Let us join up!
Keith Small certainly has his feelings on the Hibs support for last Saturday, but he sees a way forward too....

SO MUCH FOR TICKET SALES FOR THE GAME ON SATURDAY being ‘steady’. Steadily what? What does steady mean? Does steady mean good, because after another pitiful crowd at the Holy Ground on Saturday I think that the Easter Road ticket office must have meant to say a steady trickle. Now I have to admit I was taken in by the encouraging crowd reports that emanated from the club. This is probably because I wanted to believe it. I want Hibernians all over the place to re-discover their love of the club and start attending games again. But a crowd of 11,392 in a third round Scottish Cup-tie against Rangers is pathetic.

Taking into account the 3,800 or so Rangers fans that were at the game, that means that there were only around 7,592 Hibernian fans at the game. That is ridiculous, and I am personally sick of the so-called Hibs fans that whinge and comment on all things Hibs, complain about the team/manager/board/owner and yet are quite literally standing by and crippling the club with their non attendance. I don’t care if the game was on the TV, I don’t care if there was a good chance of us getting beat, and I don’t care if they don’t like the manger. You are either a Hibs supporter or you are not. It is often said that in times of adversity you find out who your real friends are, well surely that maxim can also be applied to football fans?

Less than half of Hampden best for Hibs?  (hibs.net)

The next time Hibernian are in a cup final against one of the Old Firm, I hope we don’t get a 50% share of the tickets. As long as the real supporters, and I include exiles in that, all get a ticket, that is enough for me. Whatever you say about Old Firm fans, at least they have the courage of their convictions and support their club, not by proxy but by paying the money and bothering to attend.

Now I realise that the club is trying to entice fans back to the game, but so far it has simply not worked. I also realise that many people genuinely cannot get to the. What is the solution to this problem? Well I think that one solution could well be the membership scheme that was mentioned by the club a while back.

By initiating a membership scheme, the club would be creating a way in which those who cannot contribute via gate money would be able to, and those who claim allegiance to Hibernian but choose not to attend games to financially support the club in spite of their apathy. It surely cannot be that hard to set it up. Becoming a member would mean joining Hibernian for life, and paying a membership fee. I know that some political parties even give the member the opportunity to choose how much they want to pay, it could range from £5 a month to £25 a month, it would obviously come with benefits. For example a standing discount in the club shop, discounted tickets, season tickets, the opportunity to participate in the running of the club, automatic eligibility for cup final tickets. Why not even allow the members to vote for the board? I realise that this may be too much to ask, why would the board want accountability to be added to their job description?

But this scheme could in my opinion be a valuable part of the Stand Up And Be Counted campaign. I admit I do not know what the initial outlay would be on such a scheme but in the age of computers I cannot imagine it being that difficult to implement. I also do not know how much revenue it would raise. But even making a conservative estimate of say 4,000 members paying £20 a year, which would raise around £80,000. Not a huge amount I agree, but surely every addition to the money-in column of the balance sheet is only a good thing, and if managed properly it would grow, perhaps even bringing in a six figure sum a year.

And apart from the money that would obviously be welcome, it is an opportunity to increase the democracy within the club, bringing the fans and the club closer together. And after the appalling crowd on Saturday, anything that brings the fans back within the club is badly needed. And then at last there would be no hiding place for those mouthy types that have opinion on everything to do with Hibs, yet always manage to have an excuse as to why they don’t attend, come on we all know at least one, will have no hiding place.