Graham Smith

The Club had representatives of SOS and Spion Kop in for a brief meeting on Friday to discuss the start of a debate and consultation about important ticket issues - here is the overall report - I'll split each section into a separate thread so the individual issues can be discussed and ideas put forward. Away Tickets The Club are clearly very keen to grasp this by the scruff of the neck during this season but do not plan to make any changes until season 2017/18. Firstly, though ALL ticket sales are going to go online and window sales will end. The Club says that for away tickets they get between 30 and 40 people who use window sales. We made the point that the withdrawal would be controversial and that those that were not IT literate or had access to online purchases needed to be considered. The Club has said that the number buying from the windows was so small that they intended to phone them all and tell them what was happening. If it was felt it was necessary they would run three or four sales from the windows at the start of the season but only as a way of showing people how to use the online system there and then, the tickets would not be given at that point - it would be a sort of training session. The Club's point is that they are selling between 1100 and 3500 tickets a game now and having window sales for 40 people isn’t viable or necessary. People will still be able to pick their tickets up from the windows however if they wanted to. The point was made that the IT system was not robust enough and if these trial sessions were being run then the LFC staff should get into the system the way ordinary supporters do. The Club is also keen to get the announcements of when sales are happening much better than last season and with as much notice as possible - this is already being worked upon. Disabled sales are also being looked at. Secondly, they want to start a debate about away sales, credits and loyalty. Primarily, the status quo is no longer an option. The Club estimates that 25% to 30% of away tickets are touted. They recognise the core of support who have gone for years and who’s loyalty needs to be protected - the issue is going to be how they get around this and don’t lose or affect the true away support. One issue raised was to get the PL to get all entry systems at all PL grounds ‘talking’ to each other - this would allow ‘away’ cards to be used for entry, which while not foolproof are another way of making it harder for touts. We suggested that the online system should not allow those without qualifying credits getting to the basket page on any sale - this would reduce the chancers getting online and make the system less slow, it would also stop tickets sitting in baskets and stopping them being available - They said they would look at that. Overall they want the debate started and for all supporters' groups and supporters to get a say. We asked about surveying the supporters and they think a survey of away goers is essential as is surveying those outside the away bubble to see what challenges and considerations there should be. All of this will go on during the next 12 months for the start of the 2017/18 season. Season Ticket Amnesty Again this issue is now needing attention but it is such a big job the Club doesn’t envisage any changes until 2018/19 season. Last season there were 25,000 STH, these tickets are held by 19,000 people - meaning there are 6,000 ST in duplicate or triplicate (and above) names. The Club recognises that everyone of those 6,000 duplicate holders have a story about why they should retain all of their tickets and expects to have those conversations, although criteria for agreeing retention and moving the names is again a matter for consultation. They know this will also cause much controversy, but again the Club are convinced they need to get the tickets into the name of the person predominantly using them. Again provision for some limited passing on is likely - friends and family scheme etc. The Club recognises that they originally allowed this to happen and have caused the issue. 1000 Youth Tickets This relates to the 1,000 tickets being set aside for local youth at 50% of full price. Firstly, it became clear quite quickly that the Club just saw the 1,000 tickets going out as a separate part of the members' sale twice a season. We said that they should think again about that for a few reasons. Asking 17-21 year olds to shell out two ‘lump’ sums twice a season wasn’t really fair and the tickets should be sold on a game by game basis so more youth have the chance to attend and can afford the ticket price. Better to have say 5,000 different local youth coming in a few times a year than 1,000 doing all 19 games. The idea currently is that the sale will be to members between 17 and 21 who have registered an L postcode - their worry about a sale on a game by game basis is that they might find only half the tickets sold two weeks before a match and would then struggle to get rid of them - possible for some games but unlikely generally we would have thought. We turned to where the tickets might be based - 1,000 in the Anny Road won’t happen - all the usual crowd control issues, too close to the away support etc etc. We have asked him to consider as large a section as possible in that stand (it is the only one where a block could be created) and over forthcoming seasons to look at developing blocks in other stands whenever they get the chance. They are going away to think about this again and will come back to us. Finally, they agreed that the publication of transparent information after each match of the percentages of each type of ticket sold or allocated should start again. All in all lots for us to consider and to engage with. Over to you......

There's no qualified apology, its an apology full stop. The reality was that the singer wasn't booked to appear, it was impromptu and unplanned until a few minutes before he went on to fill in a break as another band was setting up (I think he had something to do with Nicky Allt's play). At the time there was no one back stage (mistake) and our organisation of the acts going on and off was too relaxed. EDIT It didn't help that he choose a song that had been adopted by some supporters on away coaches, he didn't know that. The after event response was slow but the organisation was very much about a Committee making decisions, requiring getting everyone together. The immediate storm wasn't that immediate (in the sense of the following day), there was then some inertia but ultimately we got our act together. It was a reflection of volunteers, new to reputational management acting too slowly but ultimately reflecting it was wrong. Again, this was an open event, and one incident in five years doesn't define an organisation.

And on a separate point about the posts above and boycotts....Sky Sports have the four most active, campaigning Clubs playing each other on a Super Dooper Sunday. I suspect there will be action around that.

Billy Bob. I was there that night, I was on the Committee. I had finished my stint on the door and was having a beer with the people I was with when 'Horsegate' happened. A few facts for you, the event was open to anyone, although promoted by SOS admittedly and as such we take the rap for what goes on. There were about 1200 in the room that night, I'd guess about 10% maximum got involved in the short nonsense that took place. I've no idea whether everyone of them was a member but I'd hazard a guess that they weren't. That doesn't condone, it explains. Here you go, I apologise for your offence and I agree as all involved did that it should not have happened. But for you to sum up and dismiss five years of constant activity, trying to do what we can for our members (and occasionally, like the H&G stuff for the wider supporter base) in a three minute video is risible. You've got your personal apology.

The supporters' committee isn't democratically elected, it is appointed by the Club.

Al can ask him this straight question: Chrissy, when you sat on the top table at the Liverpool Ramblers annual dinner did you show anyone at that table texts from current LFC players at the time that we're critical of Rafa Benitez? And then, if Al gets an honest answer, which I doubt, he can ask, 'Who were the texts from?' Or we could just hear a load of self serving tosh about how he saved the Club and knew what the Bad Yanks were like from the go. A couple of supplementaries Al - ' How did someone brought in only to find finance(his exact words) get to pick and choose managers and produce a list of players to sell without any announcement to the Club or it's supporters of his change in role?'

It's absolutely true. And on its own it's why the bloke should never show his face again.

Leave this to one side in the nonsense of he said, we said. Hopefully Al will ask him a straightforward question about whether he ever showed people at a dinner table at a Liverpool Ramblers dinner texts from players dissing Benitez. I dare him to deny it. Or maybe that was considered acceptable?

Al, I was Secretary at the time of SOS and that allegation is utter rubbish. You and I (with others) met the day FSG landed and you shook our hands, as we did yours, recognising the different roles played by different people in binning Hicks and Gillete and the fact that we'd got what we wanted and had all worked towards. You didn't say anything then, or since, as far as I am aware to anyone's face to suggest that the Union were in Ayre's pocket and there was a conspiracy to pin everything on Purslow about Benitez. I've said it before until I'm blue in the face, I've never been at one meeting or had or heard one conversation relating to the Union Committee where Benitez was given the chance to use the Union for his own purposes. I've been involved in many conversations and a few meetings with Purslow though where his (Purslow's) abilities were clearly in question. Good luck with your 'interview', expect a whitewash - ask him why he called a respected supporters' organisation 'Sons of Strikers', ask him about a dinner at Liverpool Ramblers where he showed strangers texts from senior players dissing Benitez and ask him why he tried to re-draft minutes of a meeting he attended after he realised he was dealing with people who weren't the scum of the earth he thought they were. Or better still ask me to come.

He'll have to backtrack on this presumably when the Peel evidence is produced.

Ayre's statement is odd, as it seems almost a half moan, or a half preparation for supporters for the reason for a move. Again the Club seems to have forgotten the major missing link in all of this and their major strength - the supporters and local residents. Firstly, they need to get off the fence and be equivocal about what they have as their preferred option. If it is refurbish then publish the figures, timescale and plan and compare it with a move. If they did this then at least those affected a bit (supporters) and those affected most (local residents) would have the facts and be able to decide, but again they have decided to keep those most affected out of the loop. If they want to refurbish then a properly argued (and public) consultation with those affected would be better than a press release from the CEO - if they convince the supporters and local residents then a momentum would be created, it strikes me that they're almost testing the water with the Council and supporters instead of being mature and doing the right thing.

For matchgoing members who leave their kids behind (ticket prices/availability etc) and who as a result don't have the benefit of what many had over the years - "the matchgoing routine" - we are looking at doing something about that for televised home games. Hopefully see members able to jump in the car/on the bus for a game with child or youth member. Grab your curry and chips, beer for you, coke for the kid in the Sandon/Solly/Park etc. You into the match and the kids into a very local venue to watch the match in safety and comfort, making as much noise as the old Kop. Game over, pick them up. If the Club don't care about grabbing them young we'll do the job for them. All in the planning stage - watch this space.

You might have thought they put you on then but they didn't. I put my lad on in September 1999 and he is 3162. You've been noted as being after that date clearly.

Andrew? Andrew? Still there?

No. As in putting money into an SOS Share Account. Not No as in I won't answer a simple question.

I'm just trying to read this over and over to see if this is actually the car crash I think it is. I'm not getting into this with this bloke. Save to say no one gets tied into anything at the CU where their money gets irrevocably pledged to a share in the Club and it cannot be used for anything other than that. On the bus stuff, he is spot on about the vote issue, a slip of the keyboard by Roy Bentham saying there was a vote, there never was. However if you look at the meeting again it is raised clearly and unequivocally as somehting that was being planned. From all 10000 members we received ONE complaint. From a Mr A Moran. If members at the meeting were opposed no one said anything and no one before, at the time or subsequently has rasied this as an issue, save for one person. Not a particularly edifying start to someone's career as a supposed representative of ordinary supporters, especially one who has had his own personal difficulties with the Club's official site and employees. Come on Andrew, let's here the full story about lfc.tv and the selected employees you have issues with, not just the editied highlights of your beef with the Union, only fair now you have a public rather than just an electronic persona. Mind you, you will always be welcome to meet with us and we can talk like adults about exactly how the CU works. How about it? Thursday at 6.15pm at our Committee meeting.

At the end of the day when you've tried to explain on a number of occasions to someone that they are reading "SOS Share" the wrong way and asking them to check up by ringing the actual credit union there's only !"humour" to go back to. I know that the saving scheme is not tied in any way whatsoever so that any money saved is tied up, allocated or ring fenced only to buy a share in the club and there is only so many times you can say this. It is risible for someone to say that any money you save will be held only to buy a share in the Club and cannot be used for anything else and there is only so many times you can say it isn't the case. When the person says that even ringing the credit union won't convince him then there really isn't much else to say.

Fair enough. You've sussed us out. Can I interest you in some double glazing?

Question we have posed many times and not received an answer to (even from this cuddly lot) is whether the Ticket Office is supposed to be a profit centre and how the recoupment of booking fees actually equates to the cost of running the operation. No answer. The argument is that the cost of running the Club's ticket operation should be part of the ticket price or the booking fee pitched at a level that makes the TO running cost neutral.

It doesn't, as you've been told many times. The saving up bit is what it takes to be part of the Credit Union and is not a separate sum put aside that can only be used to buy a share in the Club. If you don't believe me ring Partners and ask them these questions: 1. Once I have saved a minimum of £2 for ten weeks do I qualify to apply for a season ticket loan? 2. Is the money I save my money to do what I want with? 3. Am I forced to use any of my savings to buy a share in LFC if it became available?

That is not factually correct. He has not been given a stake in FSG, he has been given part of LFC. What amount isn't known. He has no part of FSG. He was given part of LFC (not FSG) in return for him doing a deal with the marketing arm of FSG (that marketing arm is itself a separate company to FSG as well). It is that company that gets the benefit of his marketing income to an agreed extent, it isn't even FSG never mind LFC. If you don't think knowing who owns our Club, in what amount and what measurable benefit the Club gets from the arrangement then you're entitled to turn a blind eye, others aren't prepared to do that. And the request isn't a negative request to say it shouldn't happen, it is a request so people can know what commercial deals the owners might be interested in entering into. Again 10,000 people are interested in knowing as this issue is one of the aims and objectives (holding owners to account) that everyone signs up to when they join. The naysayers on here aren't members or any that are haven't contacted the Union to indicate their view is a majority one of the membership.

It's entirely legitimate to ask questions about why he was given part of our Club for nothing. The questions being asked were not aggressive or posed in any other way than to find out the reasoning behind the deal. The fact he's wearing Liverpool shirts in press conferences is a positive presumably as it raises our profile but the questions still remain.

I think the confusion is coming from the Credit Union calling the saving part of the scheme a "share account" and people thinking the reference to "share" is about buying a share in Liverpool and the money being saved being for that. It isn't - it is merely the saving part of the scheme that qualifies you for the loan element. Of course (to confuse matters again) the money you save can be used to buy a share in the Club if an opportunity arises, but what anyone does with what they have saved is entorely up to them. And just in case there are any thoughts about the Union, it gets no commission, income or return from Partners in any way, shape or form.

It isn't linked. You have to join the Credit Union and to do that you have to take out a £2 share in the credit union. On top of that you do the savings thing. On balance the credit union scheme is cheaper than credit card (and possibly) most bank loans.

Just after SOS bolted from the grassy knoll to the white fiat that rammed Di's car.