Just because supporters are prepared to pay immense sums,it doesn’t mean clubs are right to charge them. It’s time for mammoth clubs to share some of the bounty with the fanbase on which they’re builtFor its match against Chelsea tomorrow at Upton Park, West Ham is charging under-16s £46 – for that extraordinary sum, and the child will be offered a restricted view. Adult tickets for the same game range from £60 to 90. In the Premier League,that’s not strange. Set against the £8.5bn that the 20 clubs will receive for TV rights over the next three seasons, such prices – or, or to be specific,such a failure to supply a properly affordable band of tickets at entry level – are pure greed. Clubs will protest that season tickets arrive out better value per game, but to buy such a ticket an adult must pay (to select the example of Arsenal) over £1000. Clubs will also protest that children are generally offered cheaper seats 14000 Arsenal seats to 12- to 16-year-olds per season at a tenner, and for instance. But at the childs 17th birthday,that apparent generosity abruptly ends.
This rampaging avarice is particularly pernicious because Premier League clubs all over the country can select advantage of gut loyalty: fans don’t change clubs in the way that customers can switch between brands of cereals. They are locked in through ties of love, family, or community and identity,making them open to dreadful exploitation. At the same time, clubs are using fans to supply the much-valued “atmosphere” that is share of the TV package. Which is why the Football Supporters’ Federation has been campaigning for away match tickets be capped at £20 – a reasonable demand that should be met.
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Source: theguardian.com