Stadium full but can't increase it!!

Hi, I've taken Crewe Alex to the Premier League title and won the Champions League but the capacity has reached 13,000 and sells out 100% every game! They won't increase it further or build a new stadium as say we haven't got the fan base.

Any suggestions what I can do to increase it? It's hitting me hard keeping up with wage demands.

Just keep winning to increase your supporter base, the problem is that you've in an area that has a number of huge clubs so assuming that SI take into account regional populations it could take decades of consistent success to get Crewe to a level that can attract more supporters.

As for the finances you'll have to accept the current limitations & manage your squad, if this means missing out on the better players when buying or having to sell one or two of your better players each season to generate income then that's the way it is.

I'll give it a go. Success has been quite quick but hopefully it'll come in the next couple of seasons as it takes a good few to build a stadium anyway!

A couple of seasons is not enough, as I've mentioned you need to be thinking in terms of decades & if the club researcher has set the board philosophies as I would expect then unless you've had an ownership change the board should be more interested in you bringing through players from the academy.

I'll give it a go. Success has been quite quick but hopefully it'll come in the next couple of seasons as it takes a good few to build a stadium anyway!

Within your catchment area you have Liverpool, Everton, Man City and Man Utd, not to mention a load of lower-league clubs. People aren't going to change teams just because you're good now after decades of failure to achieve anything at all. Nearly everyone around there interested in football already has a team, and it isn't you. Changing that, winning over even a portion of a new generation who for whatever reason don't just follow whoever their father supports is going to take a long, long time. I don't know how much success you've had so far but you'll need to maintain those successes for many, many years to gain more supporters and convince the board the club won't just fall back again and lose them. There's a reason why historically in English football all of the surprise success clubs, from 80s Nottingham Forest to early 2000s Leeds to this year's Leicester have been from areas without a dominant force: partly it's because these clubs inherently have more potential and thus are more attractive investments. You're doing very well to emulate that with Crewe regardless, but making it stick is another matter.

look how many extra fans city have unearthed since they've become successful same with chelsea a decade before.

Nonsense, Man City were a big club before the money & so were Chelsea.

To be fair having only a 13,000 seater stadium when your team is a PL and CL winner is a bit ridiculous, I don't think any PL and CL winners have been stuck in such a small stadium. Catchment area or not a team with that degree of success would and should be puling more (I don't know maybe 20k?).

The flip side a club like Crewe would not get to the Premier League any time soon let alone win the title, somewhere along the way they would be picked apart for their best players & their manager.

Realism is a two-way street.

Regardless of what clubs are near by if a team became one of the best teams in the world with a 13,000 stadium it would be increased. The fact Liverpool, Everton, Mancity and Man U and every other club in the area did the same should show this shouldnt be a factor. Its obviously hardcoded to work the way it does whether it makes sense or not. Its not very dynamic.

Regardless of what clubs are near by if a team became one of the best teams in the world with a 13,000 stadium it would be increased. The fact Liverpool, Everton, Mancity and Man U and every other club in the area did the same should show this shouldnt be a factor. Its obviously hardcoded to work the way it does whether it makes sense or not. Its not very dynamic.

Bad examples tbh, Old Trafford was an 80,000 capacity stadium in 1910, and most of their developments have been to get back to that, and now move beyond it, but they've been a successful club building a fanbase for generations on end. Man City have had a strong fanbase for generations(IIRC having over 30k attendances in the 3rd div), but now they've moved to a bigger stadium(and are expanding again), and are struggling to give away tickets sometimes. Liverpool haven't had a development in over 20 years, I'm not sure how long for Everton.

Look at the big Italian clubs, Juventus moved into a smaller stadium despite massive success, Roma are following suit and AC Milan want to too.

You don't just chuck down a brand new 50k stadium because a club have been good for a few years. In the game you'll probably stay at the club for a however long, and continually be successful, but the game doesn't know that. They're operating under more realistic parameters, basically thinking "what if the bottom falls out here, what if this brilliant manager leaves and we nosedive, what if these players feck off and can't be adequately replaced?"

That's all without considering if they even have the land to expand the stadium much more, if at all.

Bad examples tbh, Old Trafford was an 80,000 capacity stadium in 1910, and most of their developments have been to get back to that, and now move beyond it, but they've been a successful club building a fanbase for generations on end. Man City have had a strong fanbase for generations(IIRC having over 30k attendances in the 3rd div), but now they've moved to a bigger stadium(and are expanding again), and are struggling to give away tickets sometimes. Liverpool haven't had a development in over 20 years, I'm not sure how long for Everton.

Look at the big Italian clubs, Juventus moved into a smaller stadium despite massive success, Roma are following suit and AC Milan want to too.

You don't just chuck down a brand new 50k stadium because a club have been good for a few years. In the game you'll probably stay at the club for a however long, and continually be successful, but the game doesn't know that. They're operating under more realistic parameters, basically thinking "what if the bottom falls out here, what if this brilliant manager leaves and we nosedive, what if these players feck off and can't be adequately replaced?"

That's all without considering if they even have the land to expand the stadium much more, if at all.

Not my examples, it was the reason some guy further up gave to explain why its not possible for another club too expand. All those clubs have decent sized stadiums already. I'm just saying its pretty irrelevant. In this country youre never far from a big club. Big clubs are a stones throw from other big clubs all over the country. But stadiums still upgrade.

All stadiums were bigger when they didnt need seats. Crewe got higher attendances than 13k when they were allowed to let more people in. Alot of capacities have dropped. The record attendances of 99% of all clubs are what they managed to squeeze into the stadium to capacity, not how far or near a bigger club it is. Wigan built a new stadium when they rose through the division, they didnt decide not to cos there was already big clubs in the area.

Most fans are born from success. More people would support crewe if they were more successful. Its not a sudden increase in the local population that makes a club more popular. Its cos they arent winning the champions league their fan base is small. I'm pretty sure if they did they would suddenly have season ticket holders from across the globe suddenly die hard crewe fans.

Theres a big difference between not wanting to build a 50k stadium and not wanting to expand a 13k, unfortunately not in the game world. The game rule is simply No, not No unless special circumstances. The game cant tell the difference. The game isnt very dynamic if its not taking change or sudden growth into account. The game is saying there isnt enough fans, nobody wants to watch the champions of europe because the game still thinks its Crewe Alexandra bottom of league 1. The guy never said how many years of growing he did to get crewe to win the champions league either.

Past games it would have grown. This game seems to have followed a much more conservative rule that this just doesnt happen, that little crewe will be little crewe forever, and that its more likely clubs dont have a sudden growth spurt. If the only way to get a club to have a bigger capacity than 13k was to have success for 20 years running and be 50 mile from an existing one then nobody would have one.

They can grow though, just not that quickly.

It would be interesting to know if anyone has actually achieved an increase in fan base. I have played Liverpool in one of my saves and haven't been able to increase the stadium after it reached 55k because of the fan base. 17 champions leagues in 25 years as well as 21 league titles in that time would usually result in a swell of fans. In addition, I have been asked in press conferences, since day one, what my thoughts are about the increase in fans due to the attractive possession football we have played.

I fear that every club has a limit. The creator has a section which asks for maximum attendance (or something like that) and in my time playing FM16 I have seen no evidence that this is ever increased.

It would be interesting to know if anyone has actually achieved an increase in fan base. I have played Liverpool in one of my saves and haven't been able to increase the stadium after it reached 55k because of the fan base. 17 champions leagues in 25 years as well as 21 league titles in that time would usually result in a swell of fans. In addition, I have been asked in press conferences, since day one, what my thoughts are about the increase in fans due to the attractive possession football we have played.

I fear that every club has a limit. The creator has a section which asks for maximum attendance (or something like that) and in my time playing FM16 I have seen no evidence that this is ever increased.

Loads of people who've built up lower league clubs have exceeded it. It does change, just slowly and with regards to more than just on the field success. What other clubs are around? Did the club keep ticket prices low to encourage a new generation of fans, or maximise immidiate revenue by increasing them and locking them out? Were Fan Days used to encourage new supporters? What's the population of the city and local region? In truth lots of clubs probably do have an upper limit - what chances are there of a flock of supporters to a small club in London or Lancashire, even if they are succesful? - but it certainly isn't hardcoded.

I've taken Chester up to the championship, we start with a 6000 capacity stadium and it expanded to 9000 when I was in league 1. After promotion to the championship the George Horan arena was built with a capacity of 13,300ish, and the potential to expand to just under 30,000. I didn't ask for a new stadium either, so it can be done.

Regarding crowds, in my first season in the conference I averaged a very realistic 2500ish (finished 2nd), and its grown steadily every year with success. I now get 11/12k no matter what, and sell out 4 or 5 times a season. The maximum attendance is hard coded, but is dynamic. Chester always had a max crowd of 15000, however on previous versions I have had regular crowds of 30/40k sell outs every week

Hard coded & dynamic are mutually exclusive terms. You're correct in that the maximum attendance is set by the research team but it it a data point that is only valid for the first season, as soon as the game starts the code is already at work assessing any changes to a club's circumstances.

You can definitely grow a fan base because i am managing Udinese at the moment and i took over in the fourth in game season and two seasons later without me asking as the option wasn't there, my board have decided to build a new 35 000 seater stadium.