Mark Catlin confident Portsmouth fans will be back against Peterborough - explains how seats for flexi-season ticket holders will be decided

The government today announced that Portsmouth will be placed in tier two of their new regional coronavirus restrictions when the current national lockdown expires on December 2.

As a result, supporters will once again be able to take their seats at Blues home games – albeit at a vastly reduced rate and with social distancing still in place – with stadia in tier two areas permitted to host 2,000 spectators.

Chief executive Mark Catlin admitted Pompey still have ‘quite a few hurdles to jump’ to show they can accommodate fans in a safe environment.

But as the Blues ticked all the boxes to facilitate 1,000 fans against Wigan in September before the pilot scheme was scrapped, the CEO remained optimistic supporters will return to PO4 after an eight-month absence.

Speaking to The News, Catlin said: ‘Everything we have been planning for a number of months – the preparation and the structures that have been in place – we are now going to be formally applying to have fans back into the stadium for the game on Saturday week against Peterborough.

‘There is still a lot of work to do. As a club, we can't unilaterally say we are having fans back. There are quite a few hurdles to jump from a regulatory point of view.

‘At this moment in time, I don't know what documents the SAGE group or Sports Grounds Safety Authority have been given and what hoops we have to jump through to have fans in.

‘I am confident, but I don't like to give guarantees outside of anything I can directly control because it can come back to haunt you.

‘But we are very positive and confident.

‘We did tick all the boxes when the government was looking at pilot events. Unless there has been a significant change then hopefully we should be okay.

‘It's symbolic. It's not financial, it's symbolic because it hopefully looks to be the beginning of the end. Aligned with the vaccine coming online soon, it's symbolic.

‘The sooner we can safely get back to normality the better – not just for the football club but society as a whole.’

Pompey must now come up with a way of accommodating 14,000 flexi-season ticket holders.

The scheme was introduced in the summer when it was clear the 2020-21 campaign would start behind closed doors.

It ensured fans’ usual seat would be reserved, as well as giving them the chance to buy tickets on a rotational basis.

Catlin knows there will be ‘huge demand’ among supporters to get a match-day seat.

He insisted Pompey will endeavour to make the system as fair as possible.

‘We did the flexi-season tickets to cement people's rights to buy tickets on a per-game basis,’ added Catlin.

‘There is obviously going to be a huge demand. We have a lot of work in the next few days deciding how we segment approximately 14,000 people we have to cater for.

‘The way it will probably work is that we will divide the amount to flexi season tickets we've got by the number of fans allowed in. Then it'll be done on a rotational basis.

‘We are never, ever going to please everyone because we could be allowed to have 2,000 fans for a month and then it increases to 4,000. It's an impossible task trying to please one in seven of our fan base. We will do our best to make it as fair as possible.’

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