Cup final tickets - credit where it's due

Portsmouth Football Club and Ticketmaster were heavily criticised for the way tickets for the FA cup semi final were organised and sold - in many cases rightly so, in some probably unfairly so...

In all fairness Portsmouth Football Club then held up their hands and said 'yes we did some things wrong'. But what we also have to remember is that although we have used Ticketmaster for tickets this season the organisation of what 35,000 tickets was always going to be difficult and was something new to us and the club, ok maybe it should not have been to them though. As a result our voices were heard and the way tickets for the final have been organised and allocated has been much, much better and smoother - have you really heard many complaints about the way the process of ordering tickets has gone this time round? Not really.

Some were unhappy at the way that we could only order in blocks, for example you might be in the Fratton End but have friends in the North Stand but this time you could not sit with them, but the way the tickets were been broken down I think has made it work all the more smoothly. At the end of the day you must have got to know those sitting around you, and are in most probability sitting with friend's week in week out anyway - or in the same stands as friends - so sitting with them is not an issue really is it? When all is said and done though the harshest answer of all could be if you so desperately wanted to sit with someone else at Wembley why are you not doing this week in week out throughout the season anyway?

The club listened to the fans and organised the tickets as best they could, and as I say I feel credit should go where it is warranted to be honest.

I also think that a hell of a lot of thanks, credit and praise should be given to Peter Storrie - ok he might have thrown a wobbler when meeting one lot of fans - and the people at the Ticket Office, particularly Elaine Giles.

Put it this way guys, I know not everyone that has been to the '3 or more games needed' could get a ticket as they were not the named person who ordered but they said that if you put forward your case they would 'look into it' and Storrie and Giles did this and have in many instances been able to help - I am sure they could not help everyone as it would not have been physically possible to allocated tickets to every single person that could have qualified that has asked, but I have not come across one single person that has pleaded their case and not been helped!

I am not going to lie, sometimes the people at the Ticket Office have been about as helpful to me as a chocolate teapot would be, some would not so much as give me the time of day and this winds me up, but on the whole for the cup final process I think they have done Portsmouth Football Club proud and I for one will be raising a glass in toast of them prior, and hopefully after the cup final, and would hope that those of you helped by the club would do so likewise.

If you have any messages that you would like passed onto Elaine Giles, Peter Storrie or the Ticket Office as a whole please forward them to me via email and/or leave a comment below I will get them all forward at once to the club to show the support and appreciated that has been felt by many - come on guys share your thoughts and like I have give credit where it is due...

PLAY UP POMPEY!