Quote ="The Chair Maker"Go to the last few seconds of this Granada reports preview of the season and you get a picture of the West terrace. Its got bags of room in it. Looks like the safety authorities are being ultra strict with Saints. www.itv.com/granada/super-league-saints09841/'" And rightly so, they have to look at worst-case scenarios. Even if there was plenty of room in that stand during your 1st game and only a handful of people moved stands they have to think that it could happen on a much larger scale if the stadium was at full capacity. Are any of you actually that bothered that you can sit in one stand and go and buy a pint in the other? If they didn't give people that option there would be no issue with people moving stands.

Quote ="The Chair Maker"Go to the last few seconds of this Granada reports preview of the season and you get a picture of the West terrace. Its got bags of room in it. Looks like the safety authorities are being ultra strict with Saints. www.itv.com/granada/super-league-saints09841/'" And rightly so, they have to look at worst-case scenarios. Even if there was plenty of room in that stand during your 1st game and only a handful of people moved stands they have to think that it could happen on a much larger scale if the stadium was at full capacity. Are any of you actually that bothered that you can sit in one stand and go and buy a pint in the other? If they didn't give people that option there would be no issue with people moving stands.

I think it's a nice idea, one that is in keeping with what you could do at KR, but unfortunately probably unworkable in reality given you're likely to need stewards checking tickets at each vomitory into the stands, which is labour intensive and would cause massive queues.

At matches were there are only 10k speccies on, having the ability to move around backstage can help ensure a more even distribution of spectators queuing at the bars. For example the East stand bars are likely to be very quiet when the likes of Huddersfield, London, and Wakefield are in town.
The stadium concourses were designed to be far larger than required, so they are legally able to take the added capacity of people meeting their mates behind the North stand at half time.
What people should not be doing though is using that mobility as an excuse to then sit or stand were they should not.

The facility to move around grounds is something that is seen at Rugby Union and Cricket stadia, and is historically something that was present in rugby league stadia. Only Soccer in the UK with its long history of crowd violence has penned people in to specific sections.

They will need to do this then as both the West and South stands share the same turnstile entrance and contiguous concourse.

The North stand can be isolated pretty easily and also the East as they have their own dedicated turnstile entrances.
All it really needs is a temporary barrier complete with yellow jacketed steward to send out the message not to move.

I think a wrist band system would be better. You can then walk round the 360 degree concourse. I can see no reason why anyone would want to, other than use empty vending outlets in the away end, but it would allow it. People could then be forced to show their band on re-entry to the stand and anyone with the wrong colour would the be clubbed to death. Or do what almost every other stadium in the world does and build four walls.

The temperary barrier IMO is the best option and was the first thing that came to mind when this problem popped up.

This way for the games that will be high capicity we can use the barrier and have steward stood there and when the low capicity games we can just leave it.

Also, I'm sure mates who want to meet up before the game or at half time can chat over the barrier then go back to their own stand.

I think the fact that our major concern going into a new season is that we have sold too many tickets is a fairly good position to be in. Ok, there are a few teething issues to sort out, but lets focus on the positives around Saints at the moment, and celebrate the fact that we are supporting a fantastic club.

I agree but bad news always makes for discussion, Good news makes for short threads because everyone just agrees and that's the end of it

I understand capacity is 18000. Does this figure allow for any movement between stands or none at all?. Rovers east stand is regulary sold out but you can see small gaps here and there.

They dont allow terraces to get full in this day and age.

even so called full terraces, would in the old days have held many more without any hassle whatsoever.

People will be restricted to the stand they have bought tickets for.

I honestly don't think it will be an ongoing issue especially at Superleague matches because the majority of the seats will be occupied by season ticket holders who have bought those tickets for the specific purpose of being able to sit down and doing so in 'their own seat'. I think the novelty factor of the first game was a major factor in the stand switching.

I'm told the council had asked for the reduced capacity and would question whether the incident of the gentleman having a heart attack, and potentially a number of complaints from those being asked to move to the North Stand have played a significant part in that. Either way I suspect it is all a bit of an over-reaction.

The site says all ticket for this one. Which by any stretch is a good result. I know it's the first league game, but all ticket for a match against Salford is definately a first in Saints history.

Can see a lot of home games being classified as all ticket especially if we progress to having a successful season.
One problem is when saints fans can,t buy tickets for the west stand and start to buy tickets by other means for the East Stand. This would be OK against most away teams, but migrating into a Leeds or Hull KR supporting crowd could possibly create problems for the stewards. Could this be allowed to happen!

I see no reason why not. Have been to Leeds a few times and Saints fans tend to stand in the middle of the away end, whilst Leeds fans take the front wall and the edges around us. Never seen a fight or trouble apart from the occasional shut up passed between fans as tries are scored.

Saints fans will get first dibs as you can get a ticket online a month in advance of the game on the Saints site, so the away allocation will probably only be sent out the week before.

I can actually see games like Wigan getting to the point where less wigan fans can go than previously. If we agree 10k season ticket have gone. If capacity is now less that 18k. Saints fans will be waiting in March to book their ticket for the game in April and if we sell out the game against Salford, then those same walk up fans will want a ticket for the wigan game too. It maybe that there will only be about 1000 tickets left for Wigan to be sent.

In the end Saints have to get the homefans in first , away fans including the little Wiganers will have to take what ever is left the week before kickoff.

Absolutely, who would have thought that potentionally the equivalent of 14% St Helen's populate could be attending a rugby game at Langtree Park.
Some saints fans must be aware of the possible restriction of walk ups at certain games. If we have a reduced capacity of say 17000 tickets we might have 10000 season ticket holders, 1000 corporate.sponsor tickets, 2000 match day advance tickets, 2000 away tickets. Which would only leaves a margin of 2000 for home and away fans walk ups.

Disagree with this to some extent.

The Wigan fans that travel away from home will be loyal RL fans, whereas many of the Saints fans that will be scrambling for tickets for the Wigan game will be the one game a year only fans.

Wigan and Wire should be given the whole of the East stand and also a few hundred seats. That still leaves around 3000 tickets for non season ticket holders of Saints. Hence loyal fans who dont have season tickets, should be well aware of the need to snap up tickets early to avoid disappointment.

This creates a demand and a buzz around town. To get a ticket for the match is a big thing, this fuels hype and interest.
Furthermore this also encourages fans to get season tickets the following year, because no season ticket means you might not get to go to the big matches.

According to Saints they have sold 14000 for the Salford game, with five days till kick off Looks like it will be a 15-16k attendance. capacity has been set at 17200 as well, which is only 700 less than its full capacity. Looks like they have knocked 350 off each terraces capacity. www.saintsrlfc.com/news/page/1548

According to Saints they have sold 14000 for the Salford game, with five days till kick off Looks like it will be a 15-16k attendance. capacity has been set at 17200 as well, which is only 700 less than its full capacity. Looks like they have knocked 350 off each terraces capacity. www.saintsrlfc.com/news/page/1548

Chair Maker,didn't you work out that the ground could take more than stated (19,900 or something).With the safety issues atm this might be impossible.
Dare I say we should have gone for at least a 20,000 capacity?It's academic now but for the Wigan/Warrington games and possibly a few others it looks like we could have filled that.I seem to remember Eamon saying they'd gone for quality over the size but also I don't think Saints expected to sell so many STs.
Still as you say it will create big demand and publicity.

Quote ="The Chair Maker"According to Saints they have sold 14000 for the Salford game, with five days till kick off Looks like it will be a 15-16k attendance. capacity has been set at 17200 as well, which is only 700 less than its full capacity. Looks like they have knocked 350 off each terraces capacity. www.saintsrlfc.com/news/page/1548'" According to that link, it's confirmed that Saints have the East Stand as well. That should be awesome if we can get 16k of home fans, Salford fans would be hardly noticed as I can't see them bring more than 500 fans.

Quote ="The Chair Maker"According to Saints they have sold 14000 for the Salford game, with five days till kick off Looks like it will be a 15-16k attendance. capacity has been set at 17200 as well, which is only 700 less than its full capacity. Looks like they have knocked 350 off each terraces capacity. www.saintsrlfc.com/news/page/1548'" According to that link, it's confirmed that Saints have the East Stand as well. That should be awesome if we can get 16k of home fans, Salford fans would be hardly noticed as I can't see them bring more than 500 fans.

I thought they might have sold more than that to be honest. I'm a little disappointed given that it's our first league game. Since it's all ticket, there will be no walk up on the night.

I wonder if the press following the Widnes match, especially the wet concourses, have undermined take up for this match? Not saying it has, but I just wonder.

Yes i did, if maxed out to maximum legal density. However taking into account that RL is a family sport, i think the 17.2k current limit and hopefully the 17.9k future limit provides decent sized terraces with room to move in them.

I think our stadium capacity looks about right.
For the big local derbies tickets will be at a premium, which is what it should be like, for other big games, matches will come close to capacity, and against cellar dwellers we will be at 2/3rds capacity which will ensure a good atmosphere and a ground that doesnt look empty.

Going forward if demand is very high for certain games, then in my opinion i can see Saints introducing match categorisation. So that match tickets for Wigan and Wire are more expensive than for a run of the mill games. Say £25 in advance for seats rather than £23.50 or £20 to stand up.
I suspect Saints will see how things go demand wise this year, then way up the options next season. The fact Saints charged full price for the Widnes Friendly to me though shows that they are aware of the potential to get maximum value from the stadiums events.

Surely your kidding Saints fan, 14,000 so far. Most people will be thinking this is the old Saints where an all ticket game suddenly becomes a pay on the night the day before. When people realise that the all ticket is not going to be dropped then that 14,000 will get another 2 - 3k easily. Also does the 14k include the allocation for Salford?

14,000 the week before the game is strong. We'll no doubt get a surge this week and will be close to a sell out, if not a sell out.

Lets not forget this stadium is built with expansion possible. If we get a bumber year and finances are very good, then if the club can pay back it's debtors quicker, there will be more chance of filling in the corners. Old trafford was not 75k overnight.

You can take stands down, build teirs above. But lets not get ahead of ourselves. It's our first game in our first season at Langtree park. Lets see what the take up is later in the year for say a game against Wakey. If we are still getting close to capacity then expansion is viable. but it may drop off.

However 14k for Salford cannnot be ignored, just shows that for the Wigan and Warrington games they will be lucky to get the same allocation they could get at KR.