Fulham's Bad-Taste Ticket Promo Deserved The Backlash - Here's Why

Fulham's Bad-Taste Ticket Promo Deserved The Backlash - Here's Why

Premier League Blog

Fulham’s Bad-Taste Ticket Promo Deserved Backlash - Here’s Why

It’s no shock to anyone that Fulham have an atmosphere problem. From personal and from other away fans' experiences, Craven Cottage is comfortably one of the worst atmospheres in the Premier League. But the opportunity for fans to increase and help improve the atmosphere is being taken away from them.

Why is it so quiet?

There’s a good number of reasons for the atmosphere problem over at Craven Cottage. However, the biggest problem is purely down to the extortionate ticket prices that home fans face. Local match-going fans are being priced out of the club they support, and in their place are tourists or day trippers who only attend to watch the game. They aren’t there to support Fulham or help the atmosphere improve; they are simply there to say, “I went to a football game.”

Now let’s go over the prices of the newly built Riverside Stand when they face Manchester City on the 2nd of December. Make sure you’re sitting down when reading this section because you may just faint when I list off these prices.

  • Adult ticket: £160
  • U18: £80
  • Senior (65+): £140
  • Young Adult (18-21): £140

A family of four would set you back a whopping £480. And I can go even worse than this, if that’s even possible.

For a RESTRICTED view seat in the Johnny Haynes Stand, these are the prices:

  • Adult: £107
  • U18: £83
  • Senior (65+): £101
  • Young Adult (18-21): £101

One thing I’ve just realised when writing is that a restricted view seat for a U18 is £3 more expensive than a non-restricted view seat in the Riverside Stand. What are they smoking over in West London?

But yes, those prices are correct, and I haven’t just added a zero on them by mistake. Regular people can’t afford those prices; they feel distant from their own club, and despite obviously still wanting to attend the team they support, they simply can’t, and it’s incredibly sad to see. Moreover, it is an unfortunate reality that Fulham aren’t the only club pricing out fans, but that’s a story for another day.

Sander Berge to the Rescue

Fulham faced Wolves on the weekend, and the Cottagers comfortably saw off Wolves in a 3-0 win; however, that wasn’t the main talking point of the tie. Prior to the game, during the build-up to it, Fulham posted a video across their social media of Sander Berge seemingly asking Fulham fans to buy tickets to the game because they hadn’t sold out. However, due to the backlash, the video has been taken down across all platforms.

The Fulham man said, “We need your support as always. Buy your tickets if you haven’t got one already.” An incredibly out-of-touch move by the club in order to try and guilt-trip fans into buying tickets that they might not be able to afford. Getting a player to do their dirty work made it look that much more tone-deaf.

But it goes to show the club know there is a ticket/supporter issue, but instead of trying to actually address the real issue (the ticket prices), they decide to get one of their players to beg for fans to buy tickets.

Deserved Backlash

Following the post, prominent football journalist Henry Winter was the biggest critic of the stunt. His tweet gained a huge amount of attention amongst football fans, getting 1.1 million views.

He agrees with how the club shouldn’t be using players in the way Fulham used Sander Berge and how Fulham “risk losing more fans’ loyalty”. Winter summed it up perfectly in the last paragraph about how cheaper tickets, despite being cheaper, will lead to increased revenue in the long run.

I seem to be banging on about greedy owners in every article I write, but once again the trend continues, and here I am, banging on about owners. They constantly remain out of touch with the footballing world, and nothing will change unless more people like Henry Winter speak up about it, as an increased audience on the issue will put pressure on the people in charge.

Thomas Davies-Crisp
Thomas Davies-Crisp Brighton and Hove Albion Correspondent

Thomas Davies-Crisp - Brighton and Hove Albion Correspondent at Football Park

Meet Thomas. He is a graduate from the University of Brighton who studied Sports Journalism. During his time on the three-year course, he learned all forms of Journalism, from live blogs, match reports, interviews, reactionary pieces, writing features and many more.

Thomas is also a massive Brighton fan so perfectly suited for his role. He's held a season ticket for 10+ years as well as travelling up and down the country following the Seagulls. His favourite game being his first European away day in Amsterdam as Brighton beat Ajax 2-0. Being a huge Brighton fan it's helped him gain huge knowledge of the ins and outs of the club and what it truly means to be a fan.

Being new to the Sports Journalism industry and having just graduated, Thomas is always keen to learn and develop his writing to become better each day, he hopes he can bring his own twists on certain matters going on at Brighton over here at Football Park.

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