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No Ajax supporters to away game in Heerenveen
23 October: Tomorrow's away game at SC Heerenveen has
already become remarkable for the fact that there will be no
Ajax fans present to support their team. Yesterday, Ajax
announced that a fair presale for Ajax 'priority away card'
holders can not take place, because SC Heerenveen refuses to
provide Ajax with the minimum obligatory number of tickets.
Based on the 18 Eredivisie stadiums, the KNVB has determined
for each Eredivisie club how many tickets should be reserved
for visiting fans. Roughly, each club should have an away
section covering 5% of the stadium's seats, with a maximum of
1,600 for Holland's largest stadiums, the Amsterdam ArenA and
Rotterdam's De Kuip.
SC Heerenveen's Abe Lenstra Stadium (capacity 14,800) has
the smallest away section in the Eredivisie: 595 seats, which
number does not meet the minimum KNVB standard. For two
seasons, SC Heerenveen has been promising to make the away
section larger. During the construction works, the KNVB granted
the club an exemption: the number of tickets sent to visiting
club could be kept down to 395. However, the KNVB explicitly
added that clubs needing the full away section for their
supporters should be provided with the full 595 tickets, as
that number is already too low, officially.
Ajax introduced an ID system of 'away cards' a few seasons
ago. Every Ajax season card holder can 'upgrade' his season
card to an away card. The hard core of Ajax supporters who
attend the most away games, automatically become 'priority away
card' holders - and go first for every away game presale. Ajax
deliberately adjusted the number of 'priority season card'
holders to the smallest away section in the Eredivisie (595)
and refuses to go below that.
However, SC Heerenveen refuses to send Ajax more than 395
tickets, and are supported in their refusal by the Heerenveen
mayor. Negotiations did not have the desired effect. Ajax
figured it would be unfair that 200 of the club's 'priority
away card' holders will not be able to buy a ticket, whereas
395 other will. Therefore Ajax has decided not to sell any
tickets at all, a decision which seems to be supported by
fanatical supporters' groups such as the Independent Fanclub
Ajax (OFA), the F-Side and its fanzine De Ajax Ster
('The Ajax Star').
In protest against SC Heerenveen's business, Michael van
Praag and the Ajax board and management will not join the SC
Heerenveen board on the main stand of Abe Lenstra Stadium.
Instead, they will watch SC Heerenveen vs Ajax from the empty
away section, a gesture of solidarity which seems to be
appreciated by the large part of the Ajax fans.
Now that Ajax will not sell any tickets and, logically, will
not organize bus trips to Heerenveen, the club does not accept
any responsibility for Ajax fans travelling to Heerenveen to
protest in non-violent or violent ways. The club has explicitly
asked its fans not to go to Heerenveen and to stay calm - which
is, at this point, all Ajax can do.
Ajax has not yet announced further legal actions against SC
Heerenveen. The club has announced that it will be showing the
game on big screens in the Amsterdam ArenA. All Club Card
holders can come and watch the game for free. (MP)
(Source: Ajax.nl)
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