ROB GUTMANN is joined by Gareth Roberts and Spirit of Shankly’s Jay McKenna to discuss the controversies surrounding Liverpool Football Club’s announcement of an entirely new tiered structure of ticket pricing ahead of the 2016/2017 season to coincide with the opening of the new Main Stand.
In a broad discussion concerning the last 24 hours, the panel, lead by Jay, discuss the process and conversations between the ‘Ticketing Working Group’ and Liverpool Football Club that have been taking place over the last 13 months.
Gareth, Rob and Jay then talk about the fall-out around the announcement, what progress has been made and where they think the club might have managed both the process and the outcome in a different manner.
Such is the importance of the subject of discussion the podcast is being published outside of the paywall as we would like to encourage debate around the subject amongst all fans and hopefully within the walls of the club.
Its good to know there are people out there not just accepting these changes, its hugely disappointing the club seem to have not listened in the main.
On Saturday I’ll be watching Liverpool v Sunderland for £53, the atmosphere will be dead. I don’t know how much longer I can carry on with this. I’m a member and its the only way I get a ticket.
It seems so obvious that everyone benefits from a model more aligned to the bundesliga.
I’m scared that the people I see every week, with the ipads, and the backpacks and the cameras won’t blink at a £77 ticket because whats an extra £20/30/£40 once a year?
I think people will pay these prices to the huge detriment of the atmosphere and ultimately the club. I hope they don’t.
Please don’t slag off people for whom coming to Anfield maybe a life time experience. Someone coming over from California wont care if its £77. Season ticket holders want cheap/er tickets, club wants more money. People who can actually afford to spend the dough for a season ticket when 2 million people went to food banks this year should not be complaining. Our problems are entirely first world problems. Why not watch the games in the pub and donate your season money to a charity.
It’s not the fault of season ticket holders that we have food banks, that’s the government’s. Typical supporter v supporter stance and attitude that, that’s why the people that run football clubs get away with taking us all for a bunch of dickheads.
Why should they go and watch it in a pub and donate to charity instead? Even though the atmosphere at Anfield can generally be considered pathetic at times, I’d still rather be there than in a pub if I can afford to be.
These increases, they’ret not right. End of.
With our shitty league position isn’t this a perfect time to “boycott” the home games in the league? Can that be organized by the supporters groups amongst the locals that’s still going?
We’ve seen that people in the streets or banners in the stadium has little or no effect. You usually aren’t being showed that on the telly anyway so how can people from the outside (the so called none dedicated supporter) be made aware of the problem?
If something drastically is going to be done it must start with every local supporter.
Talking obviously hasn’t worked.
Definitely time for action.
Walkouts
Arrive late
Boycotts
No flags
No singing YNWA
Pickets
Marches
The whole 9yds…
Fuck them the cheeky pricks
Although it’s depressed me even more after freezing at Leicester last night, this has been illuminating. Jay is clearly a balanced man – not something I necessarily thought before… I’m a pensioner with a Kop season ticket for 25 years, and a regular much longer, away and home. I sat low in the Centenary last week for West Ham, it was a library, a real shock. Away games are also getting a bit too quiet for my own liking, especially London games.
Age will eventually stop me going, but I want to be there with my soon-to-be-3 year old grandson before I give it up.
Maybe that’s now just a dream.
Thanks for trying Jay – don’t give up the fight tho’, cause you’re so correct on so many aspects.
It appears to be a cynical ploy by the owners to create winners and losers within the ground in terms of ticket prices whilst increasing their overall match day revenue. Divide and rule, which will make it less likely that the whole fan base will unite and get behind boycotts, protests and initiatives to put pressure on them to make changes.
It is a missed opportunity to lead the way on fairer ticket prices and is hard to stomach. So where is all the extra tv money going? Even more for players and agents? This is what happens when there’s no effective regulation and just mirrors what’s happened in British society generally.
I appreciate the efforts of SOS and the other supporters groups who have tried to fight against ordinary fans being fleeced. Let’s get behind them and try to put more pressure on FSG.
Freezing KOP Season Ticket prices would indicate that the Club realise where the passion and noise is generated.
Tickets priced from £9 – £77 is utterly ridiculous however. I
£77 is too high but equally £9 is too low and not representative of what is on offer.
I appreciate we need to attract the next generation but a paltry amount of tickets at a ridiculously low price isn’t going to achieve anything !
£30 for adults and £20 for Juniors is about right in my opinion. Let the Club fleece the corporate set not the core support !
I’ve been on the KOP since 95 when they rebuilt the stand. Our season tickets work out around £38 per game. I haven’t got a massive issue with that price tbh.
Keep up the good work guys despite the recent slap in the face from the Club !
Interesting listen..all be it alot of subjective points made based on a platitude argument.
I also just wish that one day..just one day the constant reference to the “out of town” fan isnt rammed down our throats..It always seems to be a thing here..”foreign tweets” was mentioned by GR.
Ie tweets outside a certain IP RANGE..wtf?
Shouldnt ticket pricing be an issue for all.LFC fans..
Take foreign cash but limit their involvement..
I will still maintain. Ticket pricing is a symptom of the bigger problem of football in England. It is money driven on every level.
Lfc are playing the game like everyone else. Platitude arguments cannot work in an economic driven ecosytem.
This is the game.
Truth be told SOS et al are lucky they got a sniff of a discussion. Other clubs are far more ruthless.
The only way to reign this in is through Government and or Legislation.
While I am on the same side of the pod guests, this wasn’t really a “debate”.
How do you propose we could have changed the dynamic, Brandon? Rob did his best to offer alternative views. We invited the club and they said no. Not sure what else we could do.
I thought Rob did a good job of trying to play devil’s advocate of the club’s position. What I think was missing from the debate is someone representing the supporter who would be prepared to pay the higher ticket price for 2-3 matches a year.
It would be great if there was another podcast where someone argued that side of the debate. Although obviously might prove tricky to do as they mostly live overseas.
Great podcast as always guys. I am a die-hard Liverpool fan from New York. The steroid issues in baseball and, the shenanigans that go on in college sports recruiting and the rule changes to american football has turned me off to American sports over the years and in that time the EPL has become more and more accessible and is now the sport I care about more than any other.
For Americans it is hard to relate to the ticket cost controversy initially because in the US a Yankees ticket a few rows from the field might cost $1000 even for a normal home-game of which there are 81 per year. These seats are always taken up by corporate people, not the loyal fans. For NY Giants football or Knicks basketball tickets, good seats are equally inaccessible for your average fan.
This is the way its been for years in the US and it has only gotten worse by the season. So, I can understand FSG not being amenable on some level, but the way that you guys break it down it certainly would be better strategically to have a lively, intimidating stadium full of mostly local fans. That would translate to points, better table position and getting further in tournaments which would in turn make more money for the club.
Certainly LFC wouldn’t blink at spending a few million on a player that might make a 3 point difference in the table, so you would think getting a more supportive audience for the same figure would be equally as valuable.
One question that someone else might have a better answer to though… The atmosphere now is not great and certainly some players might argue that they’re not exactly feeling “supported” by the fans when they step on the pitch these days… So in theory you’d need to significantly reduce, not simply keep the prices the same to have a chance at winning the favor of the fans right?
Excellent pod, Jay was very calm and articulate and the show was long enough to go in the depth the subject deserves.
What FSG are doing is simply not sustainable. I am not a season ticket holder and never will be, I am a life long Liverpool fan that wants to take his kids to the match once or twice a year. I did this for the first time againt Bordeaux when there were cheap tickets £25 for me and £12.50 for two of my three kids.
£50 bargain, except is in’t, because you all have to become members that costs £68 for the three of us and when i tried to buy more tickets for the second half of the season i was too late. To get to and from Anfield on a Thurday night from the Lakes plus food costs another £80 and so it has now cost over £200 for the game. As i was driving home the question of value popped into my head, for all three of us to be members of Windermere Golf Club is about £350 for the year
When we have been to Lords it cost about the same but we had all day and met different friends over beer in the ground.
When people give up their season tickets the club expects people like me to replace them, but they are in for a shock because even if we could its too much hassle to go to the match and although watching the game live is far better than in the pub it is not £300 better and once you start to pay over £200 for something you start to think of other things you spend the money on. Regular match goers organise their life around the match and once these people and their mates stop going they are not going to be replaced because unless you live within an hour of Liverpool and have 5k spare each year and loads of time off work available it is impossible and even if you do have the means to do this your social life is already built around other things and other people. There are a generation of peolpe that go to the pub with their mates to watch the match and for many this is the only time you go to the pub and many pubs empty once the match is over.
There is a long wait for season tickets, but of those on the waiting list how many are now able to go if they were offered, Robbo waited 16 years so when he put his name down how much was a season ticket? £200 ? £300 ? How many people have moved away from the area or have young children or old children?
15 – 20 years ago Windermere Golf club had a waiting list to join, now they offer reduced price for the first two years and anybody under the age of 60 is considered young! That is because most people that can afford to live in the Lakes are retired and those that are not, are working, and don’t have the time to play golf. Anfield has an old crown, the same crowd as 20 years ago but those that were 40 are now 60, they have seen the best football any crowd has ever seen but they have not seen it for the past two seasons and CL football once since Rafa and that was embarressing.
They have a right to be pissed off and this for some could be the final straw, they may give it another year or two but in 5 years? Then who will replace them?
Any ideas as to what fans like me who follow the Reds since a young lad…can do to show our support for the match going fans?? I now live in France but me mum is still in Liverpool & so I always try to get tickets…unfortunately it’s just impossible..the last time I paid 100 each for me & my son for “Hospitality” tickets…in 2011 of course we were made up but it was only against Bolton & the hospitality was a cheap meal in the Sandon…even had to pay for the drinks !! This has been going on too long..LFC fans deserve better treatment especially today….supporting a team of overpaid players who underperform a bit too often for my liking. Despite that I never miss a game on either rubbish streams or pay TV over here…I’d love to be able to do my part…but I’m not switchin the tv off at 77 on saturday…must be something more concrete to do???ANY IDEAS ???
FSG’s true “colors” revealed at last. All you super-fans claiming cynics like myself were pricks because we could see they were boosting the books at the expense of the team. Whacha saying now, eh?
Assets up, payroll %age down to 52% of income, team dogshit, no real stars left, mid-table crap with an occasional cup run. Stand well under way (forget the Annie Rd project). ‘Tis almost time to cash in their investment.
77 minutes tomorrow, time to leave…
I listen to most podcasts TAW do. And love the content but the “ticket debate” has me fuming. I’m a member who can only get tickets for auto cup games and the odd league game. I would love the opportunity to pay £77 to get to watch a derby ,a cat A game or God forbid an away game but no chance I can have a restricted view for maybe a Bournemouth game or a mid week cup game that doesn’t really matter. I can sing and create an atmosphere just as much as any other fan given the chance. So it really is simple if you can’t afford the increase change your seat, if you can’t afford your season ticket go to less games as a member and less someone else get the chance to take their child to the game and create the atmosphere. I’m not someone who condons the club ripping the fans off but from what was said on the podcast some people want to realise how lucky they already are .
Thought Jay spoke brilliantly on the pod and I’m fully behind the fight to make tickets affordable.But his tweets and retweets on twitter today I feel will ultimately weaken the cause.Saying those who don’t walk out on 77 will always walk alone in tbe fight against ticket prices is antagonistic to not only those who are torn on the issue,but also those who support the fight but feel that particular protest is the wrong way to go.Civil war among supporters needs to be avoided at all costs or the campaign is doomed before it really gets going.Jay needs to lead and avoid confrontational comments/tweets where they’re not required.Highlight and educate and keep the message simple and also leave the propaganda to the club.When you’re in the right,keep the message as simple as possible,avoid making it about net spends or the quality on the pitch because that subliminally suggests that if the team was better or the net spend was higher,these prices would be justified.Quite simply point out that the people who the club was built by and built for are being priced out of supporting their team and if they dissapear,so does the clubs soul and identity.All these other things confuse the issue and give the club more to work with when it comes to their spin and propaganda.
I’m one of those who will have a ST costing £1000+ which is definitely too much, so my sister and cousin will share it with me – until the American blood suckers end that practice.
I moved to the Main Stand after many years of Kop Choir membership and whilst it was a bit of a culture shock at least I was among ‘proper’ supporters with great banter and the occasional heated argument. However over time I have become surrounded by an ever changing group of people who are either low end corporate ‘visitors’ who have no clue what’s going on or are supporters having a rare treat and expect to be entertained in between texting and taking photos – all dispiriting.
So although only being able to attend fewer games next season the blow is lessened by not missing the vacuum around me. This is the way the owners want it to go – get old gits like me out who spend fu*k all apart from the ticket and long for the good old days, and replace them with high value transient ‘customers’ who don’t know any better.
This model is a short term success story designed to maximise income and make the Club attractive to potential purchasers. FSG will be gone as soon as they reckon they can get maximum return on their investment leaving the Club finished as a traditional football club, more an investment vehicle which sells football – no loyalty, no Scouse heritage and no soul.
I hope I’m wrong and it’s comforting to know that I usually am.
How advantageous would it be for FSG if groups like the SOS and Spion Kop did not exist? If fans like Jay and his mates were priced out? When FSG bought LFC it was following the brilliant efforts of the above that brought wall street to its knees. This made Liverpool a hot potatoe and a risk for any investor. 2 million quid is nothing to FSG but everything to the ST fans, if the SOS and Spion Kop were priced out then it would be so much easier for FSG to sell the club having ‘broken the union’. This is why this is so important. Most things in football are now about money and this has been increased since Sky arrived and celebrate a new billionaire owner like a CL victory.
This debate should not be focused on the price of tickets £30 /£50/£77/£100, but on the long term objective of removing long term loyal existing fans and wanting to replace them with anyone that can afford it. The price of the ST ticket is just the mechanism used to do this. When season tickets and gate revenue were the main source of income then you could argue that the club needs to charge more to attract top players, but the new TV and sponsorship deals obliterate that argument. There are ways of making tickets available if the club want to do this, but it is more beneficial to remove season ticket holders like Jay. As an out of towner / wool myself, i would like to go to more games but not at the expense of removing fans that have been going for years and have organised their lives around going to the match. The club was built on its support and people like Jay that fight the establishment, as a city its what Liverpool is all about, its why Shanks loved it because it has always stuck two fingers up to the rest of the world. Its how the club and its fans conquered Europe its why so many fans from around the world want to support Liverpool and why beating Chelsea in 2005 was so great because it was a victory of spirit, fight and history over money, and this is being fundamentaly and incrementally broken by FSG because they prefer more affluent members of society that cannot mobilise themselves to protest because they do not need to, because they can afford it, and because logistically it is impossible. They are using classic divide and splinter tactics to marginalise the support and you can bet that sky will be in their element pointing out how much it costs to go to all the London clubs as if this was a good thing.
We would mock the Mancs with all their fans from London / South East / moneyville but these are the type of ‘customers’ that FSG want to replace supporters like Jay with, and it is wrong and action needs to be taken, and the wider fan base needs to ask itself what sort of club it wants to support, one that embraces people like Jay or one that wants to replace him, because there is no point in supporting Liverpool if non of the local lads can afford to go to the match because you have just culturally changed the reason for supporting the club in the first place, first and foremost the club should represent the city and the cities people, which is why Liverpool embodies scousers and Chelsea embodies rich obnoxious wankers. What is the point of supporting Liverpool if all the scousers are priced out? You don’t have to be a scouser to support Liverpool but you should respect that it is the historic scouse support that was channelled by Shanks and the boot room boys together with a strong scot and celtic influence that created the club and that it is wrong that families that have been going to the match are being priced out, and it does not matter what that price is, it is the principal of them being priced out. Yes these families are privileged to be ST holders in the same way that if you are born into a family that has a house overlooking the sea you are privileged, but they should not apologise for it, be grateful yes, but not apologise.
Money and privilege do not always go hand in hand. I was born into a family in Troutbeck in the Lake District, we rented our house and it cost £15 a week when my mum was paid £2 per hour, so even though our rent was cheap it was still a lot of money to us. I was privileged to grow up in a wonderful village that will now cost you £600k + for a 1 bed cottage and when the next rich nobhead pays £800k for the next house everything else will look a bargain. Even if i could live in Troutbeck now i would not. The reason is because it is full of rich nobheads, all the people i knew have either died or moved away for work, give or take the odd farmer. Troutbeck as a working class village has gone and all the spirt and sence of community has gone. Of course the people in the village have been replaced and from the outside it looks the same except porsches have replaced the old grey fergies (one for the real wools that).
Getting back to Liverpool, all because you have a ST it does not mean you should have to be priced out for the privilege. FSG does not need the money but it can see it as a way of getting rid of troublesome ST holders to the detriment of the club itself. All because FSG own the assetts and business does not mean it owns the club and its support. This is what the fight is about because if not the ground will be full of rich nobheads like Troutbeck, with the locals priced out and the spirit, community and family values lost forever. Its happened across the Lake District for 30 years, don’t let it happen at Anfield if you value the club. Owners, are only knobheads with money and should be replaceable, unlike season ticket holders, that should be cherished for generations.