New West Brom slogan makes a mockery of Guochuan Lai’s ownership

“Your Team, Your Legacy,” is the slogan which the West Bromwich Albion marketing team have gone with this season, as they released their season ticket details for another summer. It’s the same sort of glitzy header which many clubs come up with. Walsall, for example, have gone with ‘Our Story, Our Journey’.

Blackburn have opted for ‘More Than Football’, while Bristol City’s slogan is ‘The Future Is Now’. Aston Villa, who have hiked their season ticket prices by around 15%, are selling theirs with the ‘Different Journeys, One Destination’ catch-phrase. Yikes. For many hardened football supporters around this country who follow their clubs across the nation, such, ahem, inspirational mottos aren’t really necessary when it comes to renewing season tickets.

Albion’s – which has moved on from last season’s offering ‘Next Generation. Albion. Always.’ – at least has a little meaning behind it and isn’t merely a cringey strapline which is the case elsewhere. In fact it retains the same definition as the one which preceded it. Albion are, at a difficult time for the club, targeting young fans in order to sustain and increase the longevity of the fanbase, generation by generation, by making watching the Albion on a Saturday affordable.

READ: West Brom shareholders left furious after receiving ‘unacceptable’ response

READ: West Brom release season ticket details and confirm new adult prices

Sadly, there’s a cruel irony to the slogan. Legacy is a big word. As they say in football, managers, players, board members and – hopefully, eventually, please – owners come and go, but it’s the fans who are the constant. Theirs is the legacy which is never in question. For other individuals at the club, though, it’s alarmingly the polar opposite. In truth, Guochuan Lai could repay every penny he owes to the club this summer and attend every match home and away next season, but his picture in Albion history has already been painted. There’s no coming back from this brink.

At a time when minority shareholders, who actually own parts of the club which they support, are having requests for information denied and for questions to be answered ignored, ‘legacy’ is a big word and, as I say, ironic that it should sit atop the club’s annual drive for season ticket sales, leading a graphic with stars of the past like Jeff Astle, Cyrille Regis, Bob Taylor and Zoltan Gera.

Onto the subject of the tickets themselves, Albion have navigated potentially choppy waters pretty well. Price increases in adult and 65+ tickets were predictably inevitable, after the failure to claim promotion, the money which the club now owes and, as they say themselves, the rise of inflation. To freeze season tickets for under 25s is an applaudable move, and that’ll hopefully bear fruit when it comes to the wider fanbase further down the line, something which they’re quite clearly aiming for.

The fact that an adult supporter can buy a ticket in the Smethwick or Brummie Road this coming year for £349 is still very reasonable indeed, and for the better seats in the house – in the East Stand Upper, for example – it’s in the region of £450. For context, Rotherham United’s cheapest season tickets begin at £440. Albion were 19th out of 24 Championship clubs last year when it came to the most expensive season tickets. Their cheapest adult ticket was almost half of Bristol City’s dearest.

There are a few sticks with which you can beat Albion, of course there are, but season ticket prices down the years have really not been in question. That you can take your son or daughter with you all season, right up to the age of 17, for £23, is staggeringly good value. Where else could a child watch a football match for a pound, let alone 23 times in a year and at the level Albion are operating at? It’s about half the price of a child’s replica jersey these days.

Even the adult tickets you’d struggle to knock. Walsall, who are also local and are playing in two divisions beneath Albion, will charge you more post Earlybird. It’s the same too with League One Cheltenham, whose most expensive season ticket is £480 post Earlybird. Those clubs need to source income from elsewhere and depend on their generally smaller fanbases, it’s true, but Albion aren’t exactly a picture of financial health themselves and many supporters feared the day the 2023-24 admission costs would drop, anticipating a price hike.

The crystal clear emphasis is on the future and the maintenance of the fanbase, particularly those who are just starting their fanatical ‘journey’ – these slogans are rubbing off on me, now – let’s just hope that there’s still a club to be proud of once Lai’s own legacy is finally consigned to history.

READ MORE