Udon Thani FC - The 2013-season

Post by **Svein66** » September 25, 2013, 4:10 pm

Some interesting news in this article: http://tl.smmonline.net/news/99473.html

I got someone to translate, and was told it says "the chairman is confident of promotion, despite lower budget and other teams having better players. Club has spent about 10 million baht this year, and expects that to triple if promoted, including buying TPL-players. Spending 1 million now on pitch repair and stands behind goals increasing to a 4000 capacity (won`t be completed until after CL)."

Post by **Svein66** » September 26, 2013, 10:07 am

All the CL-games with kick-off times below. Homegames are at 18.00 except the last game that`s at 16.00.

Post by **phen** » September 26, 2013, 1:31 pm

How they go to sale the tickets? Only a few hours for the game.
When I look at the schema we have 3 home games on Saturday and 3 on Sunday
I still hope they can change the game against Chiang Mai to Saturday 16 November.

Post by **Brian Davis** » September 26, 2013, 4:37 pm

phen wrote:How they go to sale the tickets? Only a few hours for the game.....

IF they decide it has to be all-ticket and not just pay at the gate. I wouldn't mind the option of a kind of mini season ticket i.e. you could pay for all five home games at once. Whilst Svein's translation suggests additional seating won't be completed until after the Champions League, perhaps some additional seats will be available. Udon will, I'm sure, still be obliged to give visiting fans a certain percentage of seats.

I know one thing, thinking it was going to be hectic for Buriram tickets on sale at the ground (and wasn't) I won't get there at 0830 when tickets started selling at 1200!

Incidentally, the news this am showed some of Ang Thong flooded and this may be a factor in forthcoming weeks, particularly that side of the country.

Post by **Brian Davis** » September 26, 2013, 6:15 pm

Interesting stuff, Svein. I saw the article on Facebook and was able to make some sense of it – in spite of Google translator help!
Although we’ve seen a roller on the pitch (and perhaps they’ll do the other half in this dry spell), I wonder if the Chairman really meant the pitch improvements and additional seating were really dependant upon promotion. Whilst I’d hope the pitch might receive some golf course type attention, I think perhaps they’ll try and flatten it more often and fill the holes with sand. That alone would be a great improvement. I do think there should be some investment in maintenance tools (they had trouble recognizing the fork I brought along

) and staff should be available to attend to the pitch in the event of heavy rain both before and on match day.
It’s to be hoped that the extra seating behind goals will be quality, that its’ base is raised above ground level and the seating has the right pitch to provide a good view. Daft if it only provides people perhaps 30 meters from the pitch with a view through the goal net!

But just where is this money coming from? I understand still that the stadium belongs to the local administration and Udon has to lease it. Whilst the football club is, no doubt, the main user of the main stadium, it is also used for student (and other?) functions. My argument is, therefore, that improvements to the ground as well as maintenance of facilities is the responsibility of the local administration, Udon FC paying for its’ use. (I note there’s talk elsewhere on the construction of a new Udon University. Much as it’s an exciting prospect of having all those young female students riding by on motorbikes [-o<

, I think I’m correct in saying that quite a few Clubs use University facilities and I’ve certainly seen teams turning up in University transport. Perhaps a way forward Udon is considering?)
I’m not quite sure what the Chairman meant about competing against ‘better players’. Udon has surely finished second on merit and it’s my view that, whilst the opposition has sometimes had an exceptional player, Udon’s players have matched if not bettered them on an individual basis. Then, of course, we have our stars, who have shone in this division. Perhaps he was suggesting that teamwork and tactics were better?
Presumably the League awards prize money for champions and/or getting promoted? - and from sponsors? Good the Club is anticipating its’ financial outlay IF promoted and if 30 million is a realistic figure, I can’t imagine the Club being able to progress without one or several sponsors contributing large sums.

Post by **Svein66** » September 28, 2013, 8:20 am

Some statistics from the teams in group B:

Chiang Mai - home: 13 2 0 away: 8 4 3 points per game: 2,30 points 1st/2nd half season: 35/34
Nakhon Nayok - home: 9 2 2 away: 8 3 2 points per game: 2,15 points 1st/2nd half season: 30/26
Paknampho NSRU - home: 10 0 3 away: 7 3 3 points per game: 2,08 points 1st/2nd half season: 25/29
Sukhothai - home: 10 4 1 away: 8 2 5 points per game: 2,00 points 1st/2nd half season: 31/29
Ang Thong - home: 9 0 3 away: 6 3 3 points per game: 2,00 points 1st/2nd half season: 20/28
Udon Thani - home: 11 1 3 away: 7 4 4 points per game: 1,97 points 1st/2nd half season: 25/34

Udon Thani are the only team with less than 2 points in average per game.
Paknampho NSRU was deducted 3 points for leaving the pitch and refusing to finish a game, but the deducted points are included above.

Udon Thani got 9 points more in the 2nd half of the season than the 1st, Ang Thong got 8 points more and Paknampho 4 points.
Chiang Mai, Nakhon Nayok and Sukhothai got fewer points in the 2nd half of the season than they did in the 1st.

Nakhon Nayok, Paknampho NSRU and Ang Thong all had a 5 week break in May/June, while the 3 other teams has not had a break since the season started in February.

Udon Thani has also played 6 cupgames this season, 4 against TPL-teams + 1 against D1 and 1 against D2, so they`ve had a very busy season. When the play-offs end, Udon Thani has played 46 games in a 10 months long season. If promoted, they have to play 2 more games before Christmas to decide which teams will be number 1 to 4, as there are different prize money for the 4 teams.

And then the 2014-season kicks off in February...

Post by **phen** » September 30, 2013, 9:27 am

I hear that they sale the tickets same as always by home games.
Ticket price will be 80 Bath.
Looking forward at the start off the play offs.

Post by **Brian Davis** » September 30, 2013, 4:17 pm

You obviously have loads of time on your hands, Svein.

I think we’ve agreed that it’s difficult to make comparison between the different regional leagues, the standard MIGHT be much the same, or particularly strong or weak. There’s also miscellaneous factors such as the number of local derbies (always IMO more difficult to win), and as the season progresses, whether there are runaway promotion candidates or relegation certainties, or quite a few in the mix either way.

I looked at your average points analysis but, perhaps with the exception of Chiang Mai, there’s very little between the teams. Just one more point(a draw rather than defeat) from Udon would mean their average is 2.00, same as Sukhothai and Ang Thong and just two more wins would, I think, have matched them with Nakhon Nayok.

In my spare time, I chose to look at goals scored and conceded.
Again, Chiang Mai stand out having scored 70 in 30 games(avg. 2.33 per game) and otherwise it’s fairly even going down to Sukhothai 50 in 30 games(avg.1.66).

But shouldn’t we give recognition to the fact that there have been some heavy wins (e.g. Chiang Mai won 7-0 TWICE, Nakhon Nayok 7-1). So, allowing for ‘silly’ scores and any games with 4 goals or more scored as a comfortable win…..

Chiang Mai scored 27 of their total in just 5 games
Paknampo 10 in 2
Nakhon Nayok 15 in 3
Ang Thong 13 in 3
Sukhothai 9 in 2
Udon 9 in 2

Excluding these games which, arguably, distort the true average, Chiang Mai’s average goals per game becomes 1.72, whilst Nakhon Nayok is bottom at 1.45. Using these figures over, say, a 30 game season would mean Chiang Mai would only score 8 more goals than Nakhon Nayok. So again, hardly much in it.

I didn’t pursue goals conceded much. Only two teams let in four goals in a game throughout the season. The highest goals conceded average 1.00 per game, down to Chiang Mai at only 0.66 per game. Unless my brain is playing tricks, using these averages over a 30 game season, would only mean a ten goal difference between the best and worst defence.

The following surprised me. In looking at Paknampo, Nakhon Nayok and Ang Thong, I found they played 8 of their first 13 games at home (actually 8 of 12 in Ang Thong’s case). Their first 4 games of the season were all at home, the last four games all away(actually Nakhon Nayok varied it either side of the mid-season break).

It appears other teams use this pattern, but not all. I’m not sure if there are advantages/disadvantages here, but again extraordinary that the League allows these variations.

Any idea why some teams have a mid-season break, others not? I can only guess why teams play more games home than away in the first half of the season – something to do with religion, the planting or harvesting of rice, possibility of flooding, or unavailability of grounds.

Anybody any wiser?

I thought I would see advertised somewhere, fans’ transport arrangements to Sukhothai, but nothing yet.

Post by **Svein66** » September 30, 2013, 5:36 pm

Brian Davis wrote:You obviously have loads of time on your hands, Svein.

Any idea why some teams have a mid-season break, others not? I can only guess why teams play more games home than away in the first half of the season – something to do with religion, the planting or harvesting of rice, possibility of flooding, or unavailability of grounds.

Anybody any wiser?

I thought I would see advertised somewhere, fans’ transport arrangements to Sukhothai, but nothing yet.

Seems like you have some free time too, Brian.

All 6 leagues kicked off at the same time, and ended at the same time, so when the 2 Northern leagues have 30 matchdays and the others only 20, 24 and 26, then they have time for a mid-season break while the 2 with 30 games don`t.. To give all leagues a mid-season break, there has to be the same number of teams in each league, or there has to be some midweek games. I don`t see any of those things happening.

I haven`t seen anything either about the Sukhothai game, but will post here if I see something.

UDFC on Facebook now has more than 31000 fans. More than 6000 of those has come within the last couple of weeks, and more than 12000 since mid-August. I think they had less than 10000 when the season started. Maybe there will be a lot of new fans at the next homegame too?

Post by **Brian Davis** » September 30, 2013, 7:34 pm

Svein66 wrote: All 6 leagues kicked off at the same time, and ended at the same time, so when the 2 Northern leagues have 30 matchdays and the others only 20, 24 and 26, then they have time for a mid-season break while the 2 with 30 games don`t.. To give all leagues a mid-season break, there has to be the same number of teams in each league, or there has to be some midweek games. I don`t see any of those things happening.

It's not the first time I've been known to complicate things, whilst overlooking the blatantly obvious!

Thank you.
The reason for playing more home games than away in the 1st half of the season(vice versa 2nd half) and therefore four home or away games in a row is still unexplained though?

Post by **Svein66** » October 1, 2013, 9:47 am

Brian Davis wrote:The reason for playing more home games than away in the 1st half of the season(vice versa 2nd half) and therefore four home or away games in a row is still unexplained though?

It can be due to stadiums being used by others on matchdays, or work being carried out at stadiums, or other reasons, but I don`t know why it happened to the teams mentioned. Maybe the reason is as simple as This is Thailand...? Many things are unexplained in this country.

Some TV-news: Udon`s game at Chiang Mai on October 26th will be shown live on SMMTV.

Post by **Svein66** » October 2, 2013, 9:00 am

There are too little info coming from the club these days. I thought it would be more during Champions League than there was during the leagueseason, but except for links to articles on various sports websites, and posts about all their new Facebook-fans, there has been almost nothing of interest from the club the last couple of weeks. Also with all those new FB-fans the club should have posted more information, as they might not know a lot about the club yet.

The other clubs in CL has posts about tickets for the games, travels to awaygames, new merchandise for sale and a lot more, so they look more professional than UDFC. Also most of the clubs have websites in addition to Facebook, Udon hasn`t.

Anyway, there is a game in Sukhothai at 17.30 this Sunday...

Post by **Brian Davis** » October 2, 2013, 1:39 pm

I have to agree, Svein. One would think that things would be bubbling with the Champions League about to ko, but all seems very low key. It does seem facebook is the place for what news there is. I do recall coming across what appeared to be an official website some time back. It had a who's who of the then people running the Club + photos, but little else. I can't find it now. I certainly expected some coaches to be going to Sukhothai - seemingly not. I was contacted by a guy organising a minibus, but was rather put off by a proposed 0400 hrs departure, which means I'd have to get out of bed around 0200! It IS quite a way, but money and missing work are factors for many Thai fans. Perhaps they're all awaiting the home games, or away to Chiang Mai which seems more attractive, although TV coverage may now affect that.

I'm just a fan, I've no experience/involvement in running a football club. Yet, probably to the extent of boring stiff people ranging from the Chairman, head coach, physio/trainer, players, admin. staff, the IT guy, photographer, guy responsible for music, groundsman' and fans, I've expressed my opinion on how, I believe, things might be handled better, run more professionally. Subjects have included information, updating Wiki, having stuff in English, advertising, pricing of merchandise, maintaining the pitch, having good pre-match music, facilities, relationship with the Local Administration etc.

I really thought Udon would be leading in communication/information, but it seems other CL teams are ahead there.

Post by **Brian Davis** » October 2, 2013, 3:12 pm

I meant to include the following article. It seems things were much the same 3 years back.

http://www.thaisabai.org/2010/06/big-ba ... verything/

Post by **Svein66** » October 2, 2013, 3:53 pm

Brian Davis wrote:I have to agree, Svein. One would think that things would be bubbling with the Champions League about to ko, but all seems very low key. It does seem facebook is the place for what news there is. I do recall coming across what appeared to be an official website some time back. It had a who's who of the then people running the Club + photos, but little else. I can't find it now.

I really thought Udon would be leading in communication/information, but it seems other CL teams are ahead there.

The website disappeared 1 or 2 years ago, as has happened to many club`s websites, but most clubs then got a new website. Udon didn`t.
Had a new look now at Udon`s FB-page. Since the draw 9 days ago, there hasn`t been any info about CL from the club itself. They have shared some links from sports websites, and pictures from other FB-pages. They have also shared the fixture list in English, that I posted on their page shortly after the draw, a couple of times. But nothing else!

Also the UDFC-fans FB-page are "dead". No posts there at all for 7 days.

Of the 12 teams in CL, only Chiang Mai (48000) has more fans on FB than UDFC (32000), with Roi Et and Sukhothai 5-8 thousand less than UDFC. The rest has only 3-10 thousand. But UDFC has without a doubt the most quiet page of them all just now.

I`m excited about CL, but I`m disappointed that it seems the club and fans don`t share my excitement. Maybe they think they`re not good enough to get promoted, and that kills some excitement? Maybe the start with 2 awaygames has something to say, as most fans still has to wait 17 days more before attending a CL-game? Or maybe the excitement is there, but not visible to us farangs?

Post by **Svein66** » October 4, 2013, 12:41 pm

The game on Sunday might be shown live here:
http://footballdv2.dmiinter.com/?cat=6
It looks that way to me, but don`t know how & if it works.

Post by **Brian Davis** » October 4, 2013, 6:26 pm

Looks interesting. I suppose we can test it with the games tomorrow. I've no idea what the August 26 date under all the captions is all about.

Post by **Brian Davis** » October 4, 2013, 7:09 pm

A few new posts on Facebook.

The team has already travelled, spending two nights away before Sunday's game. I hope the coach decor (art deco? or just gory) doesn't upset them!

There's what you might call 'a statement of intent' from the Club Management, which sounds promising. You can make reasonable sense of it using Google.

Post by **Svein66** » October 4, 2013, 8:53 pm

Brian Davis wrote:There's what you might call 'a statement of intent' from the Club Management, which sounds promising. You can make reasonable sense of it using Google.

Do you mean the long post with the logo picture? Bing (on FB) couldn`t translate it, for whatever reason, so I had to cut & paste it to Google translate. From what I understand it`s interesting and positive news about the club`s future, including a 200-300 million baht new stadium somewhere, but Google migt be wrong...

For others who might want to read/translate, here`s the link:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid ... =1&theater

Post by **Brian Davis** » October 5, 2013, 4:11 pm

Svein66 wrote:The game on Sunday might be shown live here:
http://footballdv2.dmiinter.com/?cat=6
It looks that way to me, but don`t know how & if it works.

Svein, just quickly looked at the 4 pm ko game today, Kasetsart v Look E-San. Coming through fine, picture + sound. THe pitch looks, well, par for the course!

Perhaps, as you discovered the link, you should post on Facebook. I'm sure if other Thai fans knew, it would have been mentioned.

Let's hope it covers other 'aways', although Chiang Mai on SMMTV, as you indicated