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St Johnstone Fans Are Tasting Only What Celtic Fans Have Put Up With For Years.

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First up, I think St Johnstone fans are 100% right to complain about excessive ticket prices, especially at the current time, and it is something that a lot of our fans will be saying to Celtic if the Champions League prices are not set at a reasonable level.

I have, and we should all have, sympathy for fans who feel they are being priced out of their football at this moment in time.

But here’s the thing; St Johnstone fans are getting a taste of what our fans – and those of Ibrox, who their barbs are aimed at – have been putting up with for years.

No supporters, perhaps anywhere in Britain, are so routinely screwed over.

For a while now this site has been raging at the sneering contempt shown to our supporters by clubs who have, for years, royally ripped us off. We are overcharged everywhere we go.

Their board’s know that that there are enough of our fans to buy tickets no matter what they charge and they have had a good old time over the years.

We have helped build some of their grounds, and now they talk about us as though we were gate-crashers.

Ross County slandered our supporters only a week or so ago and now they are reversing their own decision to limit the stands we get because their own sections of the ground had an embarrassing number of empty seats.

But it’s the pricing that has always riled our fans most, and talk of boycotts and other such stuff has been debated on and off for years.

St Johnstone fans are correct to focus on the cost of living and to demand a more realistic pricing plan … but let’s be honest here, nobody cried for our fans and nobody cries for them now when we’re being charged whopping sums for visiting their grounds.

I have long argued there seems to be a blind spot here; just because our club and the one across the city are wealthy in comparison to the rest of the league, I think sometimes that they forget that the bulk of our support is working class just like theirs.

Celtic fans do not, by and large, have more disposable income than the supporters of Aberdeen and Hearts and Hibs … but when Hibs visit Aberdeen the pricing policy is realistic whereas when we visit they stick a minimum of a tenner onto the cost.

The expense of going to football is outrageous.

Of course it is, and especially right now. I want to be on the side of the St Johnstone fans, but then I remember that in all the years we’ve moaned about this nobody has given a damn.

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  • Tony B says:

    I’m not sure these days about the ” class ” of your average Celtic supporter. I suspect it may be veering towards middle, or perhaps is already there.

    sevco is a different animal entirely; definitely lower, lumpen, plebeian or more aptly untermensch.

  • John S says:

    Thank goodness for a governing body that organises, administrates and regulates such things. When it happens.

  • SSMPM says:

    Is there such a stratification of purely working class anymore what with working people on minimum, medium and very reasonable incomes it in itself is divided too. Be interested to see the price of the Celtic home CL ticket package though.

  • Jimmy R says:

    Being a football fan is a competitive business. We all like to get 1 up on the opposition. At best we tolerate opposition fans. Building alliances is a rarity. Club boards know this which is why they can indulge in the old “Divide and conquer” strategy with impunity.
    It’s an old, old story which I fear is going to get older.

  • Bob (original) says:

    Pricing – generally – is too high.

    “£20 is plenty” as they say, for Cup games anyway?

    Was in Edinburgh over last weekend, and thought I would go to the Hibs v. Hearts game, just for something different to do.

    I knew there were tickets available despite it being a derby game.

    But, my interest instantly evaporated when the cheapest ticket was £35 [+booking fee].

    I grudge paying that at Parkhead, but the chances are that the games will be sold out anyway – unlike at Easter Road.

  • Effarr says:

    The majority of people are sheep, all organisations, especially governments, know that. They know exactly how they will behave.
    If someone dropped a bunch of flowers in the street nowadays the whole street would be covered within hours and nobody, if asked,
    would know why they were there.

    If a football team wanted a full strip for nothing, all they would need to do would be to put one strip on a railing and they would have enough for ten teams within a matter of hours and the above organisations notice that.

    If I went into the street and looked towards the sky or pretended I was stepping over an invisible wire, within ten minutes everyone
    would be doing the same. That, unfortunately, is how the majority who can`t think for themselves operate and they are governed accordingly.

    Even in a church where clapping isn`t exactly the done thing: it only takes one person to hit their hands together, even in mistake,
    and the whole place is at it immediately.

    Maybe if just one person had the guts to tell them where to stick their overpriced tickets for a rubbish product they would get a flock
    of sheep to follow them but “they” know that won`t happen and price accordingly The public have a lot of power but are, on the main, too cowardly to wield it.

    Here`s a simple way ro keep prices down: DON`T BUY THE PRODUCT. It`s a sad reflection on anyone who can`t pluck up enough
    courage to miss a football match, especially one involving teams in a corrupt league.

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