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Swansea City fans have voiced their frustrations over the travel arrangements for Sunday’s South Wales derby clash with Cardiff City.
Due to policing restrictions enforced as a result of the high-risk nature of the game, away fans in the fixture must travel on official coaches put on by their own club to travel to the stadium of their opponents.
It means Swansea supporters – regardless of where they live – must travel to the Liberty Stadium by 7:45am on the day of the upcoming game before being driven by coach to Cardiff City Stadium.
As a result, some supporters who live within a few miles of the stadium face a 200-mile round trip rather than a short-distance journey.
The same applied to Cardiff fans for the reverse fixture in October, a game Steve Cooper’s men won 1-0.
However, different to previous years, the travel arrangements have actually been somewhat relaxed this season.
The two meetings between the rivals during the 2013/14 Premier League season were bubble matches, meaning fans wanting to be in the away end of either game had no choice but to travel from their home stadium on pre-organised coaches, regardless of where they live.
But the Bluebirds and the Swans have worked in collaboration with South Wales Police prior to both derby matches this season in a bid to make travelling easier for away supporters.
As part of their new arrangement, both clubs were allocated a limited number of travel direct spaces for their side’s away fixture.
It means a small number of Swansea fans living in Cardiff and beyond were granted access to make their own way to Cardiff City Stadium, with the same applying to the Bluebirds’ faithful in the reverse fixture.
Both clubs were given the same allowance of travel direct passes.
However, the demand for these tickets – of which it is thought there were around 100 – was greater than what was available for the upcoming fixture.
Some fans were lucky…
Matthew Phillips wrote on Twitter: “So looks like I can travel to Cardiff independently.”
But due to high demand, others were not so fortunate…
A letter from the Swans’ Travel Direct Team to fans who were unsuccessful in their bid to travel to the game independently read as follows: “Thank you for your request to travel independently to the Cardiff City away fixture at the weekend.
“With the limited number of travel direct match tickets available, your request to travel independently has been declined. You will be required to travel by coach departing the Liberty Stadium, with your away match ticket voucher(s) to be dispatched today via Royal Mail 1st class and are expected to arrive with you by Thursday 9th January.
“We ask you to please remember that you are representing Swansea City Football Club at this fixture. We would urge you to consider the implications of any poor behaviour for yourself and the club.
“Thank you for your continued support of Swansea City AFC.”
Swansea say the availability of direct travel tickets was explained to fans in the initial ticket bulletin released last year.
One fan, Tim Lewis, said: “We were told people who live in Cardiff or further away could apply to travel to the game independently, so I did the moment I secured my ticket.
“Despite living a mile away from the Cardiff City Stadium I’ve been turned down and will have to catch a coach from Swansea at 7.45am, more than four hours before kick off.
“There are no trains to get to Swansea at 6am on a Sunday so realistically I’ll have to travel the night before and stay with family.
“I then face having to go back to Swansea on the coach after the game before returning home to Cardiff.
“What should be a two mile round trip is likely to be more like 200 miles and take up half of my weekend.
“Ordinary football fans should not be treated like criminals just because they want to follow their team away from home.”
(Image: PA Wire)
Chris Lepkowski commented: “Never before has it been easier to watch football. Never before has it been more difficult to watch football.”
And Alex Oliver said: “Once again another example of the powers that be having little to no regard for football fans.”
The club have revealed they worked hard to give those with longer journeys and those with exceptional circumstances – such as disabled supporters – priority over others when it came to allocating direct travel passes to fans having initially operated on a first come first served basis.
On Tuesday afternoon, it was confirmed that the club had been allocated a small number of additional direct travel tickets.
They will be given to supporters in or east of Cardiff, with fans set to be contacted by Swansea’s ticket office in due course.
In addition to the coaches travelling from the Liberty Stadium, a small number of fans in supporters’ groups will also be able to make their way to Cardiff from areas more convenient than Swansea, such as Aberdare and Morriston.
And some of Swansea’s own coaches will be stopping off en-route to Cardiff City Stadium to pick up fans along the way.
A spokesperson for Swansea City added that they hope the travel arrangements for the derby fixtures be further relaxed in the future.
Kick-off on Sunday is at 12pm.
Follow all of the latest Swansea City news right here.
