England Supporter’s Travel Club (1 Viewer)

Mucca Mad Boys said:

Every year the Euros/World Cup comes and goes, I always try to get England tickets and the prices are ridiculous. I really want to go to Euro 2024 to Germany, like I went to France in 2016, but this time I want to watch England play their games.

The only way to achieve this goal is join the ESTC.

I’ve got a few questions that I hope some of the posters on here can answer.

1) my brother is 15, would he classify as a child or adults membership?

2) how easy is it get tickets to away games when you’re first starting to get caps?

3) The caps I’d hope to accumulate this season, will they last until the ballots for the 2024 tournament?

Any help with this would be appreciated!

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C J will be the one to ask mate

Evo1883 said:

C J will be the one to ask mate

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And one of the Earlsdon pair. Think it’s Earlsdon Loyal Blue that travels.

I’ve done a few England away trips and got tickets out there every time except Germany ‘06 when I was pretty skint so didn’t even bother trying and just watched it in the fan parks.

If it is just the Euros in Germany you want to do then I’d just start putting a few quid away over the next few years and go out with a wad of cash.

75 quid gets you a membership until next December with 2 caps awarded for every non tournament game and are valid for 2 cycles. So everything since Russia goes towards this Euros and Qatar. The first two games for Germany were the ones in Middlesbrough. First caps for 2026 will be the March 2023 games.

Membership is the only way to get tickets in the England section at tournaments and in the away end for away games. For away games where the demand exceeds supply a ballot is needed. This is done on the basis of the top 70% of applicants in the caps table get a ticket and the other 30% of the tickets get issued randomly to everyone that doesn’t meet that threshold.

Tournaments are similar but it’s done as 70/20/10 with 20% going to those that have done 2 away and 4 home games during that cycle and 10% going randomly to everyone else.

I’m not sure how it works with the age banding but the tickets for tournaments for away trips are always one price. The only thing you’d save is a reduction on the membership and a slight reduction on the home tickets.

The FA have been difficult in the past despite the people at the Travel Club department’s best efforts. However there does appear to be shift now and things are getting better for us. Paid members only pay 20 quid for home games and we also have had a bit of help here and there in setting up the stuff we do with Block 109.

I was in England members/englandfans for about 12 years. There's a lot of carrot on stick induced tactics employed by the FA to ensnare membership.
You'll have no problem securing tickets for all home internationals - Qualifiers and friendlies. Away games are gonna be more difficult given allocation and your placing within the priority system that is used. There's also a fair amount of shit housery employed by the FA whereby they will sometimes actually decline some of the initial allocation offered by foreign FA's for reasons only known to themselves. I kid you not!
My advice would be not to join (Unless of course you're happy with just attending home fixtures or when we next host a tournament)
Instead I would buy an extra lottery ticket each week in the slim hope of landing a large sum of money which will facilitate your cost of travel, accommodation and transaction with scalpers.
Ticket touts, in my estimation generally possess more honesty and integrity than our own FA.
Hope this helps.

Should be reformed now. Major tournaments should not be a closed shop for members. Members should get about 20 percent of the total. And weed out the yobs, drunks and racists. The general public should be able to enter a lottery for about 70 per cent of the tickets. High time elite sport was made more accessible to all not just the rich and the members.

Don't 'yobs, drunks and racists' make up the 'the general public'?

oscillatewildly said:

Don't 'yobs, drunks and racists' make up the 'the general public'?

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No

oakey said:

Should be reformed now. Major tournaments should not be a closed shop for members. Members should get about 20 percent of the total. And weed out the yobs, drunks and racists. The general public should be able to enter a lottery for about 70 per cent of the tickets. High time elite sport was made more accessible to all not just the rich and the members.

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Agree with the sentiment, but I'd be peed off if I travelled everywhere and couldn't get a ticket for the games. Its not all cost, its investing effort and commitment too, a bit like City. We rightly as season ticket holders get first dibs on away games and cup final tickets etc and if we didn't I'd be pretty annoyed if someone watches their one game a season at eg a play off final and I couldn't go.

Also I agree with yobs and racists, but mot drunks. Drunks who are then yobbish or racist are yobs and racists, but plenty of harmless drunks at football games and I'm sure we've all had the odd one too many at times.

Yes but its also about availability and capacity. Why should a group of members buy up most of the capacity as a reward for loyalty? This practice leads to too much privilege - Lords cricket, golf and other sports clubs etc taking the lion's share of land and every other type of ownership. Time to prevent these privileged elites with legislation like that which reserves certain sporting events for terrestrial TV.

So it's actually revolution you're hankering for not just the chance to see England away in San Marino?

oakey said:

Yes but its also about availability and capacity. Why should a group of members buy up most of the capacity as a reward for loyalty? This practice leads to too much privilege - Lords cricket, golf and other sports clubs etc taking the lion's share of land and every other type of ownership. Time to prevent these privileged elites with legislation like that which reserves certain sporting events for terrestrial TV.

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Basically you just want to be able to turn up for the big games, and think the folk traveling to San Marino away shouldn't get priority. You sound like a Twitter nutter using stuff like "privileged elites". Guy I know follows England everywhere. He's a postman living down south and pretty much doesn't have a pot to piss in. He shouldn't get it because you should be able to waltz in and take the ticket when you feel like it. Not sure he's the one acting privileged here.

oakey said:

Yes but its also about availability and capacity. Why should a group of members buy up most of the capacity as a reward for loyalty? This practice leads to too much privilege - Lords cricket, golf and other sports clubs etc taking the lion's share of land and every other type of ownership. Time to prevent these privileged elites with legislation like that which reserves certain sporting events for terrestrial TV.

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What rubbish, for the final, members had 8,000 tickets, not the majority, less than 10% of full capacity, it’s nothing like lords. Most businesses reward loyalty, I’m sure you have supermarket cards, costa, Nero etc,

the travel club is firstly set up to ensure that people are vetted and police cleared and the years of showing our flights, travel details etc to get caps, pick them up in the overseas locations etc is not some privilege, it’s a dedication and it is a cost that we save hard for, if you think that those members then don’t deserve to go in a ballot for up to 10% of a stadiums attendance then i have to disagree with you.
try looking at the fifa and uefa allocations to seek unfairness and corruption with friends of mine not lucky enough in the ballot in Germany buying tickets via touto with the overseas country name on the ticket and blatantly sold on for individual profiteering

The England team belongs to all of us not just the members. No comparison to loyalty cards. My nectar card doesnt entitle me to access Sainsbury's and take all its produce, it gives me small rewards only. Membership schemes have their place but they shouldn't amount to buying almost complete access and excluding non members.
If England are to host international finals government should legislate to limit the corporate to 10 percent, 20 percent members and 70 percent general sale by lottery open to all UK residents. I want to see a much more diverse and representative crowd.

Yes let's fill it up with Scots, Welsh & Irish to cheer on our opposition because we know anyone who supports England is a nasty little privileged racist.

This last tournament had more than 70% go to the general public, we didn’t get 20% as members so your dig at members getting some kind of preferential treatment is wrong, you had to apply at the original date to be part of the big allocation.
The issue is not the distribution, it is the pricing, tickets are unaffordable to those not getting fans first tickets.
Cat 3 (cheapest) were £295

take the commonwealth games, as a local resident if you are from this region, you can go in the ballot for events from 14th July allowing everyone local from all backgrounds to apply. Should this be stopped for being a specific group now excluding others? Not sure on pricing of the events yet, haven’t researched but dont imagine it being the affordable level for a family and that’s the real issue

I don’t get the issue with the membership? It’s just like season ticket holders getting priority on away games.

I say this as someone who’s never seen England away or in tournaments.

If you follow England more you should get priority over someone who just rocks up for the big games.

oakey said:

Yes but its also about availability and capacity. Why should a group of members buy up most of the capacity as a reward for loyalty? This practice leads to too much privilege - Lords cricket, golf and other sports clubs etc taking the lion's share of land and every other type of ownership. Time to prevent these privileged elites with legislation like that which reserves certain sporting events for terrestrial TV.

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Most of the capacity? In tournaments the two nations supporters club’s/FA’s allocation is 16% each. We rightly get the chance to buy tickets on a sliding scale of chance relative to our cap level. The majority of the rest goes on sale to the public. Those that weren’t members that were desperate for tickets rightly had the chance to apply for tickets on multiple occasions like any other tournament. Many did and got what they wanted.

With regards to “privileged elite” the ESTC membership contains people from every social class and walk of life. I’m certainly not in the “privileged elite”. Like the lads I travel with I’m an every day, normal person with a working class background. My Mum is a nurse, Dad is a plumber, partner works on a neonatal ward, etc. Said it before and I’ll say it again. It’s not the cheapest hobby but one the majority could do if their work/off duty schedule allows. Get on board folks, you won’t regret it.

With regards to corporates I have no issues with them either. Without their money in sponsorship and high end ticketing/hospitality packages the tickets for the person on the street would be a lot more expensive. It’s right they have the chance to buy and don’t get a huge allocation in comparison with other large events on the sporting calendar.

Mucca Mad Boys said:

Thank you for the information you’ve provided previously!

Just out of curiosity, how much is it for a normal away game?

I agree that the higher caps you have, you should get to go to games. It is more or less the same principle as buying a season ticket at Cov. If we get a big away tie against A top club, you bet I want my priority!

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It varies in cost. Flights can be a couple of hundred return on a rare more expensive trip but generally you’re looking at between 40-80 if you’re willing to shop around and go for linked non-direct flights. Some of these require an overnight stay and some don’t. If given the choice of a hundred quid direct flight or a 30 quid two legged flight and a 30-40 quid stay in the Hilton as a stop off in somewhere brilliant like Barcelona, Berlin or Ljubljana I know what I would choose.

For accommodation I’ve found booking.com good but recently we’ve used Air bnb a lot. You can get a decent apartment around 20 quid a head per night.

Rule of thumb for tickets is the smaller the nation the more you pay. Spain both times has been 20€, Italy 14€, Germany 20€, France 30€. Whereas Lithuania both times was over 40€, Ireland 50€, Scotland both times £50. There is the odd anomaly. The most expensive for a non tournament game I’ve come across was an extra allocation for Basel where my mate paid around 100CH where we‘d only paid 30CH. Cheapest was Kosovo for a fiver, Montenegro and Ukraine, both a tenner.