Leeds United were once the best
team in all of English football but these days you can usually find them sat
around mid-table in the Championship. The Whites fall from grace has been well
documented over the last 10 or so years, but it seems the only people that
aren’t aware Leeds are no longer one of England’s top clubs are those that come
up with ticket prices at Elland Road.
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| Empty seats galore as just 20,000 turn up to the category A fixture with Bristol City. |
Having gone from welcoming the
likes of Liverpool and Manchester United to Elland Road on a regular basis, to
less desirable fixtures against Blackpool and Bristol City, you would expect
ticket prices to have taken a fall but if you do take a trip to Elland Road
you’re in for quite a surprise. Fans were once paying to see the likes of Mark
Viduka, Alan Smith and the legendary Lucas Radebe, but now they are asked to
fork out up to £42 a ticket to see a side that has continuously sold their best players and failed to finish in the top half of the table in four seasons.
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| A full Elland Road watches Leeds beat Liverpool over 15 years ago.
On nine occasions out of 16 so far this season, fans have been asked to pay category A prices to watch Leeds at Elland Road, ranging from £28 to £42 for those paying on the day. Sky have changed the clubs fixtures around as and when they please yet the club has still charged fans top dollar to watch the Whites at home. Burnley, Sheffield Wednesday, Derby County and now Middlesbrough are all fixtures that were given a category A tag, despite being moved for Sky.
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| Massimo Cellino has waged war on Sky but continues to rip off the Elland Road faithful. |
Massimo Cellino has publicly lambasted Sky for moving so many of the Whites fixtures, saying it harms the club, costing them money. He then has the audacity to allow fans to be charged up to £37 for a game that has been moved to a Monday night or an early Saturday afternoon and wonders why the ground is half empty. To make matters worse, those who wish to buy a ticket in the South Stand now have to pay a "pie tax" which adds an unwanted "meal deal" voucher onto your match ticket. The South Stand was working to bring atmosphere back to Elland Road and the movement has seemingly been killed off.
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| Leeds v Preston was moved to a Sunday at 3pm yet was still made a category A fixture. 22,000 in attendance. |
The atmosphere inside Elland Road would once make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up but the mass amount of empty blue seats dotted around the ground has somewhat killed it off. Away teams are charged just as much and this often means the away end is half empty, contributing to the lack of atmosphere. Middlesbrough fans are being asked to pay £37 for the Monday night fixture at Elland Road in February, meaning they probably won't fill their allocation, as they usually would.
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| A half empty Elland Road as Leeds face Derby on a Tuesday night on Sky, at £37 a ticket. |
With another season of mid-table mediocricy all-but confirmed, the club still continue to charge fans as high a price as possible, with Nottingham Forest at home being the latest addition to the category A club. The performances by the team certainly don't warrant the eye watering prices and 20,000 fans booing the team off at half time against Bristol City confirms this. Unless I have missed something, 17th placed Leeds against relegation favourites Bristol City isn't a big game, and certainly shouldn't have had big prices, but once again the club got it wrong.
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| The £20's plenty campaign works towards more affordable tickets for home and away supporters. |
It seems that as more money is pumped into the "beautiful game", more money is demanded from fans, which doesn't make sense. I spoke to Michael Brunskill of the Football Supporters Federation and he said: “We have been in touch with a number of clubs over
the “20s plenty” campaign and Leeds United are one that is yet to get involved.
We get hundreds of complaints from both home and away fans over the pricing at
Elland Road and if fans want to boycott or protest then we’ll make sure they
get our backing and we’ll help them organise any protests and so on.”
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| Premier League fixtures are often cheaper to attend than Leeds games. |
As a concession, I often get told to stop moaning about ticket prices as I don't have to pay as much as some others, but that doesn't mean the people I'm going with don't have to pay it. Whilst at university I paid less to watch Sunderland take on champions Manchester City than Leeds take on Blackpool at Elland Road. They eyesore of 20,000 empty seats is also something I don't enjoy when going to Elland Road, but as long as people continue to pay these ridiculous prices, the club won't be making tickets cheaper anytime soon.
