Hi guys,
im Australian, Im looking at options of travelling to England at the end of next year or early 2015, I was just wondering how easy is it to get Premier League tickets? for example Manchester United vs Aston Villa.... Arsenal vs Spurs? whats a good time to go while its the snowy season aswell??? ) and is it cheap over there?
Depends on who's playing who, and what the status of the table is at the time. Man U vs Villa could be possible. Arsenal vs Spurs would be a lot more difficult because that's a local derby and they're fierce competitors. Tickets are definitely not cheap, especially if it's a clash between teams that are riding high in the table.
Snow is hard to predict for the UK, but somewhere around mid Jan through to mid Feb would likely be the most statistically likely tmie. However, it also depends where you are in the UK. London doesn't get that much snow, and indeed England as a whole can sometimes go entire years with no snow at all.
If you wanted to have more chance of snow, either hit the highlands in Scotland, Snowdonia national park in Wales or get guaranteed snow in the Alps, Pyrenees or Scandinavia. Budget airlines are very common in Europe; major players include Ryanair, Easyjet and (increasingly) Norwegian. Refer to http://www.skyscanner.net for information, but read the small print carefully, the rules are applied extremely strictly.
Your chances of seeing a Premier league game involving a big name team (Arsenal, Spurs, ManYoo, Chelsea) or Livepool are limited. You might be able to get to see, say, Chelsea in a qualifier of some kind (say Champs League) or League Cup. Depending who they are playing you can get walk-up tickets for some smaller teams against smaller opponents (Fulham versus anyone outside the top six excluding Liverpool, for example).
Cheap is a relative/comparative term but with Aussie dollars you are travelling pretty well compared to days when just under AUD3 got you GBP1
The snow is something to keep in the back of your head and more of an issue (as a rule) for northern England although the past five or so years has seen the SE of England battling against it a few times although the impact is largely because of its rarity and therefore lack of preparedness.
Arsenal Spurs the only chance would be to buy an expensive VIP matchday package, for Man Utd if they have ant tickets left they sell them about 12 days prior to the match on their website, if they are playing some of the smaller teams they sometimes had tickets available last season but not often, early European ties and league cup games might be your best chance for the big clubs. Although there are always empty seats an Man City games so should have no problem getting tickets there!!
Chelsea often seem to have seats available for European games (assuming it's not against a Barcelona or the like), at short notice. I'm told Fulham are one of the most likely (certainly in London) for getting tickets, otherwise you might try somewhere like Stoke or Hull.
For the big teams, you will either have to pay through the nose for a VIP package, or find websites where people who can't go exchange their tickets. For instance, @arsenal_tickets retweets people who want to sell on their tickets (face value only) if they can't go. I don't know if anyone does that for other clubs, but they might.
Or, you can offer me a small fortune to borrow my Arsenal season ticket...
You'll be lucky to get United or Arsenal tickets in the Premier League full stop.
There are plenty of other grounds with much better atmospheres and more authenticity if that is something you're interested in. Even the lower leagues can be a great day out - often where you can stand up and sing - means you can soak in the atmosphere. And of course the prices will be a lot more reasonable.
FA and Carling Cup matches can be a good way to see the top teams play. Demand is lower as season ticket holders usually have to pay for these tickets, so they don't always bother going. For the FA Cup (http://www.thefa.com/TheFACup/More/fa-cup-round-dates) the 4th or 5th rounds proper might be good ones to aim for, as by that point a lot of matches will feature a premiership team, but it's not so close to the final that the tickets will be really hard to get.
You won't know where or who is playing though till near the time, and you might well have to travel outside London, but reckon most stadiums you can get to the match there and back by train within the day.
A downside to watching to premier league teams and Liverpool play in the early stages of FA Cup, League Cup, Europa League or Champions League is that sometimes/often they don't put out their best players. So instead of seeing, for example, RVP play it might instead be a squad or youth player.
Listen Corey, if you want to see football get to a Championship or League 1 game, tickets are easy to come by and cheaper - atmosphere is better and the games are alot more competitive IMO. Forget this media hyped Sky TV rubbish thats advertised all around the world - real football happens a tier or two below it ;)
If you insist though - Ticketmaster always have a variety of Prem games, inc Manchester United tickets popping up for sale.
Depends who you want to see play.
If its Fulham or West Ham for example you should be able to get if them if they are playing mid-table / bottom teams straight off their websites. It's still good fun and great atmosphere. For the bigger teams it's a lot harder to find tickets though. And Arsenal charge the most of any club in England.