Supercats to take a hit over venue change

HUNDREDS of Geelong Supercats fans will miss out on a seat at Saturday’s men’s elimination final against NW Tasmania after being forced off its home court and onto a smaller venue.

The longstanding booking of Geelong Arena for this week’s Australian Open of table tennis means the Supercats must turn the AWA Alliance Bank Stadium in Belmont into a home court for week 1 of SEABL finals.

But temporary seating will allow AWA Stadium a capacity of just 850, nearly 500 seats short of the club’s home average in the past month.

Supercats chief executive Dean Anglin said the club was well prepared, but would cop a financial hit.

“We’ve been on the go since Friday night,” he said.

“We had to bring them (the backboards and rings) over just because the table tennis event has a sports floor across the whole of the auditorium and the rings only fit out one roller door. We had to get them out Friday night or we wouldn’t get them out at all.

“It’s a good test for us to see how good we can make AWA Stadium into a SEABL venue.

“We like a challenge, we're always up for a challenge, so we’ll take it.”

The Lady Supercats also made finals and will play away at Diamond Valley at a similar time, meaning members will have a choice of travelling to watch the women or staying in Geelong to watch the men.

Anglin said the club would get a gauge from members as to where they would head this weekend before general admin tickets go on sale on Wednesday.

“Our average crowd of the last five weeks has been 1300,” he said.

“We’re going to cop a little bit of a hit in terms of ticket sales because we’re going to have a crowd about 500 less than what our average has been for the last little bit.

“Probably the only thing that goes in our favour is we’re playing North West Tasmania. We have to allocate the opposition 10 per cent of the stadium capacity. It’s unlikely NW Tasmania will use the 85 tickets — they might use 20 of them — so that might give us another 60 or so to use for Geelong supporters.

“(But) we’re going to have to do an exceptional job of food and beverage to break even.”

Tickets will start at $20 for adults and $15 for children.