Off Topic My sincere apologies - moving on!

Hi

May I firstly apologise that I was not at the game yesterday and therefore was not directly on hand to help in regards to our supporters who with deep regret, were not able to get into the game at Woking.

I received several messages on twitter and other means around 3.20 and began to act immediately by contacting my fellow directors of the situation.

May I offer my thanks to them for immediately responding and were already responding, including the Chairman. Realising that there was space in certain parts of the ground, Nick put maximum pressure on their Chairman to open those areas and allow our supporters in. I only understand from hearsay, that their Chairman responded, spoke to the Police and this request was rejected, but I cannot confirm this.

May I make it clear that the safety and welfare of all concerned is paramount and if there is a dangerous situation then those responsible must be obeyed and remembering at the same time, that the staging of a home game is the responsibility of the home club and their decision is final.

However, in my own personal view, and again I was not there, is that it is safer to have people in a stadium rather than outside on the street - providing there are sufficient facilities to accommodate them. I am disappointed this did not happen.

I have spoken to the Chairman this morning as I promised I would.
Nick makes it absolutely clear that Woking were advised by BRFC that we were expecting in excess of 1,500 supporters to attend the game. It was Woking's decision therefore not to make the game all ticket and to charge on the gate.
Clearly, they felt they had sufficient room in a stadium, catering for over 6,000 to do this. Secondly, they no doubt appreciated that the Rovers allocation would have been greatly restricted, possibly to 600 on an all ticket game and this would have had an effect on matchday revenue. They must also have been aware from our other away games that Rovers away support is constantly in excess of 1,200 and this attendance yesterday was not uncommon.

So where do we go to from here?

1. Firstly, again may I offer my sincere apologies to those of you who travelled and could not get in. Thank you for making the effort and spending money to travel.

2. I have asked Nick if in future, particularly at small grounds like Dover, we recommend all-ticket to prevent this happening again, but again this is the choice of the home team.

3. That we do continue to emphasis to the club's we visit of our potential support and ensure sufficent space to cater for everyone- but this does go without saying, as the club does this already.

If you have any suggestions which may help avoid this in future then please do email me at [email protected] and I will pass these ideas on.

best wishes

Brian SS

 

Thanks Brian for this. It is a shame that the blame was put on our club by Woking FC and I am glad that this is being corrected. Keith Brookman yesterday during commentary said that he wasnt aware of Woking contacting our club to suggest an all ticket game for our fans. Why would they contact us when if they make it all ticket that they will lose out on lots of revenue. So I am disappointed in Wokings response to pass the blame to our club. If they did contact our club, I wonder who they spoke to!

Moving on though, suggestions to help avoid this again from happening will be hard to find. The home club is responsible for segregation and we took more than what they were prepared to allow. If the game is not all ticket, we cant pursuade people not to watch their team. That would be stupid. I think some communication between the 2 clubs is key. Wokings capacity is over 6000. Look as their attendances and you will see they never get over 3000 (apart from playin us). So there is a massive space in the ground to fit all of our travelling fans in. So surely communicating with Woking asking them in advance to segrate a bigger area to allow the potential for more away fans could solve the issue? Especially when that extra area wont be filled by the home fans anyway. Maybe communicate in advance now will all remaining clubs we are due to face away and get them to prepare a bigger away alloaction or to make it all ticket if they are not prepared to give a bigger area. If they dont give a bigger area then they lose out when its made all ticket.

Thanks again Brian

 

Someone posted this on another forum....

So going by BSS comment, during the game when our club was informed of what was going on outside the ground, Higgs tried to pressure Woking into letting our locked out fans in. Going by the comment above from a fan who was locked out, the police and stewards were happy to let the locked out fans in. However both BSS and the fan above has stated that Woking refused the entry to the locked out fans. Then when asked why they didnt let the locked fans in, they blame Rovers. I hope our club puts in a complaint about this.

 

OFFICIAL WOKING CLUB STATEMENT:

Last November, when planning the above fixture, there was a misunderstanding between Woking and Bristol Rovers and, consequently, the Club decided to plan ahead for this fixture, working closely together with the police and the Club’s Safety Officer. The Club wish to make it clear that Bristol Rovers did not refuse its request to sell tickets.

The advice and intelligence reports were to expect approximately 1600 to 1700 Bristol Rovers fans to attend the game and the Club’s planning was based on these figures.

Due to the configuration of Kingfield Stadium, the maximum number of away fans the Club can accommodate is 1900, which is written into the Club’s safety certificate.

When the number of away fans reached 1,869, the Club’s Safety Officer and police took the decision that the gates were to be closed due to a concern about crowd safety on the away fans' terrace. Regrettably, a number of Bristol Rovers supporters were unable to gain entry to the game.

Other parts of the ground were not filled to capacity, but the Club’s safety certificate forbids the mixing of home and away supporters when the game is designated to be a segregated game and, reluctantly, therefore, the Club could not allow the excess fans to enter the ground under any circumstances.

The Club wish to apologise to the Bristol Rovers fans who were unable to see the game, but wish to stress that it must also abide by its safety certificate.

http://www.wokingfc.co.uk/news/article/4862/club-statement-woking-v-bristol-rovers/

 

Then straight after the Woking club statement came Rovers club statement....

The success achieved on the pitch by Darrell Clarke’s side this season is being recognised by an increasing number of the club’s supporters.

The number of those who are prepared to travel to away games to back their side seems to be taking some Vanarama Conference sides by surprise and that was certainly the case on Saturday when over 2,000 of you made the trip to the Kingfield Stadium to see our game against Woking.

It was a truly magnificent turnout for an away fixture at this level, and the backing you gave the players was outstanding and very much appreciated.

Unfortunately, as many as 200 of you were unable to gain admittance to the ground and we sincerely regret that was the case and have been investigating the reasoning behind the decision to leave so many of you standing outside once the game had kicked off.

Senior staff at the club have been in discussion with Woking officials this morning and they have confirmed that at no time did Bristol Rovers refuse to sell tickets for this match and have issued a statement on their official website.

Contrary to reports that appeared in this morning’s newspaper, the capacity for away fans would not have been reduced to 600 if the game had been made all ticket as the away capacity for Kingfield is 1,900 and the official away attendance given by Woking for Saturday’s match was 1,869.

We fully understand the frustration felt by those supporters who traveled to the game and were unable to gain admittance but regret that the situation was beyond our control.

http://www.bristolrovers.co.uk/news/article/woking-ticket-statement-2213868.aspx

 

The sooner we rid our selfs of Health & Safety, & those that hide behind it, the better !!!

 

While frustrating for the people who did not get in, you can understand why they had to do what they did on the day.
The only way to solve this is to make every away game all ticket - then fans know where they stand before travelling

 

Issue with that though smhbcfc is that some people decide last minute to go depending on work or other commitments. Also its not easy if you live further out to get a ticket. And of course all ticket games go one sale 1st to season ticket holders. Those who dont have a season ticket for whatever reason may miss out on a ticket. Imagine that you live up north by Newcastle so unable to attend home games that often meaning waste of money getting a season ticket. Then on your doorstep you have Gateshead so you plan to watch Rovers vs Gateshead but its made all ticket and all the tickets sell out to season ticket holders before it goes on general sale. Not fair to a lot of fans if made all ticket.