Increase To 60,000 Nowhere Near Enough!

News that permission has been granted for West Ham United to increase the capacity at the Olympic Stadium from 54,000 to 60,000 in time for the new Barclays Premier League season has gone down well with the 'huge' amount of people who have paid £10.00 each to be on the massively over subscribed waiting list. At the beginning of this season all the talk was about whether Hammers had made a big mistake by parting company with Sam 'safe as houses' Allardyce ahead of the big move to the new stadium, Premiership survival was a paramount requisite and the doom sayers were quoting "be careful what you wish for" out of every orifice! There were doubts as to club's ability to sell out the new stadium on a regular basis and that 54,000 was an optimistic amount, games would be played that were only half full and that attending them would be akin to going to the highbury library. Fast forward to the first few weeks of the season and suddenly West Ham are playing exciting innovative football and achieving great success, the clamour for season tickets is intense, however many fans had already committed to signing up for an Olympic Stadium season ticket well before the Slaven Billic revolution began to take pace, but even with the extra 6,000 seats available the 'waiting list' which fans paid £10.00 each to be placed on is apparently five times over subscribed, and so there are going to be a lot of very disappointed supporters, particularly the youngsters who were hoping to be able to see matches for the 'bargain' price advertised. The club have not currently communicated exactly where people are or will be on the waiting list, a bit of clarity would be in order, and if there is no chance of getting a season ticket fans should be informed as soon as possible, it is just a matter of mutual respect between club and supporters! Of course the current situation would never have occurred had it not been for the amazing results and performances of Billic's team, and in all honesty no one, owners fans or pundits alike expected such a meteoric rise from such a 'lesser' club.
The Olympic Stadium has a 'draft' capacity of 65,000 for football events, and it is to be hoped the board can look to raise the capacity to that level in order to satisfy the demand for the season tickets that they encouraged everyone to buy before success on the field made the tickets sell themselves! - Ed