Stranded on Green Street

  • by Staff Writer
  • Wednesday, 27th August 2014

Hundreds of fans were left stranded on Green Street last night as West Ham struggled to cope with an unprecedented demand for tickets.

This was the scene outside the Boleyn Ground five minutes before kick off last night as several hundred supporters queued to collect tickets they had booked online for West Ham's Capital One Cup tie against Sheffield United.



And despite the numbers outside and an earlier accident on the A406 that delayed many more fans, the decision was taken for the game to kick off on time.

At the time, the queue extended beyond Ken's Cafe - some considerable distance from the ground. As a result of the delays, some fans were still entering the ground AT HALF TIME.

One fan posting on the KUMB forum this morning said: "Had they not increased ticket prices on the day, forcing people to pre-book online, it wouldn't have been so bad.

"Most people in that queue were collecting tickets that had been booked over the bank holiday weekend. I was one of the lucky ones who only missed 20 minutes of the game!"

And fellow supporter zinger549 added: "One of the stewards said there were 3,500 people collecting tickets, hence the long queue.

"She said she'd asked if we could just use our email confirmation [to get in] as it had the seat number on, but they said no."

A spokesperson for the club told KUMB: "Despite asking fans to arrive early, a large queue began to form in Green Street around 6.30pm.

"Unfortunately we only have 20 ticket windows and there was a huge demand for tickets, with some 5,000 sold over the weekend alone.

"Due to the Bank Holiday we couldn't post all of them, meaning there were a large number of collections. The club had already paid Royal Mail to do an extra collection.

"We got through them as quickly as we could but the increased demand combined with major problems on the roads caused delays."

And on the question of why kick-off wasn't temporarily delayed in order to allow hundreds more fans to enter the ground, the spokesperson added: "The Police and referee, who make the decision, wouldn't have allowed it. It was their decision."

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