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Gold Coast United: All that glitters..

Marc Fox.

Not all is well with Gold Coast United and it's not just that the A-League's self-proclaimed unbeatables keep, well, getting beaten.

Having suffered one of the league's heaviest hidings last week against Wellington, a 6-0 thrashing which put some of the foolish pre-season predictions of owner and chairman Clive Palmer to shame, the Gold Coast have come out swinging against widespread criticism for their decision to cap the crowd at a mere 5000 fans to attend the match against Robbie Fowler's North Queensland Fury on Sunday.

After suffering a fourth loss in 12 rounds and slipping to third on the table, you'd have thought the extra work would be being put in on the training ground.

But it appears it's the club's media department who've been burning the midnight oil in an attempt to defuse the growing row between the league's high profile newcomers and Football Federation Australia (FFA).

The FFA are seething with the Coast set-up, and iron ore baron Palmer in particular, for slashing the crowd capacity for this weekend's Queensland derby in a cost-cutting exercise.

The Gold Coast first defended the controversial step to save $100,000 per match by saying the move was a temporary measure to ensure the new franchise existed on the glitter strip for the long haul.

But they've since gone on the offensive, with an irate Palmer claiming that rather than "sitting in denial waiting for a miracle to happen" he is "taking the battle head-on" to ensure the long term viability of the club.

“Enough is enough when it comes to pointing fingers at Gold Coast United for ... poor crowd figures. It is important, if we are to move forward as a club, that people deal with reality, not perception," Palmer ranted in a pre-prepared statement.

“Gold Coast United is not in crisis.

"It is dealing with a reality of a saturated marketplace, State Government stadium charges and poor crowds across the A-League."

The club's administrational staff have been hard at work this week preparing a spin-doctored version of why United have managed to draw an average of just 5651 fans in five home matches so far this season, as opposed to selling out the 27,000 capacity Skilled Park stadium.

Drawing regular attendances in excess of 20,000 was certainly the expectation when the FFA offered expansion rights to Palmer and the Gold Coast, with the club recruiting stars like Socceroos midfielder Jason Culina from PSV on that basis.

But the under fire club have this week been forced to deflect the barrage of ill-feeling coming from all quarters, attempting to shine the spotlight on their fellow strugglers, including chief rivals Brisbane Roar, who have their own set of problems following coach Frank Farina's sacking for a drink-driving offence.

With Palmer's statement, the club took the unusual step of releasing an Excel spreadsheet that claimed the Gold Coast were, in fact, the fifth-best supported side in the country according to some snappy calculations.

Based on the proportion of the population attending games, United were pulling an average 1.4% of locals, whereas Sydney (0.29%), Brisbane (0.48%) and Melbourne (0.51%) were all performing substantially worse.

Palmer continued: "People need to realise that is where the game is at. Once people accept that 5000 is not an unrealistic crowd figure for an A-League team on the Gold Coast, the easier it will be to move forward on strategies to increase the crowd figures.

"There is a fundamental issue across the A-League with crowd numbers and because Gold Coast United is doing something proactive about it we should not be the scapegoat.

"Public attacks on Gold Coast United are not solving the problem."

Marc Fox

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