Premiership clubs are considering bringing in a new rule that would guarantee a fixed percentage of stadia to away fans, and Celtic are likely to be interested.
The Daily Mail reports that top-flight clubs are “weighing up a proposal” that would see a number of visiting supporters guaranteed at Premiership grounds from next season.
At present, Section I27 of the SPFL‘s rules states that home clubs “must make provision for the admission of such reasonable number of visiting supporters” at matches.
With that wording open to interpretation, the league’s Competitions Working Group have asked clubs if they would like to change the rule to a fixed percentage.
Without knowing for sure, you would expect Celtic to be a fan of this move as it would entitle us to a certain number of tickets for Ibrox. Rules in UEFA competition see away supports given 5% of grounds, and that number is mentioned in the report. However, a 2.5% allocation is also mentioned for stadia larger than 30,000.
While a 5% rule would entitle us to more tickets for both Ibrox and Tynecastle than is currently the case, the obvious issue for Celtic is that it wouldn’t change a whole lot else.
When looking at the exact number of tickets we received for Premiership grounds last season, only Rangers actually gave us less than 5%. Even in places like Pittodrie and Rugby Park where our allocation has been cut, we’re above the 5% mark. At Killie, we still receive roughly 25% of the capacity.
So this may not change a huge deal. Yet it must still be viewed as a positive step, even if it just helps us get a bigger away support at derbies. It’ll need an 11-1 majority to pass.
Let’s see how things progress from here.
In other news, SFA chief delivers disappointing Hampden news; explains why Celtic Park wasn’t chosen for Euro bid
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