{"id":1472,"date":"2026-08-21T10:35:06","date_gmt":"2026-08-21T10:35:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/08\/21\/football-ticket-crackdowns-and-price-hikes-are-excluding-traditional-fans\/"},"modified":"2026-08-21T10:35:06","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T10:35:06","slug":"football-ticket-crackdowns-and-price-hikes-are-excluding-traditional-fans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/08\/21\/football-ticket-crackdowns-and-price-hikes-are-excluding-traditional-fans\/","title":{"rendered":"Football ticket crackdowns and price hikes are excluding traditional fans"},"content":{"rendered":"
Football fans have traditionally followed the same team as previous generations.<\/span> Drazen Zigic \/ Shutterstock<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The new season of the English Premier League is almost ready to kick off, and with it another annual cycle of the national game. Each August brings hope and expectation for supporters with an opportunity to start anew. But, rather than excited anticipation, frustration, anger and anxiety are the overriding emotions of many fans currently.<\/p>\n

This summer some of the English clubs with the richest history \u2013 including Arsenal<\/a>, Manchester United<\/a> and Liverpool<\/a> \u2013 have caused controversy for revoking the season tickets and issuing lifetime bans to thousands of supporters.<\/p>\n

Our latest research<\/a> has examined how the increasing commercialism of English football, which has accelerated since the return to play following the COVID lockdowns, threatens the future existence of football stadiums as an inter-generational space. <\/p>\n

Despite significant changes in the finances, infrastructure and scale of the national sport over the past four decades, English football stadiums remain a key focal point for fan communities and distinct spaces of connection and bonding between the generations. <\/p>\n

The intergenerational nature of football fandom is largely taken for granted, despite the growing realisation of the importance such shared spaces for the transmission of cultural values across generations. These latest initiatives may exacerbate the risk to this communal experience by digitally excluding fans. <\/p>\n

Crackdown on ticket touts<\/h2>\n

Ostensibly the action taken by the clubs is part of an anti-touting crackdown, as ever-rising demand has created a lucrative secondary market for touts to resell tickets at hugely inflated prices. Ticket touting \u2013 the act of buying tickets for live events and reselling them at highly-inflated prices \u2013 has been illegal in English football since the introduction of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994. While frowned upon in other sports and entertainment sectors \u2013 such as live music \u2013 it is only criminalised in football.<\/p>\n

A serious attempt by clubs to clampdown on such activity is long overdue. The advent of digital tickets has witnessed the rise of online touting on an industrial scale, with bots used to harvest hundreds of tickets to be resold to supporters across the globe. There are also signs that such actions are proving effective \u2013 it has been reported that the actions taken by Liverpool FC, in conjunction with Merseyside Police, have led to the seizure of \u00a31.2 million in assets related to organised ticket touts<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n \"Old
\n Many Manchester United season ticket holders are upset about the way the club has handled ticket touts.<\/span>
\n Luthfi Syahwal<\/span><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

However, there is also evidence that ordinary fans are being caught up in this crackdown. There has been outrage among Manchester United supporters, as thousands of season ticket accounts were restricted or threatened with closure after been flagged due to vague claims of \u201csustained activity\u201d.<\/p>\n

In many instances this appears to be caused by supporters helping friends or family members, less familiar with online ticketing systems, manage their accounts. Several fans have voiced their concerns about the blunt use of automated software and AI to identify their accounts and the lack of proper redress, highlighting the club\u2019s disregard for its most loyal supporters.<\/p>\n

Some fans are more conspiratorial. They view this as the latest attempt to exclude longstanding season ticket holders. As one Manchester United fan said: \u201cI feel angry about it \u2013 they just want us gone\u201d<\/a>. Such a view is not without credence.<\/p>\n

All three clubs have defended their actions and point to successes in combating the illegal re-selling of tickets. Manchester United admitted some mistakes and promised to refine its processes.<\/p>\n

Price hikes<\/h2>\n

In the last couple of years there seems to have been a step-change in the approach of Premier League clubs to maximise revenue at the expense of maintaining a core group of local, inter-generational support. Whether through price increases or the reduction in concessions for young and older fans, clubs have already taken active steps to curtail the proportion of season ticket holders.<\/p>\n

At the start of the 2024\u201325 season, amid a wider cost of living crisis, 19 out of the 20 Premier League clubs raised ticket prices. At some clubs, the increases jumped as high as 28% and included one reported case of a 111% price increase for a child\u2019s season ticket<\/a>. These price hikes represent an acceleration of a long-term trend, with the cost of tickets rocketing by 800% between 1990 and 2025<\/a>.<\/p>\n

There was a feeling that clubs were actively seeking to undermine the season ticket model through prohibitive pricing to free up seats for more lucrative overseas \u201ctourist fans\u201d more willing to pay higher prices and spend more money on merchandise. Fans across rival teams united in protest<\/a>, calling on clubs to \u201cStop Exploiting Loyalty\u201d and reverse ticketing policies that undermine long-standing community ties and make football less accessible to future generations.<\/p>\n

In our research interviews<\/a>, fan activists expressed general suspicion that clubs were colluding to adopt similar ticketing policies to minimise reputational damage. This suspicion was reinforced by the decision by some clubs to diminish the established concessionary prices for younger (such as under-18s and students) and senior (over-65) supporters.<\/p>\n

Along with hyper-inflated ticket prices, these new measures may irrevocably alter the composition of the matchday crowd by pricing older and younger fans out.<\/p>\n

The irony here is that these clubs seem to be motivated by the same rationale as the touts \u2013 displace the season ticket holders and maximise revenue by reselling to overseas fans.<\/p>\n

In the wake of the most expensive World Cup ever held and Fifa President Gianni Infantino\u2019s ill-fated plan to sell a 20% stake in the competition, a growing proportion of English football fans feel alienated and actively excluded by the increasing commercial interests in the game.<\/p>\n

Voicing his opposition to Infantino\u2019s World Cup sell-off, new Prime Minister Andy Burham (a lifelong Everton fan), said that: \u201cFootball does not belong to investors \u2026 Football belongs to the fans. It always has, and it always will<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n

Football\u2019s strength has always come from the commitment of generations of supporters who pass their club loyalties from parent to child. If rising prices and digital barriers continue to push local fans to the margins, the game risks losing the very communities, traditions and atmosphere that made it the world\u2019s most popular sport.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Football fans have traditionally followed the same team as previous generations. Drazen Zigic \/ Shutterstock The new season of the English Premier League is almost ready to kick off, and with it another annual cycle of the national game. Each August brings hope and expectation for supporters with an opportunity to start anew. But, rather […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1472"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1472\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redzine.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}