To stand or not to stand?

THE FOOTBALL League is facing pressure from its clubs to back trials of safe standing areas — a move Athletic are in favour of.

All but one of the Championship clubs present at a meeting last season voted in favour of a motion to trial ‘rail seats’ of the kind that are used in Germany.

It could be back on the agenda again at next month’s meeting of all 72 member club chairmen and if the motion is passed, this time the League would be expected to lobby the Government for a change to the existing law.

At present, standing is banned in the top two divisions. And under current rules, clubs in the bottom two divisions who have all-seater stadia, like Athletic, cannot revert back to having standing areas.

But with support for safe-standing areas growing, Jenny Warburton, Athletic’s commercial manager, said: “While under current regulations we are not able to offer the choice we note with interest the growing support from fellow clubs for the FSF in its call on the Government to permit a limited number of trials of safe-standing areas fitted with ‘rail seats’.

“We believe that the rail-seat concept has merit and could provide football clubs that currently have all-seater stadia with a safe and well-managed means of enabling fans to watch football standing up.

“We would therefore encourage the relevant authorities to permit trials of the rail-seat system with a view to defining appropriate criteria under which it could be introduced in future at grounds such as ours.”

However, Shadow sports minister Clive Efford has revealed that the Labour Party has no plans to get behind the campaign, despite the MP having personally backed safe standing areas in the past.

Efford believes the opposition of Hillsborough families to the campaign should be respected, especially as it is only recently that the inquest into the deaths of the 96 fans in 1989 has been reopened.

He said: “It is too close to the time that the families of the Hillsborough victims have finally got justice.

“You can understand their reasons for that [opposing standing areas] and we always have to be very respectful of that view.

“There are definitely no plans under consideration by the Labour Party to review the policy at this stage.”



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