Giving Orient fans a voice
Leyton Orient Fans' Trust
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Bristol Rovers match date switches
2/25/2010

The recent Bristol Rovers home match was subject to three date changes. The original date of Saturday 16th January was unavoidably postponed due to a pre-match deluge.

The rearranged fixture was then officially announced for Wednesday 3rd February (although Bristol Rovers had jumped the gun and announced it for Tuesday 2nd before correcting it). The Wednesday night match – unusual for Orient – was demanded by police because Bristol City had a potential FA Cup replay at Crystal Palace on the Tuesday night.

So far, nothing particularly contentious. However, in the week before the rearranged fixture was due to take place, the match was switched again, this time to Tuesday 2 February. The only explanation given was that the Tuesday night had become available once it was clear that the Cup game at Selhurst Park wasn’t going to take place – which indeed was the case.

All these changes caused dismay to some travelling Rovers fans, leading to their Fans’ Trust issuing a press release, which you can see here. Some Orient fans were also upset with the final late change which meant they had to miss the match, and LOFT asked the club for an explanation behind the last change.

Matt Porter, Chief Executive of Leyton Orient, responded:

"I appreciate it was not ideal for people who had made arrangements for the Wednesday. It’s never great when fixtures have to be moved for any reason because it always causes disruption and moving a game once it’s been re-arranged isn’t something we’d look to do again unless we felt it was of particular importance…On this occasion, the decision was made predominantly for footballing reasons and also to give the pitch, which has been struggling this winter as you know, an extra 24 hours to recover in time for the Brighton fixture."

While LOFT understands and accepts the footballing reasoning behind the last switch, especially the need to allow the pitch the longest time to recover between matches during this period of cold, wet weather, we would urge Orient and other clubs to do more to communicate such reasoning for similar short-notice changes in advance. It does no harm, and indeed is surely something to strive for, to ensure that fans of both sides are fully informed and can better appreciate the rationale behind such decisions when they are made.





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