Saturday, 3pm. Even in the modern football age, the old tradition survives, at least at Carlisle United's level. But what if the Blues took a different path?

What if they suddenly left weekends free, in favour of staging Friday night football at Brunton Park?

Chairman and co-owner Andrew Jenkins, in his latest programme notes, said the possibility of holding the recent Oldham FA Cup tie on a Friday, under the lights, had been suggested by some members of staff.

It didn't get far enough to happen, since United's 3-2 win took place, as normal, on a Saturday. But what, Jenkins wanted to know, would people think about the idea of shifting some fixtures to the last day of the working week?

For his own part, the 81-year-old prefers his Saturdays. "I didn't agree [with the Friday night idea] as in the past evening games have drastically reduced the attendance," he wrote.

Opening the debate on social media brought forward a range of opinions. Some credited the club for at least considering new ideas and felt Fridays were at least worth a trial. The fact more people work Saturdays than before was advanced as another potential benefit for those keen to see their team.

More, though, were doubtful. As well as some who felt cynical about the club asking for fans' views on anything in light of how they responded to the Checkatrade Trophy survey results, there were other reasons for saying no to Friday nights.

They would not, some felt, be ideal for those with young children; others said the duty of heading to Brunton Park was the last thing they needed a couple of hours after clocking off on a Friday. Supporters who travelled by train saw another drawback, while some doubted whether United would market any Friday night initiative with enough gusto to make it work.

Then there was a broader view that said umpteen reasons exist for crowd sizes being as they are that have nothing to do with the day the team actually plays.

Jenkins' conclusion, meanwhile, that night crowds routinely drop does not always tally with Friday nights at the ground over the years - not that United have provided much evidence either way in recent times.

Indeed, one has to go back as far as 2005 for the last Friday night fixture at Brunton Park, while they have been sporadic at best since the turn of the 1980s (this discounts Easter fixtures on Good Friday, commonly held in the afternoon, or Friday afternoon games around Christmas).

In the 1960s, they were much more common, yet so much has changed in society, supporting habits and recreation in general since then to base an up-to-date appraisal on those times.

What emerges, through looking at Carlisle's general Friday-night form, is that the picture is by no means consistent. As you'd expect, many crowds depended on how well the team was doing at the time, the stage of season and time of year the games were held, and the geographical proximity of the visiting team.

A handpicked selection below:

Friday, May 6, 2005 - United v Aldershot

This game could have been staged on any day or night and still had the same boisterous effect.

It was Carlisle's Conference play-off semi-final second leg against Aldershot, Paul Simpson's side chasing a 1-0 deficit, and it brought 10,803 into the stadium: comfortably Brunton Park's biggest crowd of the campaign.

Many of those people ended up on the pitch, as United won a dramatic penalty shoot-out, and it surely mattered little that United were playing at the lowest tier in their history, or that the fixture wasn't staged on a Saturday.

The stakes were high, good feelings were returning to the club - and that night of bedlam will never be forgotten.

Friday, September 6, 2002 - United v Rochdale

The last Friday night league game at Brunton Park did not necessarily have the stadium packed out - but nor did it see a significant plummet in crowd.

For the 2-0 defeat to Rochdale, some 4,501 were in the ground. It was still early in an underwhelming season, which may explain why that September gate remained the 10th highest of United's home attendances that campaign.

A handful of big crowds early and late in the season meant it turned out to be slightly below United's 2002/3 average. At the same time, how many more would a home clash with Rochdale realistically have attracted if held a day later?

Many Saturdays proved less appealing to the fan base. On that night, meanwhile, Clive Platt and a certain Paul Simpson scored to leave Carlisle's fans heading for last orders with sorrows to drown.

Friday, March 23, 2001 - United v Torquay

Carlisle were in a relegation battle, and their visitors had further to travel than just about any other side in the League. Yet those facts didn't get in the way of a memorable Brunton Park Friday night.

Indeed, the 4,828 tempted to the stadium formed the biggest crowd of the season to date.

Two subsequent crowds overtook it, but there was still a fervent atmosphere on the evening Ian Stevens struck a 60th-minute winner for Ian Atkins' side.

Some of those in the ground had responded to a News & Star campaign for bigger crowds. Less flattering sentiments were also voiced against the regime, with Mark Knighton the subject of angry chants when he took his seat before kick-off.

It was, though, wrote this paper's Anthony Ferguson, "one of the best nights at Brunton Park for a long, long time."

Friday, August 25, 2000 - United v York

The first of two Friday night home games that campaign was the brainchild of new manager Atkins, who asked for the game to be put back from Saturday for two reasons.

The first was that he felt more fans would turn up, including "lads who play football on Saturday themselves", for Friday night football which the manager professed he had always enjoyed in the past.

The other was that Carlisle had a trip to Shrewsbury the following Monday and Atkins felt an extra few hours' preparation would help his side.

The latter, in the event, was also moved, for it clashed with the Shrewsbury Flower Show and was put back a day. Yet United still went ahead with their Friday game, not that it did much to appeal to the evening crowd.

After a grim display against York, it took a last-minute free-kick from Steve Soley to salvage a 1-1 draw. Yet the crowd, 4,087, was still above the season's average.

Friday, October 17, 1997 - United v Preston

Brunton Park's first televised Friday night fixture nonetheless brought one of the biggest crowds of the season to the stadium.

The visit of Preston - as close to a derby as the Blues had - saw 6,541 heading down Warwick Road.

United slumped to a 2-0 defeat in front of the Sky Sports cameras, with David Reeves starring for North End against his former club, the night also infamous for the solitary appearance of French midfielder Laurent Croci in a blue shirt.

The fact United failed to get out of a relegation battle is no doubt among the other reasons their attendances seldom hit the same heights from there.

Friday, December 18, 1987 - United v Cambridge

It should come as no surprise that United's lowest ever Friday night crowd came at a time when the Blues were amid their steepest decline.

Struggling at the foot of the Fourth Division after successive relegations, few were feeling festive as Christmas approached.

So low were spirits that only 1,843 turned up for the evening battle with Cambridge.

It was their second lowest crowd in the first half of the campaign, and Clive Middlemass' first win as manager - a 2-1 victory earned by Wes Saunders and John Halpin - did not lead to an immediate turnaround.

There were, in fact, even smaller gatherings as the Blues stumbled on, and it mattered not that their April game against Colchester came on a Saturday - for only 1,496 were there to see that one.

Friday, February 23, 1968 - United v Portsmouth

You have to go back to the 1960s for a time when Friday night football was, if not regular, then certainly much more frequent as far as Brunton Park is concerned.

It was also an era of serious progress by the club, with attendances generally high, and the long trip made by Portsmouth in 1968 still saw 11,976 in the stadium on a February night.

On an icy surface, John Rudge gave Carlisle the lead before Ray Hiron earned Pompey a point. Carlisle, under Tim Ward, were sixth in the second tier at the time, with Chris Balderstone among the stars of a high-quality side.

That game, though, still produced higher than the average crowd that campaign - proving that, where support is concerned, it's what you do that counts much more than when you do it.