Fans' Forum - Dec 08

Ben Frost provides the key points from the December '08 meeting of the official AFC Supporters Forum.
 

Ticket Touting
- There have been 8 arrests for touting so far this season, and 7 bans from the area on match days have been handed out in court (some of which were hangovers from arrests last season).
- Police are now looking to seize the assets of touts, as well as getting banning orders; so going after their cars and houses. This obviously requires more evidence, and takes longer, but hits them where it hurts more. 
- 400 memberships have been cancelled so far this season, after being linked to touted tickets; many more than in the past. 
- The new customer services and IT infrastructure is helping to create a "web" of intelligence on touts - linking memberships, addresses, credit cards and the like, and allowing more tickets to be stopped at the source. 
 
Trouble at the Everton game
- There were some instances of Arsenal fans spitting onto Everton fans, confirmed by Arsenal stewards in the away section. A programme and a burger also came down from upstairs onto the away fans. 
- The vast majority of the objects that landed on Everton fans (as seen in the YouTube videos of the incident) were in fact thrown up by other Everton fans, trying to reach people in club level. Merseyside police confirmed that Everton fans have "previous" for doing this - trying to throw objects up, and ending up hitting their own fans.  Obviously they don't teach kids about gravity in Liverpool.
- The police's view of the incident was that it was "something and nothing".  Some Everton fans rushed across the away section to get involved in an altercation across the barrier; a number of Everton fans were drunk and "lively" that day. 6 arrests made, all of whom are Everton fans and are going to court. 
 
New Home Kit (and the lack of white sleeves)
- Adrian Ford, Commercial Director was at the meeting.  He stated that the  main aims of all Arsenal shirts are that they must be "commercial", and that they must reflect Arsenal's history and values.  
- He said that the current home shirt is selling very well, and the away shirt is selling disappointingly, despite great feedback. The white away shirt also sold extremely well, despite feedback that it was "un-Arsenal".  
- There are no elements in the current home shirt that have not been in an Arsenal shirt before. We were shown a picture montage of the last 15 years of Arsenal shirts to prove this!  In particular, the lack of particularly white sleeves was true about a couple of shirts in the mid and late 90s. 
 
Fan memorial area
- There is space for 10,000 bricks outside the Armoury, for fans to buy and inscribe with messages.
- From a logistical and commercial point of view, this is all very do-able. 
- Arsenal have met with a company called Brickonomics, who organize memorial bricks at other venues, and are currently deciding whether to use Brickonomics to launch the product, or whether to do it in house. Either way, the aim is to launch sometime in 2009. 
 
New Chief Executive and the Board
- Peter Hill-Wood was at the meeting, and talked about the new CEO. He said that we are lucky to have him, given his track record and previous successes.  In particular, in his role at MLS, he negotiates all player contracts (as all players are owned by the League, not clubs), which is going to come in useful. 
- The decision to appoint him was made a while ago - but announcement had to be delayed until after the end of the MLS season in late November. 
- Stan Kroenke was not involved in the appointment, but did receive a courtesy phone call.
- In answer to a question about the circumstances under which Alisher Usmanov may be offered a place on the board  Peter Hill-Wood said that people were invited onto the board when it was believed that they could make a positive contribution, beyond "just" owning lots of shares. 
 

To express a view on any of the above please contact Ben Frost at ben.frost@aisa.org