Hibs have confirmed that home fans will continue to be seated in the South Stand for their post-split match against Celtic.
Late last month, Hibs CEO Dan Barnett raised the idea of increasing Celtic’s allocation at the club’s fan forum.
He pointed to the fact that the club has lost money in giving less tickets to away fans, but promised that no changes would be made without communication with the Hibees support.
Traditionally, Celtic have been given the full South Stand when playing away to the Edinburgh side, but this has changed in recent years.
The decisions are yours…
Hibs confirm home fans in South Stand for Celtic fixture
The game will be played on Sunday 3 May at 12PM, being shown live on Sky Sports.
The club confirmed on the Hibs website: “As per other home fixtures, the Club have committed to making more tickets available to home supporters and we have opened up additional seating in the South Stand for Hibs fans.”
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Celtic’s allocation was initially cut from the full stand to around 2,930 tickets in early 2024, and subsequently reduced further to the current level of less than 1,500.
Barnett spoke to the Hibs Observer on the topic last week, saying: “We’ve been very open and honest about what we want to do in principle, versus what the impact is from a revenue perspective.
“We’re working with the fans to make that decision together in terms of the position we adopt and whether it’s worth doing it that way.”
“It equates to around between £150,000 and £200,000 a year if our fans do not take up the allocation that’s not allocated to the offer.
“We’ve also made the decision to freeze season ticket prices for next season, which could have been an incremental revenue driver for us, but we feel strongly that we want to keep football accessible for everybody, and we want to reward that loyalty.
“So far, it’s paying off. We broke our records for season tickets last year, and we’re tracking well ahead of that for this season.”
Barnett joined Hibs after six years as Commercial Director at Leicester City.
Your first thought when you see the fixtures…
How many points will we pick up?
The trend of decreasing Celtic’s away allocations
Since the pandemic, Scottish Premiership clubs – following the example of Rangers – have increasingly moved toward cutting away ticket allocations for Celtic supporters.
Hearts initiated this shift in 2021 by reducing the Roseburn Stand capacity to 650, a strategy later adopted by their Edinburgh rivals.
Similarly, St Mirren and Kilmarnock have abandoned the tradition of offering visiting fans two stands, instead restricting them to a single end of the ground.
In contrast, Motherwell and Livingston remain the primary exceptions, still granting large sections of their stadiums to the league’s biggest travelling support.
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