Last home match I went to I was also shocked by how quiet things have become but I just don't buy all this denial stuff and its "cos we are nervous we might not go up". Over the decades united have more often than not been in a relegation or promotion scrap each seaosn, and probably always will be, next season probably, so to blame this is tosh. We used to thrive on being the under dog, being in a scrap and making the 12th man count so lets not make weak excuses folks. Disappointing that anyone who points this out is "negative", just tellin the truth. When I see the vocal support other teams of our size get at home its now embarrassing.
A few thoughts
Saga Stand G & H
More often than not when we go away we get a stand behind a goal and most vocal home fans are in side stand up close to our lot to give us sme grief. Make G & H unallocated seating and allow our lot to do the same. A similar unallocated zone on the kop maybe.
Age Demographic
Maybe I'm wrong but when I look around BDTBL I see lots of good people that have been gooing for donkeys years and the average fan's age creeping up. As someone else pointed out recently, those fans that were vocal in the 70's and 80's might not be able to do the same these days for 90 minutes so the club maybe should try harder to bring in more youngsters to fill the ground. Sell a few thousand to youngsters for peanuts before each game but not via the cumbersome club ticket office but by things they use like e-bay.
Bramall Lane Upper Tier
Should be for utd fans for all matches where the opposition can't sell out the lower tier, let the away fans have the poorest view. Get utd fans on 4 sides of the ground again.
Away Support
I used to love the atmosphere at BDTBL but now prefer the atmosphere when we go away, much better, and we are the ones who make it that way, its our choice and not something somehow outside of our control and inevitable.