Sports Minister Akif Cagatay Kilic has said the government will press on with the Passolig ticket system that has decimated attendance at top-level matches so far this season.
The poor attendance and complaints are part of a "transition period," Kilic said today. "Everyone needs to make a bit of effort" to make the system work, he said.
His comments follow sharp declines in attendance and criticism from club owners including our beloved Ilhan Cavcav, who said last week that Passolig is damaging the game. Cavcav said the system was a "pettifogging" attempt to deal with football violence, and the real solution lies in applying the law to deter bad behaviour.
Those looking for good news in the minister's comments may reflect on the following:
1) In football, when anyone says "We have complete confidence in X", X generally ends up getting fired within a month.
2) Sports Minister Akif Cagatay Kilic is not the most powerful man in the Turkish Government.
Finally, the word "decimated" may not be entirely accurate in this context, but it's not far off.
The Round Ball in Ankara! Dedicated to football lovers in Ankara (Except for those who follow Osmanlispor)
Well, at the risk of stating the obvious, there is only one way this can go.
ReplyDelete1. Kick the effin passolig thingie into touch.
2. Gradually adopt a system similar to the UK where everyone MUST sit in there allocated seats.
3. Put a Police Control Room in every Stadium and have police (NOT stewards) in radio control with it.
4. Have CCTV to cover every area in the stadium.
I can hear you all saying ......... 'dream on Eski Kanka' ......... and you are all right of course. It will take years for No2 to be implemented.
In the meantime, something has to give, and probably in will be back to Square One and a Passolig kiss of death !!!
Inshallah I can hear Oz Kanka saying !
I'm afraid I'm not with you on this one Sir Eski. I've been going to Gencler games for a number of years and have rarely seen a fight. I've seen many more fights at cricket matches at the SCG. Passolig was introduced to do exactly what you are asking for in point 2. ie To make us all be good school kiddies and sit in our allocated seat. I'm an adult and I like to STAND where I like. Why should we Gencler fans not be allowed to something that is normal in many many civilised countries (I'm not counting the UK as being civilised in this case) when we have done absolutely nothing to deserve such treatment.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I'm slightly hopeful as this government has recently been amazing in its ability to turn 180 degrees. They may scrap it... and then tell us why they were right, have always been right and will always be right in the future... cause that's democracy... or some such crap.
i hate this passolig system, it is killing turkish football .Everything thats great about Turkish football is been taken away.
ReplyDeleteI understand where jim is coming from in terms of each fan having a seat number and it works in the UK. If that was the reason why they were doing it in Turkey id maybe understand, but its not. No surprises Erdogan has links to the banks who are taking all the fans details.
This isn't about stoping violence, its corruption again