that moment of greatest emotional engagement (a home game) you keep the look of your team relatively consistent, this season's version of...the black and yellow stripey.

I get what you are trying to say Global, and generally I agree with the sentiment: Wear the home jersey always at home, no ifs, no buts... 

...BUT, in this case I think you are wide of the mark, and here's why.

The club SPECIFICALLY requested that we wear black. They were promoting the "Black Out" for Black Friday for this game. They sent it out in the pre-game email to members and marketed it (at least on social media).

I think you could argue that wearing a yellow stripey COULD POSSIBLY be interpreted as defying the club, and undermining their efforts to promote the game.

Now you might argue that they shouldn't be doing this... that they should always wear their home jersey at home. But that is a separate argument. In this circumstance, given that they WERE wearing the black kit, and had asked fans to wear black for the night, I think you should wear the searchlight if you have it. I left my spikey on the rack and wore my black "Save The Nix" YF Tshirt.

But that is exactly what i am arguing Brandon. The club did get it wrong because it  was a missed opportunity to enhance deep emotional engagement with your home kit, to a whole lot of new fans. Building a sports club brand 101.

Sorry, I thought you were taking issue with people wearing the searchlight, as opposed to the Club asking people to wear black.

Two separate issues:

Issue 1: If the club asks you (rightly or wrongly in your opinion) to wear black, should you do as requested?

Issue 2: Shoudl the club be asking fans to do that?

The point I was making was that IF they ask for black, I think you should wear black, as requested.

Whether they should ask that is a different issue.

I'm not interested in either of the issues you raise. I'm taking issue with the marketing of the club. Big opportunity missed.

Okay, cool. Although how that isn't Issue 2 above, and is "Neither", is beyond me. But whatever.

I agree with the point you are making.

decent point. I guess the Black Friday promo was organised in advance of the licence stuff. But given the new context of the game they probably could have binned the black strip idea. 

Outside of that, I don't think they do it so often that it is an issue, and the playing strip hasn't changed too much lately either. Unlike the Warriors. 

Or you could argue that it doesn't matter what you wear as long as you turn up to support the team.

I thought the Black Out the Heart game was a stupid idea and this one was just trying to create a bit of a theme for people to coalesce around attending the game.  Didn't bother me as much as the Heart stoopid.

I wore my winning away suxy white shirt.  We won. Result.

Better to wear black than show white...;>)

Wait Brandon, are you saying supporters should wear the home supporters kit, no ifs or buts (a.k.a. no matter what reasons you have, you should do it none the less).

Do you take exception to people wearing yellow fever tees?  Or any other Yellow?

I know you said no ifs or buts but I'm going to present to "if's" that I consider very reasonable.

What if they only bought one Nix jersey and its searchlight?

What if they cant afford a jersey after spending their spare money on a membership?

I would have thought buying official club merch, even if 80% of it is the wrong colour, would all be good for the club and we would be happy.

A lot of fans and potential fans cant afford any jerseys especially with families. That they show up is the prime importance. And for. Those tech savies, you might be surprised that some don't do twitter, facebook nor even the Internet. It is about priorities. 

Fixed my spelling.

Yeah, before worrying about what fans wear (and what blankets they bring into the zone) people should be worrying about fans turning up at all.

I'm not into marketing but i disagree with what you're saying is building a sports brand 101. You're not going to get anyone developing deep emotional engagement with your brand in one night, by doing the same thing (or wearing the same thing in this case) that you always do.

Surely you are more likely to get recognition by promoting something different and unusual to the largest possible market outside your captive audience and then build the emotional connection from there?

yeah, let's go back to the game. Did you guys saw Ernie's reaction to the Krishna goal? He was not happy about Siggi playing the long ball :-)

https://youtu.be/_hkqf8J5BmQ?t=58

Frighteningly positive from you Leggy!

yeah I think it works for shirt sales. Fans feel the need to buy the latest kit more often, rather than just keeping the same shirt for 10 years because it hasn't changed since then.

I wonder if you could do it with the away/alternative strips and achieve a similar result? While using a consistent home kit to achieve what global suggests. 

It works for the Warriors because they have such a big fan base across NZ and Aus and they have some great designers working on the limited edition strips every year (even Aussies I have met think the Warriors strips are usually the best) so its an excellent marketing and money making campaign for them.

You never know, some limited edition strips (not the horrible hobbit ones) could help build some interest.

We wear what we want.

We wear what we wa-a-a-ant.

Yellow Fever tragics

We wear what we want.

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/nov/17/be...

The goal was also on the ESPN FC show

Remember this game? Beating Adelaide in an open exciting game of football with 6 goals in in front of 13,000+ fans in Wellington...

...those were the days. Feels like a long time ago.