by Rob Bernard
7th October, 2014
London based football fan, Rob Bernard, had planned to take in a couple of TPL matches during his 2014 visit to Thailand - including our match against Bangkok Utd on October 22nd. However, all his carefully mapped out plans were thrown into disarray when the powers that be decided to completely rearrange the entire programme for the last six weeks of the season. Feeling slightly disappointed about this, he decided to contact the FAT/TPL. With Rob's permission, I have posted his e mail below. As far as I'm aware, he is still waiting for a reply...
Sawasdee Sir/Madam
I am a football supporter who lives in London. I usually visit Thailand twice a year. I have made this visit for the last ten years to play in cricket tournaments and to enjoy a holiday.
I have also become a big fan of the Thai football leagues. Through the internet and kind assistance of people with similar interests I have managed to attend around 20 matches right through from the Regional League to Thai Premier League. Sometimes I have seen two matches in a day. I always look forward to the football as one of the highlights of my stay.
I am visiting Thailand once again in a few weeks time. On this occasion I am bringing seven friends with me to play cricket in Bangkok as well as enjoying a couple of nights in Pattaya. All of them are football fans and were most eager to attend the game between Chonburi and Bangkok United scheduled for Wednesday 22nd October.
Plans were put in place. We were helpfully assisted by a fan of many years who hosts the English version website at Chonburi, who was obviously very proud that he could showcase the Thai Premier League and his own club to visitors from the other side of the world as he aided in organising our travel to the game and match tickets.
With this in mind I’m sure that you can feel all our disappointment that the remaining fixture list was abandoned and replaced with something very different at ridiculously short notice.
Can I please urge you in future seasons to treat your valued customers with a little more respect? I appreciate the difficulties and complexities of organising such things as I am an administrator with my own club in England; Scarborough Athletic FC. I also help to run sporting events across Asia.
However, I suggest that you consider the damage that late changes to the itinerary could do to the growing reputation of the Thai Premier League. I love the product on show. Match day experiences are something to behold, but it’s very difficult to attend games when you need time to arrange a trip when the fixture list becomes something of a lottery.
Indeed, because of the changes the league and clubs have not just lost monies from my party once, but twice as we’ve arranged to head to Singapore from the 28th October for a few days to catch S-League football action. Since we booked that trip, the TPL have scheduled a full fixture list for the 29th October. That is more money that would have gone into the Thai football economy that has been lost.
Perhaps worst of all, my friends who haven’t been to Thai football before and have been let down this time, may be reluctant to go in the future if the administration cannot be relied upon. That is more money that Thai football could lose. If they had attended their scheduled game, they would be likely to encourage future visitors to also make the effort to attend a match.
I urge you to make the fixtures for the 2015 with my observations in mind. Perhaps even schedule one Friday night match each round for TV coverage and to attract visitors to football before enjoying the rest of their evening’s while not having to vie with coverage of leagues around the world may be a good idea?
Kindest regards,
Rob Bernard
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