Club London

Just wondering if anyone has gone along to Westfield for this presentation and interested to hear the views. I was there on Saturday before the Stoke game. It was a very interesting hour, I thought the sales pitch was pretty good, relaxed and not pushy.

They are looking for 3500 members and I was astonished to hear that most places have been taken including the boxes that work out to be £80K a pop! There are basically 3 levels on entry, I made it clear that I would only look at the lowest cost which is The Boleyn level. This gives you a dedicated entrance area, not sure what advantage that gives, use of a dedicated pub / bar and a chance to use the restaurants. Bar etc is open early and is available for some time after the the match.

The seats are very comfortable, examples in the store and are in the West Side, I am told that best seats are always in the West as the east will face the sun. Not sure if this is ideal as the station, Stratford Intl is on the East side so added time required getting to the match and hitting the queues after the game. Some of the seats will remain (black and white) and some will change to claret and blue.

The views from the seat to the pitch looked ok but the highest left in this section was row 9 which still looked a bit flat, low and quite close to the pitch.

There is and will not be any parking, not sure about that either, most modern stadiums have plenty of on site parking, that could be an own goal.

So, what about the cost. In short you get all Prem matches plus the first three home cup ties. Early exit or no home ties is just hard luck i.e. no compensation. On that basis each seat will cost over £100 each per game. If you have a game like the Stoke match that 100 quid will feel like a lot of money wasted!

In conclusion I would say its not for me. I will await the release of the season tickets of which there will be 35K! I will try to get the best in terms of central, at least 20 / 30 rows up and in the East side which they expect to be more Kop like i.e. steeper slop.... this is important if you are a short house trying to avoid a tall guy sat in front :o) It will be interesting to hear the prices shortly. Tickets to Bond Holders will be released in the coming weeks so watch this space!