Supporters visit Another New Stadium

Yesterday's game at Colchester gave an opportuntity for Hereford United supporters to visit another new stadium.


Looking rather like Shrewsbury's New Meadow, the Weston Homes Community Stadium has been built on a green field site at the end of an business park. It consists of four stands, main stand pictured, with gaps between them.


However it is not the easiest ground to reach as it is poorly signposted. Even worse the extortionate £10 charge to park next to the stadium (to be dropped to £5 shortly) made some supporters look for another place to park.

The ticketing process is similar to many new stadium in so much as supporters buy their tickets at a main office and then put the ticket into a bar code reading machine at the turnstiles. However the system looks open to fraud as few if any checks were done to see if the ticket matched the person.

Warned before-hand most adult away supporters purchased £20 tickets. Colchester has a system whereby they charge up to £24 for a seat behind the goal and £20 on the ends of the away stand. However nobody seems to keep to this plan. Even the one of the stewards said sit where you like.

On the plus side there was a well laid out club shop which looked quite busy.

The stadium itself can hold about 10,000. The away end, pictured below, gave spectators a good view of the game but like most stadiums of its size unless there is a large contingent of away fans or they are sat in only part of the stand it's very difficult to create much atmosphere to back your team.


The 150 or so backing the Bulls yesterday were spread out right across the stand. Whilst the Funbus crew augmented by a few others tried their best to lift the spirits of the team it was quite difficult.

On the down side the refreshments were awful. A £3 burger came in a heat bag and tasted of, well nothing much. The vendor selling outside the ground looked a lot busier. Why is it that some clubs just fail to realise the potential from tasty refreshments?

Overall the stadium was comfortable, giving supporters a great view of the game, and had plenty of stewards but as for atmosphere it's never going to be in the same league as Edgar Street.

---