A busy afternoon of activity at Brunton Park has seen 200 of the 300 allowed spaces in the Paddock snapped up by Season Ticket holders who are looking forward to cheering their team on when Southend United head north on Saturday.
United’s chief executive Nigel Clibbens hit the reply button with an immediate YES when the EFL asked clubs if they would like to hold a ‘test event’ this weekend, and the Blues were delighted to be one of just 10 clubs selected to welcome 1,000 fans back into their stadiums.
“Our ticket office and admin staff have been working through Season Ticket holders in the Paddock area of the ground who want to attend the Southend game,” Nigel said.
“This section of the stadium is the most time consuming for us to deal with, as not only are our fans calling to get their Southend match ticket, but they are also making the payment for their 2020/21 season ticket.
“This was always going to be the case, hence the decision to deal with the Paddock area first. We expect to have completed the sale of the 300 Paddock spaces during Thursday morning and, at that stage, we will open up sales for 100 places in the Warwick Road End.
“Again, we expect these fans to take the opportunity to complete their 2020/21 season ticket payment at the same time as securing their Southend match ticket.”
“If everything goes as smoothly as it has this afternoon, we should see all of the standing area Southend tickets sold-out on Thursday afternoon,” he continued. “That means, all being well, we’ll be selling the 300 allocated spaces in the Pioneer Stand late on Thursday afternoon.
“The vast majority of seated Season Ticket holders have already paid for their Season Ticket, so the West Stand areas for the weekend game should be on sale at some point on Friday morning.
“Of course, these outline timings are subject to the amount of time each call takes, so it could change, we just don’t know for certain at this stage.”
“We have to say thank you to our fans once again,” he concluded. “Obviously everybody wants to be at this game, and we would dearly love to be opening it up to as many people as possible, but from the comments fans have made to us on the phones, and on social media, we can see that there is a huge amount of understanding of the difficulties, and for the way in which our staff have worked to make this test event happen.
“It’s really heart-warming for us to have the support of our fans in this way, and we thank everyone for their continued patience.”
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