Am I the only one who already hates Kunlun? Shanghai and Beijing has a population of over 20 million combined yet obviously, as seen, almost nobody is interested in a team they knew would be playing in KHL this season. Without magical stuff and significant development, not many will just say, "OK, let's go watch an ice hockey game!" and start filling the arena. Anyways, maybe it's because they play in Shanghai and hopefully things will get better in Beijing. Or... Did they play in Beijing? What legit team plays in two cities? Meh.
Did they really though? I mean officially everyone was only made aware that the team would be playing in the KHL in July, when they were accepted (officially) into the league. The team has been in existence for 2 months and you are surprised that there is no fan awareness and or interest? And even then, there didnt seem to be much of a campaign to gather fans before the start of the season.
If this was a club that was brought up from the Asia Hockey League I could understand your stand point (a little) more, but this is a team that only "existed" on paper until the first contract was signed. Ive said it in the Kunlun thread before, this expansion was unnecessarily rushed and there was no time for any fan awareness campaign. In a hostile market in regards to hockey! It doesnt matter if its Shanghai or Beijing! And ticket prices close to NHL level won't help one bit with this!
I mean look at the NHL expansion of Las Vegas for comparison:
They were accepted into the league at about the same time, but only start next year.
They drummed up support and had fan awareness and ticket drives to generate interest. (They just capped season ticket sales because they sold all of them in two months with proper marketing).
I know the background is different because its the first major franchise to call Vegas home, but that should be all the more reason to shake heads over this ludicrous expansion timeline in the KHL.
) and Kuznya. Biggest riser by far is Dynamo Minsk (+2k), then Spartak.
