After the depressing events at Wembley last Sunday Wednesday night’s FA Cup replay against Leyton Orient saw us give them good belting without ever having to go into top gear. Full credit to Orient for trying to play the game the right way and to their supporters for being loud and proud. A big pile of pooh to all those Gooner season ticket holders who couldn’t be arsed to either plot up or to pass on their seat to family or friends for the night. The number of empty seats despite the game being sold out was embarrassing.
It is a source of constant bafflement to me that so many season ticket holders don’t bother to turn up, pass on their seats informally to family or friends for games they’re either unable or unwilling to plot up for. It’s not as if Gold or Platinum membership at the Grove is cheap. Far, far from it. I’ve been told that the average number of paying punters coming through the gate at Arsenal is around 55,000. I’ve been unable to independently confirm that number with either the club or the Premier League as despite the fact that they know precisely how many people come through the turnstiles and how many tickets have been sold, they’re not saying in public.
How on Earth does Arsenal or football generally expect fans to engage in reasoned, informed debate and make intelligent proposals for fan-friendly changes if we can’t get access to the facts? In the USA and Canada, two countries which have a far more embedded culture of openness and freedom of information than we do, most professional sports leagues there release figures for both tickets sold and actual attendance. The “attendance” figures announced at Arsenal and all other Premier League clubs here is actually the number of tickets issued, not the number of people in the ground.
Arsenal and all other clubs should come clean on this issue. What’s to hide? Arsenal refuses requests from club shareholders to provide a breakdown of the huge amount of money spent by us every year on “other operating expenses” which runs at £50 million. The club’s response is that the figures in the accounts meet their obligations under the law and PLUS market rules (the junior stock market on which Arsenal Holdings plc shares are traded). True but how can the club expect fans to comment intelligently on whether this expenditure is appropriate and justified if we don’t know what it’s being spent on? The global figure tells us nothing except that we spend a lot of money on “other operating expenses”.
It’s entirely possible that I might agree that every penny of this sum is being spent wisely. The problem is I just don’t know. A classic example of football’s paranoia about openness. If I don’t like the way the Ford Motor Company conducts itself, I’m not satisfied with its products or customer service I have plenty of alternatives. Likewise if I don’t like the prices, quality or service at Sainsbury’s I can go to the Co-op or Tesco’s.
The majority of regular match-going football fans have a far deeper emotional and cultural attachment to their football club. Clubs have been quick to recognise and exploit that loyalty commercially. They’re not nearly so quick in giving supporters a meaningful say. I’m not going to go and watch the Spuds, West Ham Chelsea if I don’t like the way Arsenal treats me and values my support.
Arsenal has become better at listening to supporters but it’s still a very unequal relationship. I was disappointed that the board has decided to pass on the 2.5% increase in the VAT rate to 20% introduced in January this year to Silver and Red members. No doubt Platinum and Gold members will have this increase passed on when renewals become due for next season. That’s £38.83 on my current season ticket already, even if the club freezes prices for next season.
To be fair to Arsenal there’s only been one increase in ticket prices since 2004/5 in 2007/8 and that didn’t apply to the top category of either general admission or Club season tickets. The Premier League also decided to pass on the temporary reduction in VAT from 17.5% to 15% to supporters. That said, my seat at the Grove bears no resemblance to my seat at Highbury which was right next to the Directors’ Box eight rows from the front in the old East Stand upper tier. My current perch in block 112 of the East Stand upper tier at the Grove is significantly higher and further back than I was at Highbury and I’m fourteen rows from the front, the closest to the front that was available when we went to select our seats in the new ground. It’s not like for like.
The equivalent at the new ground would be Club centre block which is £19,000 for four seasons, or £4,750 a season. Yes, I’m still paying what I was at Highbury but for a markedly inferior view. It’s still a decent seat but not nearly as good as I had. If the club puts up the prices over and above the current levels at a time when many are losing their jobs or facing pay freezes or cuts then shame on them I say. The Arsenal Supporters’ Trust has called on the board not to put up prices. They’re absolutely right.
The club’s current thinking is that they have a long waiting list for season tickets. The problem is that the crowd is aging. Just look at the age range of most fans when you arrive at the ground on Saturday for our game against Sunderland. Then ask yourself where will the Arsenal fans come from in future decades? Most people get the football bug early in life. It’s highly unlikely that somebody in their thirties or forties is going to become a regular match-going, season ticket holding supporter. Younger and poorer fans are already priced out of most games with the exception of the Carling Cup. The board needs to indefinitely freeze ticket prices
Another important issue for many supporters is the lack of an adult choice to sit or stand, currently prevented by the legal requirement for all stadia hosting Premier League and Football League Championship games to be all-seated in order to receive a licence to admit spectators and the ground regulations which require fans to sit in those seats whilst watching the game.
This is a ludicrous imposition on the game. I understand why it was introduced in the aftermath of Hillsborough, but I didn’t agree with it then nor do I now. The late Lord Justice Taylor’s report into events at Hillsborough did NOT blame the fact that fans were standing rather than sitting for the 96 deaths at the Leppings Lane End. He blamed poor design, poor maintenance and neglectful, poorly co-ordinated and managed stewarding and policing and the fence in front of the terrace which prevented fans from escaping onto the pitch to avoid the crush.
Fans are literally voting with their feet. Last Sunday at Wembley both Gooners and Brummies stood throughout the Carling Cup Final at their respective ends in the lower tiers behind both goals. Most of those fans would have been standing because they wanted to. Some however will have been standing in some discomfort because they had to. It was either that or look at people’s backs rather than the game. This is a real problem for fans who either can’t stand at all for any length of time in comfort or who simply prefer – as I do – to sit. Introduce safe standing areas for those who so prefer and this problem would be greatly reduced, thus making football more inclusive, not less as the opponents of safe standing allege.
I spent twenty years standing on the old North Bank at Highbury. I loved every minute of it. I often lost my voice for many hours after games I’d sung so much and so loud. In 1988/89 I decided that the time had come for me to get a seat and so I did. I was older, lazier and earning a bit more money. That’s a choice that’s denied fans these days. In Germany they see things differently. They treat fans like adults. All the big grounds there have standing areas, including the best modern stadium I’ve ever been to, the Veltins Arena in Gelsenkirchen, home of Schalke 04.
The idea is spreading. Malmö FF’s new ground in Sweden, the Swedbank Stadion has a safe standing area. In Switzerland, the new stadium in Zürich to be shared by FC Grasshopper and FC Zürich will have likewise.
Similar stadia with safe standing areas have already or will be opening in Austria, the Netherlands and Norway. In the USA, Colorado Rapids – proprietor one Silent Stan Kroenke, also of this parish – has the first ever purpose built safe standing area in the USA. The idea has even caught on in American Football. The new Cowboys Stadium in Texas which recently hosted the Super Bowl has 35,000 standing spaces.
To their credit the Liberal Democrat Party has been the first of the major political parties in England & Wales to listen to what most supporters want. They passed a resolution at their 2008 annual conference in support of safe standing. Liberal Democrat MP for Bath Don Foster has introduced a Private Member’s Bill in the House of Commons calling for the safety regulations to be amended to permit safe standing. Good on him I say. The Bill comes up for a second reading in June.
The Football Supporters’ Federation (to which both Arsenal Football Supporters’ Club and Arsenal Independent Supporters’ Association are affiliated, as well as having lots of Gooners as individual members) is making strenuous efforts to lobby in support of the Don Foster’s Bill. They’re also pressing Sports Minister Hugh Robertson MP very hard on the issue. Robertson has written to the FA, Premier League and Football League to seek their views on the issue.
Incredibly, the response of the football authorities has been that that there is “no appetite” for safe standing amongst fans. Really? Every single survey of supporter opinion has come out overwhelmingly in favour of the choice to sit or stand, amongst fans that prefer personally – like me – to sit. As supporters we need to make sure that this argument is taken away from the football authorities.
You can do your bit by writing to your MP and telling them that you favour a safe adult choice to sit or stand as you and your fellow supporters prefer.
Just type in your home postcode and, presto, the contact details for your constituency MP. Whilst you’re at it you should also drop the FA and the Premier League a line to tell them you’re in favour of the choice to sit or stand:
Customer Relations Department
The Football Association
Wembley Stadium
P.O. Box 1966
London
SWIP 9EQ
Premier League
30 Gloucester Place
London
W1U 8PL might like to drop a line to Arsenal on this issue:
[email protected]
You
Peter Hill-Wood Esq
Chairman
Arsenal FC
Highbury House
75 Drayton Park
London
N5 1BU
Now let’s all concentrate on three points in the League against Sunderland tomorrow. Chelsea beating Manchester United has narrowed the gap at the top. If we can beat United at our place in May and match their results in the balance of our games we’ll be champions. The result at Stamford Bridge has put the title back into our hands again. We will have to cut out the pub team defending to achieve that but that’s got to be our goal.
Finally, my apologies for not responding to your posts on my blog over the last few weeks. I’ve been really banged out at work. I will start responding again as soon as I possibly can.
Keep the faith!
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