Perak head coach Steve Darby said that based on the attendance from last season, there should not be a good reason why the team cannot expect bumper crowds for the new format of the TM-Super League 2006-2007 season.Following a recent decision, the Super League has been expanded from just eight teams to 13 teams.

"We are not going to beat the attendance at Manchester United or for Liverpool matches but there is no reason why we cannot match those at Blackburn, Wigan, Bolton or West Ham," said Darby.

"If you look at previous records, we beat them several times last year especially in the TM-Malaysia Cup."

From an average attendance of around 15,000 to 16,000 in the Super League and the Tm-FA Cup, the fabulous run by the silver state in Malaysia's oldest competition saw the fans burgeoning during the knockout stages of the competition.

In the quarter-finals of the Malaysia Cup, more than 20,000 came to the Stadium Perak in Ipoh to see them dumped Pulau Pinang E&O while in the semi-finals, more than 35,000 witnessed Perak fell to eventual champion Perlis.

"I appreciate that the culture is different here where the crowds almost always follow a winning team," added Darby.

"But we have a group of hardcore fans and we hope to build on that by winning matches on a regular basis and trying to play entertaining, attacking football."

"There is already a massive interest in the first home game against Sarawak and we are expecting a huge crowd especially as we have four returning star players."

Perak's first match of the season is against Sarawak on 16th Dec, 2006 at the Stadium Perak.