Manly match a sell-out
August 24, 2007
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,22299757-5001023,00.html
THE New Zealand Warriors will be in front of a full house on Sunday for their final home match of NRL regular season, the club said today.
Club ambassador Peter Leitch hammered "old out'' sign outside Mt Smart Stadium today as the last of the 26,672 tickets for the clash with Manly were snapped up.
It will the first time the ground has been filled for a round-robin encounter since the Warriors' debut season 12 years ago.
"Tickets for the Manly match were selling at an amazing rate last week,'' chief executive Wayne Scurrah said. "Now we've seen the last few hundred go on the northern embankment.''
The club lifted the capacity for the Sea Eagles' visit by erecting 5,000 temporary seats on the grass embankment.
The rush for tickets continues a huge turnaround for the Warriors, whose average home gate for 2007 before their previous home match was just 11,302 -- the second lowest in the league.
The upturn began when 20,609 turned up for the 30-6 win over Gold Coast. The Warriors' record home attendance is listed as 32,174 for the round-six fixture against Illawarra in 1995, when the then-named Ericsson Stadium had a bigger capacity.
The ground was also sold out for the Warriors' first home play-off match against Canberra in 2002.
