PREMIER CHIEFS IGNORE FANS ON SAFE STANDING
CAMPAIGNeRs for safe standing expressed astonishment last night after the Premier League said the case had not been made as a mere five per cent of fans want to be on their feet for an entire match.
A statement, released ahead of a debate between Premier League policy director Bill Bush and West Bromwich Albion today, said ‘far more evidence’ was required about safe standing.
The Premier League have surveyed fans for the past 16 months and secured responses from a number said to be in the ‘low thousands’. That has led the League to come out in support of sports Minister Tracey Crouch, who said last week that she remained unconvinced.
surveys by individual clubs have found huge percentages in favour — Arsenal fans by a majority of 96 per cent, everton 92 per cent and Liverpool 88 per cent. Both Manchester clubs, Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur support its introduction.
But the Premier League feel the argument is far more nuanced than has been popularly understood.
The sports Ground safety Authority, who would regulate safe standing, are thought to be ready to trial small Premier League safe standing areas, but only on the basis that there is a crackdown on standing elsewhere in the ground.
The Premier League consider that development neither practical nor desirable because many fans want both to stand and sit during a match.
JoNDARCH, operator of the safe standing Roadshow which campaigns for safe standing areas, said last night: ‘ Here we have a trade association — the Premier League — whose members are saying they would like to introduce safe standing but whose association is saying you can’t.’
shaun Harvey, the eFL chief executive, has also rejected Crouch’s position.
The issue will come under discussion today at the sports Ground safety Authority’s annual conference at the etihad stadium, where West Bromwich Albion operations director Mark Miles is expected to press the case.
Albion last week said they were ‘ surprised’ and ‘disappointed’ after Crouch rejected the club’s request to introduce a safe standing section at The Hawthorns. It is thought that Bush will also lay out the league’s position at today’s conference.
Crouch’s demand for more research on the subject has prompted the launch of a petition calling for the introduction of safe standing at Premier League and Championship grounds which could lead to a parliamentary debate on the subject if it hits 100,000 votes. By last night, it had garnered 64,605 signatures.
Sportsmail revealed last June that for safe standing to be introduced at bigger clubs, the Government would want to see a coalition including the FA, Premier League and police hammering on the door to press the case.
That is because unpicking legislation introduced after the 1990 Taylor Report into the Hillsborough disaster is highly emotive. even though the game has moved on and stadiums bear no resemblance to the dilapidated Hillsborough of 1989, Government officials are averse to any decision which might carry a risk of any incident with echoes of the disaster that claimed 96 lives.
The toughest task will be to convince the police.
‘since the Taylor Report, we have had a really good safety record,’ Assistant Chief Constable Mark Roberts — Britain’s top football police officer — told
Sportsmail last year. ‘Are as many fans happy sitting as standing? The shifting culture of football shows more families attending. Do we want to unpick that?’