THE CONCRETE ROUNDABOUT (TCR)

Not much can be said about yesterday, unless you want to criticise both clubs for lack of any communication, but the situation has now created multiple problems.
If you cannot go tonight and you want to get a refund, you have to return your ticket by 3-30pm, that is bloody poor. If you can’t go tonight for whatever reason your chances of returning your ticket before the deadline are less than zero.
Whilst all tickets are honoured for Saturday, nothing has been said about pre booked parking, surely not even this club are going to get people to pay twice.
I know this has been hastily arranged and it’s going to have problems but the club have not covered themselves in any glory.
A number of clarifications need to be made by the club today and quickly.

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Read the MELTDOWN after every game, no bullshit, just giving it straight

I think the club have been left in a very difficult position and ultimately, none of this is their fault.

As these are physical tickets, they must be returned to be refunded. I also understand why they need to be returned by 3:30, so they have some time to resell but also because they’ll likely be heading down to Crawley.

Also, the club couldn’t announce anything yesterday until Crawley had, so only 1 club is to blame for that side if things.

I'm pretty sure this is an unprecedented scenario of a play off game in May being postponed due to weather. The club announced a new date within 2 hours of postponement. I can't imagine anything is well thought out because quite simply they had no time or could never have expected it.

I know we love to bash the club. But within two hours of the game being called off we have a new fixture. Many can't go, many can't return tickets team and whatever else. But there was no time to think. We deal with it and hopefully as many people as possible can still enjoy the two fixtures live.

What's the situation if you've got tickets for Thursday but now can't go Saturday. Have they got to be returned by 3.30 as well?

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Gimme Gimme Shock Treatment

IIRC the away club needs to physically return tickets to the home club before kickoff. If they don't do so they have to pay for any unreturned tickets. The unsold tickets are returned via the coaches and as these leave the stadium at 3:30 that's the deadline for crediting.

Rearranging a match for the next day on a Bank Holiday is unheard of. We are in territory that's never been planned for and I'm sure that the EFL will need to consider this and learn lessons from it.

I understand this Digger and believe the club have done the best they can in a bad situation.

I do think however that in this instance the club should be pressing Crawley and the EFL so that fans left unable to attend today's game are not out of pocket if they cannot return the tickets by the deadline. Most will probably be working today so unable to return them. As long as the tickets are returned unused, by say the 2nd leg, Crawley should have to compensate them.

To be fair neither our club or Crawley can independently change this.

Remember this isn't a "normal" match as the ticket money is pooled and held by the EFL, it's then split with the four clubs and the EFL all taking a share. It's therefore up to all five parties agreeing OR the EFL mandating. None of that would have been possible yesterday. I'm sure that discussions are taking place today but frankly I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for a positive outcome as our supporters are the only losers in this with all the other parties gaining....

Not sure that's entirely true as Crawley could agree to change it by agreeing to compensate Dons fans that return their unused tickets and extending the dead line to do so.

Agrree though that's it's very unlikely they will do.

I'm just glad I'm still able to go.

The question is - "how would they fund it?"

The deadline is set by the EFL so if they independently extended the deadline without agreement Crawley would need to fund the refund as there would be no agreement to fund it from the pooled money.

In my view there are four alternatives:

1. Crawley fund the refunds after the deadline at their cost.
2. MK Dons fund the refunds after the deadline at their cost.
3. All five parties agree that refunds can be made after the deadline.
4. The rules are rigorously applied and the deadline is kept.

My guess is number 4 is where we are at. Our club have already taken a hit financially for the coach hire and costs involved for an away match that's cancelled. Crawley will have had to dispose of food that had been unthawed plus numerous other costs. I doubt if either would want to pay compensation out of their own pockets. Number 3 would be the best scenario but the likelihood of that happening is low.

The magnanimous gesture from Crawley would be to fund those who bought away leg tickets, and now are unable to attend, out of their own pocket. I can't see it being all that many, say a hundred supporters for the sake of argument. That's somewhere in the region of £1500. Hardly likely to break the bank. And as it was them that couldn't be arsed to cover their pitch, or look at the Met Office website, then it's the least they can do.

I get the point of returning tickets before 3:30, but for the majority of folk that's quite simply impractical, and you'd think that all five relevant parties would take that into consideration.

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For those that like that sort of thing, that is the sort of thing they like.