THE CONCRETE ROUNDABOUT (TCR)

At test matches (and, yes, it's easier with cricket) you are not allowed back into the stand until the end of an over. With big matches at S:MK, the stewards could be instructed to hold people back until the ball goes out of play.

Or people could try not being pricks for a change, and wait for that themselves.

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I don't need your ill-informed, half-baked, idiotic opinions. I have plenty of those myself.

The problem is that probably 80% of those there never go to watch a live football match and think they can turn up five minutes before kickoff and still find a parking space and walk straight in. It was an expensive night for quite a few as a large row of cars parked on the pavement in mount farm had been ticketed. One thing I did notice last night or at least I think I did was that gate 4 wasn’t open (happy to be corrected) so the queues at gate 5 were horrendous from at least 6.45. Gate 6 was fine, no idea about gate 3? I was sitting dead on the halfway line so you would expect to enter via gate 4 so was clear the east stand top and bottom tier were being entranced to gate 5 which really couldn’t cope, they gave up doing searches at one point as the queue which was about 10 deep went back to the perimeter road.

To be fair, the traffic was absolutely horrendous last night. We accounted for that and still didn't get to the ground until 7:15. We thought we'd left early enough to get there at 6:30 but our usual 40 minute drive took 1.5hrs.

The only reason we got to the ground on time, was because we were regulars and ignored all the temporary parking signs (some 15 minute walk from the ground) and parked in our usual spot in the industrial area opposite Asda.

The thing that hit me last night was the redundancies seemed to show, I’ve been to all the big games at the stadium and last night I thought was probably the poorest in terms of organisation imo, not saying it was terrible, just not as good. As Alby mentioned about the fanzone, I would’ve been more than happy to have volunteered to go in in the morning or day before and help set up some tables and chairs for people, maybe this is something the club could explore in the future for any big fixture?

I think organisation by the club was quite good actually. The queues at the gate where reasonable for an almost full stadium and it took us around 5 mins to get in at 7.10pm.
We were at Wembley on Sunday and it took us 40 mins to move 20m and we entered the stadium 10 mins after KO.

The parking near Howdens was horrible though. We didn't move for 45 mins which was frustrating.

Thee game was dull but we got to see some stars that would never otherwise come near MK. I'm sure Neymar was contractually obligated to play some part and he didn't train for the 2 days before. The first thing he felt he had probably planned to go off although I'm sure he'd have wanted to play for longer. It was only a friendly though so more important to be injury free.

The bloke next to me was from Brackley but said he might come again to watch us in the league. Hopefully there are more like him.

I used the park and walk from bond estates, it said on the details when I booked it that access was available 4 hours prior to an event. Well it wasn’t available until 5pm as quite a few of us found out. I was also told I didn’t need to bring my e-ticket as my car reg no would be scanned on entry. It wasn’t and the steward told us we had to place it on the dashboard as proof of payment. I was also told that it didn’t matter if you turned up nearer ko time it wouldn’t matter as you were guaranteed a spot. The main reason for booking was my son in law was meeting me at the ground but wouldn’t be able to get there as early as me because of work. When he arrived 6.50 pm he was told the car park was full and he’d have to find another one. He ended up parking on the grass verge just up the road. Not good enough imo when you’ve paid £20 (two cars).

Which gate did you enter via just out of interest?

I enjoyed it. Nice seeing a packed stadium and the football was as I expected.

I park about 10-15 minute walk from the ground every game (Coincides with a handy pint ) and the traffic did look horrendous as I weaved back through it on the walk back. That's a glimpse into the future! I hope of course.

However it means I won't reveal where I park.

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Decided to come back.

See I don’t get excited about looking at a footballer unless they actually do something. Seeing Neymar or Ronaldo or Messi in the pledge is pointless unless they actually deliver what we expect or want from them. But I wasn’t expecting much of anything given that it was a friendly but just seeing them” isn’t enpugh worth for me.

I actually thought (from my experiences) getting into the ground, and out of the ground was fine. Didn’t queue at all getting in and got a hot dog and tango instantly. Half time got up for a piss but queue was a joke but that’s my fault for leaving it until half time but as mentioned before I didn’t want to be that guy who got up and down during a game to go toilet.

I was god a game like this could bring in supporters from all sorts of backgrounds. I saw people with Poland flags, football shirts from African countries and lets be very frank here, football in this country anyway is predominantly followed by a white audience. And things like this open it up to wider audiences. A black family who’d never seen a game before May have loved it and opened up to the idea of doing that as a family on a weekly basis. Then you have a few more fans from a different background to the norm. And that’s fantastic to me

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The most optimistic pessimistic person on this forum.

Apparently.

UTF

Very much this.

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I don't need your ill-informed, half-baked, idiotic opinions. I have plenty of those myself.