Thrifty pence: Young fans show the 20p they paid to watch Mansfield

When Radiohead announced they were going to give fans the option of ‘naming their price’ for their album In Rainbows in 2007 the music world was stunned. “Commercial suicide”, said the naysayers. “A brave leap of faith”, argued the liberalists in favour of the band’s unique stance.

On Saturday, Mansfield Town ‘did a Radiohead’. They bravely allowed fans the chance to see The Stags play Blue Square Premier Division strugglers Gateshead for whatever price they saw fit.

And so enticed by the prospect of seeing a game of football for as little as one solitary penny – if they so chose – 7,261 supporters flocked to Field Mill, an attendance higher than all but one of the games in League 2 (Bradford recorded 11,965 for their game against Bury), and just a few hundred behind the Championship game between Scunthorpe and Crystal Palace.

With The Stags aiming for promotion back into the Football League, and with their opponents without a win in seven games, the people of Mansfield united in their pursuit of cheap entertainment.

In fact, the appeal was such that the kick off had to be delayed by 20 minutes to allow all the thrifty fans to squeeze in.

Come on down, the price is right: Thrifty fans eager to see the match for a pittance cause queues prior to kick off.

Money for nothing: Fans flocked to Field Mill enticed by the ‘Pay what you like’ scheme but were left short-changed by their team’s 2-0 defeat to Gateshead.

It’s not known what the average price paid was, and Mansfield have so far refused to say how financially successful the ‘experiment’ had been. If a large portion of the 7,000 strong crowd had paid just a penny then it would have backfired tremendously. Although early indications are that most people were happy to part with £1 to £5.

Prior to the match Chairman Andy Perry took a philosophical approach to the possibility of negative financial gain, insisting that the success of the day would be measured on the size of the crowd at Field Mill, not the income it would generate.

In that respect he can be happy. But, unfortunately, because The Stags lost the game 2-0, the objective of the mission may have failed because, ultimately, the plan would have been to get bums on seats and show those stay-away supporters just what they are missing by comfortably winning the game, subsequently tempting them back for future games at full price. But, having lost the game so disappointingly, it will be interesting to see how many of those casual supporters turn up for their next full-priced home game against Rushden & Diamonds on February 20th after having left the ground bemoaning the result.

So Mansfield ‘did a Radiohead’. But did they shoot themselves in the foot? Was their brave decision to offer fans the ‘pay what you like’ option ultimately a foolish one?

For Radiohead it paid off. The interest generated from the idea helped shift more than three million copies of the record worldwide, and it amassed widespread critical acclaim.

Mansfield will be hoping that by following Radiohead’s formula they too will reap the rewards in the long run, but at this stage it’s hard to say whether their endeavor has worked or not without the fiscal facts to hand. But whatever the outcome their forward-thinking venture should be applauded at least.

Were you at Field Mill on Saturday? If so how much did you pay to see the game? And will you be going back for future games? Let us know below.