Newcastle staff knew season tickets were being sold to Scottish schools, investigation finds

Newcastle United staff were aware that season-ticket seats were being provided to third-party operators who resold them to Scottish schools and other groups for at least 10 years, a Daily Mail Sport investigation has found.

Emails and internal accounts seen by the investigation indicate senior figures in the club’s ticketing and security operations knew that two tour operators — Premiership Experience, of Glasgow, and PE5 Sports Tours, of Edinburgh — had season-ticket allocations that they supplied to schools and other non-Newcastle supporters. The documents show 103 season tickets were accounted for in one exchange and that the practice dates back to about 2015 and continued after the club’s 2021 Saudi takeover.

The issue came to public attention last week when 45 tickets destined for Newcastle’s UEFA Champions League home opener against Barcelona were found to have been offered as part of a £295-per-pupil package by the High School of Dundee. Newcastle cancelled those tickets and revoked the associated season tickets without refund, saying the resale breached the club’s terms and conditions and that the seats would be reallocated to supporters through the club’s existing ticket sale processes.

Club sources described the arrangement as an "oversight" that had "slipped through the net" and said the practice had not been raised at executive board level. The club told Daily Mail Sport that no one at senior board level had been made aware of season tickets being sold to third-party operators and that neither the club nor its staff benefited financially. Newcastle said all 103 season tickets identified in the investigation have been removed from the third-party sellers and that it is working to protect the integrity of season-ticket and membership access.

The internal email cited in the investigation, dated two seasons ago, names the two tour operators and lists two Scottish schools as recipients, while also indicating that "the usual two groups" would attend matches. Club staff and stewards were reportedly aware of the groups' attendance at home games, and supporters who sit in the East Stand/Leazes End corner said Scottish schoolchildren have occupied those seats for several years.

Supporters' groups have criticised the club for not taking action earlier. The Newcastle United Supporters Trust said it was "extremely disappointed" that supporters had missed out on tickets while an external agency was given access to season tickets to resell at a profit, "with the club’s knowledge, according to Daily Mail Sport’s investigation." The trust welcomed the club’s removal of the tickets after the issue was raised but pressed for greater transparency and leadership under new chief executive David Hopkinson.

The decision to cancel and revoke the season tickets attracted anger from supporters who were unable to buy Barcelona match tickets. The club’s additional ticket sales queue for that fixture held more than 100,000 people online, according to the reports, and fans complained that the reallocated allocations should already have been available to Newcastle supporters if the club had previously flagged the resale arrangements.

The investigation also found complaints had been raised with the club’s supporter services team after the 2021 takeover about the presence and behaviour of groups from Scotland, but sources said those complaints received no substantive response. During Newcastle’s 1-0 Premier League win over Wolves on the weekend following the Barcelona controversy, a group of Scottish children were still present in the East Stand/Leazes End corner; the club has said those tickets have since been cancelled for future matches and will be made available to supporters.

Some schools and clubs in Scotland were reportedly targeted by the third-party operators as part of packaged travel offers, allowing the operators to bundle tickets with travel and accommodation and mask the markup. Kirkcudbright Academy announced that a planned Premiership Experience trip to the Newcastle game against Wolves had been cancelled after the tour operator said it had been advised by Newcastle United and Northumbria Police that, "as a matter of safety, no groups should attend the match." Northumbria Police said it had no involvement in the decision taken regarding the tickets.

Premiership Experience advertises packages for other Premier League clubs including Manchester United, Manchester City and Burnley; neither it nor PE5 Sports Tours responded to requests for comment from Daily Mail Sport.

Newcastle have emphasised that the practice has now been identified and addressed and that the club is taking steps to ensure season-ticket and membership rules are enforced. Supporters’ organisations, however, continue to demand answers about why the arrangements persisted for years, why senior executives were not notified, and whether other third-party operators hold season-ticket allocations within St James’ Park.

The club said the affected tickets "will be made available to Newcastle United supporters through the club's existing ticket sale process," and it has removed the identified allocations. The investigation leaves outstanding questions about how many seats were involved over the decade-long period and whether similar resale routes existed elsewhere in the Premier League, matters supporters and the club say they will pursue further.