So, it’s a Lincoln County away day. You make your way to the ground, a 200-mile round trip. A few beers with the boys, maybe with the girls, a bite to eat, and you come into the ground full of hope.
It’s 20 minutes before kick-off, with no need to get in before that. You go to your seat, your allocated seat on your ticket, and someone’s sitting in it. You ask them to move, and they say: “Sorry, mate, someone’s in my seat up there.”
Now you’ve got to find somewhere else, but there are only odds and sods dotted around. Your whole group gets broken up, you start arguing the toss, and the game kicks off while you’re still trying to sort it out.
Welcome to 2026 and the away-day football experience.
The frustrating thing is that I can understand the appeal of both allocated and unallocated seating. I would happily support a system that allowed people to choose where they went when they arrived, provided everyone knew that was the arrangement. What we’ve got instead is a seat number on a ticket and an argument waiting to happen about whether it means anything.
Away days are social occasions. You might spend the week looking forward to getting on a train or a minibus with your mates, having a few beers and watching City together. Arriving at the ground to discover you’re scattered across six different rows takes something away from that.
I’ve done it myself, going to MK Dons on a minibus and then finding we were spread around the stand. We sat where our tickets told us to sit, but of course we’d have preferred to be together. I don’t think wanting that is unreasonable, and I don’t think everyone who favours ‘sit where you want’ is some selfish idiot looking to upset a family.
There are perfectly ordinary reasons why people don’t buy together, too. Different sales windows can mean one person has to wait while the others secure their tickets, and buying separately means nobody has to fund everybody else’s afternoon. It is easy to say they should have booked as a group, but that isn’t always possible.
However, there is another group to consider: the people who did buy together. If six supporters have booked six adjacent seats, why should they be split up so that another six can stand alongside their mates instead? Both groups want the same thing, but only one has made arrangements for it within the system being used.
That is where I struggle with the argument that it’s only a randomly allocated number. You might not care about yours, and that’s absolutely fine. Someone else might have checked where they’re sitting, worked out that they’re near friends or deliberately arranged to be alongside their child.
Some people have very practical reasons for needing a particular part of a stand. My dad’s knees were about gone towards the end, so we specifically picked seats near the front at Sheffield United in 2023, and I contacted our ticket office before Sheffield Wednesday in the same year to ask about being lower down. He needed to avoid a long climb, and having made that effort beforehand, he shouldn’t then have had to negotiate with whoever fancied his seat.
The same applies to a parent taking their lad to an away game. They might want to stop for something to eat, arrive 20 minutes before kick-off and sit in the two places they’ve booked. There shouldn’t be anything remotely controversial about that, and they shouldn’t have to justify wanting to stay together.
Then there is the view itself. If some seats have an obstruction and others don’t, being displaced can mean watching a different game from the one you expected. The argument that all seats are much the same becomes rather less convincing when you’re the one left looking around a post.
Of course, there is room for common sense. If we’ve taken 2,000 supporters into a stand holding 4,000 and somebody is in my seat, I’m probably going to find another suitable spot and get on with my afternoon. There is enough space for flexibility without anybody losing out.
A sold-out away end is a different proposition. Three empty seats dotted around the stand don’t replace the three together you booked, and moving somewhere else can simply mean occupying the next person’s place. Eventually, somebody arrives with nowhere obvious to go and no easy way to put it right.
That happened to me at Peterborough a few years ago. A group in my allocated seat wouldn’t entertain moving, so I went elsewhere. Shortly before kick-off, the people whose seats we’d ended up occupying arrived, and I moved for them because they were entitled to those places.
My own seat was still taken, though, and the people in it had already made their position clear. I ended up at the back in a part of the stand that wasn’t supposed to be in use. The stewards didn’t resolve it, and my willingness to accommodate somebody else had achieved very little beyond moving the problem around.
That is why I don’t buy the idea that a polite request always sorts everything out. Plenty of people will move without a second thought, but the arrangement has to work when someone refuses as well. You shouldn’t need to be the most confrontational person in the row to secure somewhere suitable to watch the game.
Equally, the person in your seat might already have been moved from theirs. They might be just as fed up as you are, and marching in ready for a row won’t help either of you. By then, you’re dealing with the consequences of a system in which people have arrived expecting different things.
Getting in early is a perfectly sensible approach when seating is advertised as unallocated. Everyone knows the position, and a group wanting several places together can plan accordingly. It is a much weaker answer when somebody has bought allocated seats and reasonably expects them to remain available.
I’m fortunate at the moment because I’m usually in the media seats. Mine tends to come with a table and a plug, and there’s relatively little debate about who should be sitting in it. However, I remember enough about being in the away end to understand why the prospect of arguing with your own supporters might put someone off going.
The clubs have to take responsibility for this. If allocated seating is the policy, supporters need to be told that clearly and stewards need the briefing and support to make it work. Leaving people to sort it out among themselves is how a small disagreement becomes several rows of displaced supporters.
I also understand that moving to unallocated seating may involve a smaller allocation. If fewer tickets can be sold, that means supporters missing out on a popular trip, which deserves consideration alongside the freedom to choose your spot. There is more to it than simply deciding everybody should sit anywhere.
My preference would be to explore a mixture where possible. Offer an allocated section for people who want that certainty, alongside a clearly advertised unallocated area for those who prefer to find their mates. It would need proper planning, with any safety and capacity implications addressed, but it would at least recognise that supporters want different things.
We have parents and children, older fans on the club coach, groups arriving on the train and people who’ve driven over for a quiet afternoon watching Lincoln. Supporting the same club doesn’t mean we all experience an away day in the same way. Nor does it guarantee that everybody will be considerate when those expectations collide.
I’d have no issue buying an unallocated ticket and acting accordingly. If I buy an allocated one, I should be able to expect the seat it promises, without having to win an argument first. Clubs need to make the arrangement clear, and we need to respect the people sharing the away end with us.
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