Canberra seems to be copping a hammering in here (largely cause of one person antagonism...), so I thought I'd explain Canberra's crowd problems, so that at least if people are going to bash the Raiders and/or Canberra then they can do it from a relatively informed position.
Like everything the Raiders inability to attract fans to games is quite complex, fixing just one of many problems in of it's self would have little effect on crowds in the long term, so a lot of things have to change for the Raiders to attract more people to games.
For a start the Stadium is shit, it's poorly situated and is basically built like a big concrete wind tunnel with basically no cover from the elements, as you can imagine paying a premium to sit in a wind tunnel in subzero temperatures isn't appealing to most people, add to that the wind tunnel is in the middle of a suburb with basically nothing to do around it and you have to pay to park on a dirt field and it's a big turn off.
Then there's the experience at the field once you get in, frankly it's shit, apart from the game it's self the whole experience is crap, you have local radio personalities acting as the ground announcers who suck at it and frankly have no clue what they are doing so end up only serving to be annoying, the "entertainment" well it isn't entertaining and basically no money goes into it so you're paying $30+ to watch what is basically school assembly levels of entertainment but with adults, they (the club and the people running game day) have no clue how to build atmosphere and frankly aren't equip with the technology necessary to do it effectively on a regular basis, then there is the price, everything in the stadium is over priced and/or extremely low quality.
Add to those factors that for the past 25 years the team has been mediocre at best (with a couple of flash in the pan semi-successful years scattered around in that time), the total failure of both the club and the NRL to market their products and advertise their matches in Canberra almost at all, let alone to a reasonable level, that for a good part of those 25 years the club actively ignored the will and opinions of it's fans and marginalised them, an attitude in the community that once you've been to one Raiders game you've been to them all, that watching the game on TV is frankly an easier, cheaper, and arguably a better experience on most occasions, that the ACT government has been basically endorsing and propping up main competitors from outside of the community for a good part of those 25 years and the current ACT gov is almost openly hostile to the both the Raiders and Brumbies in the way that it deals with them sometimes, the perceived shitness of the refs and the perceived attitude that the refs are as likely to decide the game as the teams (whether you agree with those attitudes and opinions or not they are having an effect), the lack of mainstream exposure the club gets compared to others (especially on FTA), the NRL's complete inability to scheduled an even semi fair draw or good draw, the perceived attitude of disrespect and/or disinterest and being treated as an after thought or even a second class citizen that the NRL treats the region with, and the simple fact that value for money wise the NRL simply isn't competitive with other competitors in the entertainment industry, and you have a recipe for disaster when it comes to crowds.
I get that this was a big post (and as such will most likely be ignored because of that fact), but there's pretty much all of Canberra issues in a nut shell when it comes to crowds.
