Chris Waters: It’s time for fans to rise up in protest against greedy owners

MICE, uncooked chicken, dead insects, out-of-date food, cobwebs, flaking paintwork, empty soap dispensers, leaking pipes, filthy extractor fans, no hot water to hand basins, poor lighting, missing tiles...

No, not the state of play at my house (honest), just some of the many attractions available to supporters at the Premier League football grounds of England and Wales.

A new report into environmental conditions at our 20 Premier League clubs has revealed some shocking findings – ones that prove that, when it comes to football clubs’ priorities, poor old supporters come way down the list.

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Only Arsenal scored top marks with inspectors with no contravention of legislation witnessed; otherwise, most clubs were pulled up for some thing or other, with Manchester United memorably instructed to “continue to monitor and react to the mouse activity”.

Where Arsenal have not scored so highly, however, is in terms of the ticket prices they set for the current season, which are comfortably the highest in England’s top flight.

The most expensive match-day ticket at the Emirates Stadium, pictured right, is £126, while the dearest season ticket is £1,955.

These issues of facilties and ticket prices go hand in hand.

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For just as most clubs are falling below standard on the former, so they are charging over the odds on the latter, which means that the privilege of attending a football ground with mice, dead insects and out-of-date food for company has never been higher.

In an effort to make watching football more affordable (an oxymoron if ever there was one), the Football Supporters’ Federation has launched a national campaign to cut ticket prices at Premier League stadia.

It followed Manchester City returning 912 unsold tickets, priced £62 each, for last week’s match at the Emirates Stadium.

Incredibly, the cost of watching football has risen to five times the level of inflation in the past 14 months.

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Considering the economically-challenged times in which we live, ticket prices have become a national scandal.

Lord Triesman, the former Football Association chairman, put it well recently when he warned that watching football could soon become the preserve of the wealthy.

He blamed spiralling player-wages for the excessive price hikes.

“I think it will prevent the next generation from really seeing live football other than on very unusual occasions every so often when clubs will give away the tickets,” he said. “Most of the causes of the increases are driven by the salaries paid to players.

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“As it is, it will become a sport in which relatively well-off people will be able to go and watch it live and nobody else.

“That seems to me to be a tragic historic reverse.”

It is not just admission prices, however, that need attention.

A recent survey showed that a cup of tea at Manchester United costs £2.50; a match-day programme at Leeds United is £4 and the cost of a pie at Kidderminster Harriers is also £4.

Considering that Kidderminster are in the Blue Square Premier League – four divisions below the Premiership – £4 should be the cost of attending their games – not the cost of a pie.

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Writing as one who has the misfortune to support Kidderminster’s Blue Square bretheren Lincoln City, I can report that the situation is no better at the lower end of the scale.

It costs me £16 to watch a Blue Square match at Sincil Bank, where the facilities can also leave much to be desired.

When I attended my first game of the current season in August (coincidentally against Kidderminster), I was horrified to discover that the seats were literally covered with cobwebs because no-one had apparently cleaned them in the summer.

Although I was prepared to give the club the benefit of the doubt, my heckles rose when the problem persisted.

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Eventually, I took to wiping down my seat with a handkerchief before sitting down – I should have sent the Lincoln chairman a dry-cleaning bill, along with a request to make sure there is soap and hot water in the toilets in future.

The problem with football, of course, is that many clubs take their supporters for granted – particularly at the highest level.

Arsenal can afford to price season tickets at £1,955 precisely because they know that, if one person will not pay it, another one will.

Of course, the only way to change things at football grounds is to rise up in protest.

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The answer, as Manchester City’s supporters are saying, is to vote with one’s feet.

It is to lobby and whinge until the problem is sorted.

It is to hit the greedy where it hurts the most – in the pocket.

The flip side, of course, is that supporters are addicted to watching their teams.

For many, the idea of “punishing” the powers-that-be is no good if one simply ends up punishing oneself by not attending games.

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Clubs have a huge emotional pull over their fans and are only too aware of it.

Some believe they can more or less treat them how they wish.

Football fans, when you think about it, must tolerate much.

If it is not extortionate ticket prices and abject facilties, it is ineffective stewarding, ear-splitting PA systems, people standing up in front of them so they cannot see the pitch, and so on.

That latter point is a particular bug-bear. Week after week you see people standing in all-seater stadia, oblivious to the fact that poor old Joe Bloggs behind them cannot see a thing, with stewards simply standing idly by.

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When someone stood up in front of me at Sincil Bank the other week, I politely asked if he would mind sitting down.

After he had finished wiping the look of contempt off his face, he sneered: “There’s plenty of other places to sit, you know”, apparently oblivious to the irony that we were watching Lincoln City, where empty seats and cobwebs outnumber the fans.

and another thing...

AN email recently caught my eye.

It was circulated by Lancashire CCC and was simply entitled: “Happy Birthday Lancashire!”

The communication read: “Lancashire County Cricket Club was formed 149 years ago today when 13 clubs met in Manchester to form a county club.

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“The leading members of the Manchester Cricket Club organised a meeting at the Queen’s Hotel in Manchester for the purpose of forming a county club. Thirteen clubs were represented and on the 12th January 1864 Lancashire County Cricket Club was born.”

Now call me cynical, but do you suppose there was any link between that email and the fact that, four days earlier, Yorkshire CCC celebrated its 150th birthday?

After all, what is so special about a 149th birthday that would necessitate such an expression of enthusiasm?

I’m not a Yorkshireman, but it did suggest to me that Yorkshire’s rivals from t’other side of t’hill were trying to reclaim a bit of the limelight.

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And if Yorkshire put out an email next year celebrating their 151st birthday, a few days before Lancashire justifiably celebrate their 150th, I will be more than happy to prove that this column is biased towards neither white rose nor red.