Third test event announced as a pre-season friendly against Roma

Just had the email. Saturday 9 August as predicted.

Saturday 9 August v Roma.

Our girl dog is called Francessca Bella (Bella). A loose connection to Francesco Totti.

I thought about naming my next boy dog Totti, but I might a few worried looks on the local park. Torn between Sheedy and Muller.

Bella Ciao, which we played at Goodison and couple of years back.

A full house would surely mean every facility, restaurant, bars etc will be used.

I've been trying to ignore them daft rumours of a pushback...

But perhaps you should check with the caterer who leaked this one, rather than expect transparency from the official channels. He might have a better idea…

And with regards to transfers “It's all systems go as we enter the new season and we fully expect to have a new and improved squad.”

For fuck's sake, it's not rocket science — there's hundreds of thousands of Toffees waiting every day for scraps from the club?

Have we got a Chief of Communications yet? Just saying.

As a purveyor of that daft rumour, I can deny that it's a daft rumour.

And they have just anounced the new corporate facilities for those who want and wish to pay for them.

I know we have been scarred in the past, but this is a different regime now. They won't won't be making announcements if there is no substance in it.

The 3rd test event will tell us a lot. Maybe we will have to play a few games away Who knows?

The infrastructure needs addressing, but then Goodison has hardly been the best place to get away from after a match.

I can think of worse. Brighton, West Ham, Tottenham and Arsenal spring to mind.

Even Wembley.

Whether that"s changed or not I don't know.

You know yourself if you throw enough men and money at things, you can often sort the problems.

How do you know my wife, Brian??

But I am optimistic that, soon, the transfer floodgate will open.

The Roma match will be a great day for fans.

Once we get started for real, we don't want people being distracted by the novelty of the stands, filming it all on their phones and saying Wow! We need 100% focus on getting behind the team. Roma are a great club and it will be a good test.

If we had vision, I think we should have been thinking big 2 or 3 years back and got on the phone to see if we could have pencilled Bayern Munich in for the first ever game, 40 years on. Or maybe Juventus and play the 85 Super Cup 40 years late. Even Rapid Vienna 40 years on would have been a really nostalgic link to the past, handing the baton onto the future.

If we had played 2 home games, one of them could have been members priority. Me and my boys have season tickets, but the club are now charging £65 for Membership plus to provide a day priority on ticket sales. They are holding fans to ransom.

If you don't pay it, you've got no chance of a ticket. I think it would be fair to give members first crack at one game to make their membership more value for money, to show they are valued as fans and to allow loads of kids a chance to get into that new ground, who otherwise won't get a look in.

Ergo, if it is scheduled, then presumably the powers-that-be are already satisfied and this is a rubber exercise as opposed to a true "test" to see if the whole building collapses or something?

So to have the first full house test event just a week from potentially the first home game of the season is crazy… isn't it?

I can see merit to the rumour of the first three games being played away — technically it's only the second game that would be moved.

Cutting it a bit fine now as, if there are any major issues at the Roma game, it'll be too late to schedule another full capacity friendly before the season starts.

It must be all in hand, mustn't it?

With Everton leaving it so late to get the last test event done, then it wouldn't surprise me at all, mate.

This is not what we need.

Everton, that.

Phone or text: 07761 679228

In this historic season, why not simply tell us the current situation, plan and expected outcome. If it changes then a simple update will suffice.

The 3rd test event being at the start of next season, rather than the end of this or early pre-season tells me there's a 'muck-up' and we will not be able to play any home games until September at the earliest. That's assuming everything works successfully and we get our certificates issued after the Roma event.

Otherwise I presume another test event may be required. No big deal, but just let us know. Personally I'm looking to plan a late summer holiday and I don't want to miss our first home games.

I'm not pointing fingers, I'm not in a rush to get into the stadium before it's safe to do so. I simply think it's bad planning and poor fan management.

I have no proof, but all signs point to the fact the stadium is not ready. Moyes moaned at the end of the season about his frustration at not being able to train in it, to gain any little advantage we can. I completely agree and understand why Moyes would be miffed.

It makes the thought of an early mid-season move last season (as suggested by the club) laughable, another unrealistic pipe-dream. Will someone competent please get a grip of the Everton reins?

So it's Hill Dickinson or bust.

There's no 'muck up', Justin.

Everton might play the first match of the season away from home, I think.

I'm down to play golf that day, don't do freindlies anyway, so first game for me will be the first competitive.

I have booked flights from California and will be in Liverpool from 14 to 28 August, the idea being that either the first or the second game of the season will be at home and I will be there. I already have a ticket secured through a friend who has season tickets, but I need to know when the first home game will be.

The fixtures come out on Wednesday, so presumably we will find out then.

Even if the painting hasn't finished and some bars etc are not quite ready, it won't have any effect on the safety of the crowd. The test event is to test how safely the crowd is managed, both getting in, during the game and exiting the stadium.

Yet people are still peddling rumours of a delay!!

Segregation, gonna be a different kettle of fish when Newcastle or Leeds are in town,

52,888 Evertonians no problem, 49,000 Evertonians and 3,000 dickheads?

I'm sure there will be a healthy smattering of Roma supporters. The Eternal City is only a 2 hour hop away from the UK and there are hundreds of thousands of Italian citizens resident in the UK. Not to mention many more of Italian descent.

There is no issue with away supporters. Many of us have mixed with plenty of them in town, around Goodison and at away matches.

We'll have to see what the fixture list throws up. It will be interesting to see who receives the privilege of being the first team to be hosted at the Everton Stadium. From a personal perspective, I hope it is Aston Villa.

The issue/s "may" now have been resolved, mate, so we could be in luck regarding getting into the new stadium from the off.

I will tell you face to face at the next TW get together, the first of a new era!

I don't think it's as simple as that. Years ago, before the advent of social media, speculation would often come from local media / journalists, and the club would respond (or not) as required.

These days, everyone's an ITK, influencer, wannabe journo, etc, and the amount of shite that's out there is huge. You'd spend your whole time responding to such rumours, and the mere process of that would add fuel to the fire.

ITK taps nose, says "Well, they would say that wouldn't they?"

It's possible there may have been a risk of delay, and the club and contractors worked out a program to mitigate that risk, and that's worked out.

But why the hell should they keep fans informed of every nuance of program management? Because no-one ever says "Okay, thanks for the update" anymore

We're doing other stuff as well, but the whole point (for me) was about my 1 day as 'King of the Hill'.

Having figured (or gambled now as it may turn out) that tickets for home game numbers 3 or 4 will be a little easier to find than game 1 or 2.

I ill not be a happy camper if we have delays to home games.

I'll even settle for a League Cup game.

Tickets on sale from 30 June to Season ticket holders and then from 7 July for Forever Blue+ members, 9 July to Forever Blue Members, then general sale from 10 July.

It's not been unusual to have a finale pre-season match at home in the past. The US tour has been planned for a while now and we have the fixtures at Accrington and Blackburn prior to that.

Claiming we are (h) to Palace, then (a) Chelsea, (h) West Ham, (h) Man Utd, (a) Burnley, etc.

At least whoever's faked it has included the international break!

I guess we'll find out tomorrow when they are released at 9am BST.

Derek @39, make sure to keep in touch. If you're making that trip, there will be plenty to help you out, myself included.

And meet the TW natives at the same time!!

Southampton

Can somebody tell me what the problems are please.

Southampton? We're not playing them next season mate.

Don't get me wrong, Goodison has never been great for getting away from. But the authorities had 4 years to plan and provision for what is the city's iconic landmark sporting venue.

At the 2nd test event, I walked from the dock, past the Pier Head and to Lime Street. 25-30 minutes. That's okay for me but not for everyone.

Access and parking is an issue. With parallel planning and foresight, it could have been addressed. But until then, I'm going with my size 9s.

What's the difference with Sandhills??

I think the issue is that the gates are going to increase by 30% and the lack of parking anywhere near the ground is likely to again increase the number of people using the train so there are concerns about the capacity of Sandhills, and the Merseyrail infrastructure generally, to manage the number of passengers.

LCR Mayor Steve Rotheram is totally inept and made the excuse that they couldn't plan the transport until they definitely knew the stadium would be completed. Then he had a photo opportunity with his solution; the totally inadequate corralling system at Sandhills and then, soon afterwards, announced a bridge would be built to get people over to the other side for trains to Kirkby, Southport and Ormskirk. I was there 2 weeks ago and work hasn't even started, yet.

For the first test event I got a football bus into Lime Street and that was OK albeit it went half way around Merseyside. After the second test event I got a train from Sandhills. Both times there wasn't a problem but a 53,000 crowd will be a totally different proposition.

LCC tried to emulate Rotheram's ineptitude with their 24/7 parking ban until the storm of protest from local businesses brought a, temporary, lifting of the restrictions. I'm at a loss to understand how council officials came up with that barmy idea and at an even greater loss to understand why councillors voted for it.

I've been at meetings with Rotheram and Burnham and it's like comparing non league to Premier League but I'm afraid we're stuck with what we have!

Like me, you often come into Lime Street. James Street or Moorfields are good options. Sandhills will struggle, but then it's always been their station of choice and coped.

As we all know, big sporting event, large crowd, it takes a while to get away if you stay to the end.

We got the bus to the 2nd event. I'm a geography geek and know most parts of Liverpool well. What I couldn't understand was why it didn't take us along Regent Road. It has a bus lane and goes right past the stadium.

We got dropped off on Great Howard Street, which, okay, isn't too far, but attention to detail.

It worked well. We had a sit down meal at Tai Pan and got waited on. A bit different from queuing outside the Goodison Supper Bar and eating with a plastic fork in front of the Holy Trinity and St Luke's!

The train station at Montmelo is really small and is partially underground but they manage to deal with up to 100,000 race-goers on the Sunday and double that over the course of the weekend.

They use lots of staff and, unless you do an early dart, you do find yourself queuing for 30 mins or so, but it’s not a big deal.

At the very least, surely Sandhills and Kirkdale stations will take a similar approach and have extra staff, provided by either the club or the local authority (or both), to get the increased volume of people safely through?

Or am I being naive and will it actually be a clusterfuck of epic proportions?! 🤣

However, the problem arises after the game when everyone arrives a Sandhills at the same time. Because Sandhills only has one island platform, to accommodate all those travelling South into Liverpol and those travelling North towards Southport, Ormskirk oand Kirby.

Whereas Kirkdale has two platforms & splits North & South bound accordingly. Additionally Kirkdale doesn't have to accommodate Southport bound passengers, because they have to embark from Sandhills already.

So Sandhills effectively becomes a perfect storm after the game and is a proverbial screw-up by this red council, which I doubt would've been the case if it had been the rs?

Maybe they will fix it over time, but that will take years now. Maybe LCC / LCR will get their act into gear for the Euros as it is not just Everton, but the city on show.

I always used to use Kirkdale. If not, the 81D and walk up City Road.

Nowadays, it's a train to Lime Street, so, just like Goodison, it will be making my way to the Everton Stadium from town.

Wouldn't it be just Everton?

After the 2nd test event, he was on Radio Mersyside again, after several complaints about Sandhills, he said we haven't got £100M for Sandhills.

I'm sure Sandhills won't cost £100M to upgrade as most of the infrastructure is in place. Doesn't look like Mayor Rotherham could be bothered to look into this.

Why would anyone do that? Roma are getting better all the time and will probably get in the Champions League next year.

However, if both us and Roma qualify for the same European competition, then it's the lower-ranked club which would be excluded. So for example, if we finish say fifth, and Roma sixth, then Roma would be excluded.

Though what would happen if both us and Roma finished fifth, I've no idea?

Palace are facing expulsion because they finished twelfth, whilst Lyon finished sixth in the French league, and therefore take priority.

Got to be honest, I'm not sure how that works but it meant he was not involved in the running of Forest. TFG could do exactly the same with either ourselves or Roma.

Once Forest and Olympiacos were in different competitions, he closed down the trust and took control of Forest again.

And Southampton 😂

Marinakis is once again listed as a 'person with significant contol' at Forest.

Sorry for being ambitious... heaven forbid. 😂

I've only been there by coach, but it can be a good hour after the final whistle before the coaches start making their way back.

So nothing to stop training grounds, women teams, or hotels to be flipped within the group like Chelsea.

The rules just continue to be circumvented by those brave enough to do so.

Far be it from me to defend LCC but the council have nothing to do with Sandhills Station.

The station falls under the remit of the Liverpool City Region (LCR) and is the responsibility of the hapless LCR mayor, Steve Rotheram (also a RS)!

LCC were responsible for the insane, blanket, 24/7 parking restrictions.

Surely a safety certificate is given based on the physical construction of the ground, number and accessibility of emergency exits and such, and would have to be in place before you can even think of filling the place, not some days later when, presumably, nobody has died?

Surely the test events are just about testing the stadium in use to make sure people like the stewards, turnstile operators, and catering staff and their equipment all function as planned?

The alleged threat was that Goodison’s safety certificate may not get renewed. That was after thousands of standard matchdays, never mind a few test events, and was because the fabric of the ground was difficult to maintain, not because fans missed out on food and drink.

Also, for new stadiums, test events are required. The structure will have already passed. The events are more to ensure the operation and staff are familiar with the operation. The safety bit relating to supporters, is to prove access and exit and emergency procedures, hence we had a practice evacuation at the 2nd event.

It was the same for Tottenham. I'm not sure about West Ham, as I suppose their test events would have been the London Olympics.

Rob @65, the Vitality isn't the easiest and can be up to a half hour hike from Bournemouth station, although there is a closer station, just not on the main line.

I am simply questioning whether it is likely you can put 52,000 people in a building that hasn’t already been judged as safe?

Does any of what you have posted mean that Everton may be waiting until after the Roma game to get a safety certificate (not an operating license) for the ground?

Not sure such a certificate would include the mass use of Sandhills! That could present problems.

It just a modern process we now have to go through.

Legislation, auditing, H&S, all of those things. It might have always been the case, but it came more into the spotlight after the tragic events of the late 80s at Heysel and Bradford.

We've passed so far, this will be the rubber stamp from the authorities. I don't envisage any issues.

Something we have to go through and it will be a good day out.

I approach from and head the other way from town.

All I can think of, is that to my knowledge and experience, Sandhills, although not ideal, far from it, has always been the preferred choice of the other lot, with a capacity of over 60,000. Ours was Kirkdale.

If it can cope with more than 60,000 then our 53,000 should be manageable in the short-term.

That is not making excuses for the lack of foresight by the way. This should have been thought of a few years back. For both clubs and the city.

Not everyone get's the train, but Moorfields and James Street in town are pretty equidistant to Bramley Moore as Sandhills. It just depends on how you travel and which end of the city you are travelling from.

The biggest issue remains parking for those who drive.

For me, if I do drive, I park at my sisters and get the train in from South Parkway. I've parked there as well. 350 free parking spaces and 8 minutes into Lime Street if you get the mainline rather than Merseyrail.

I always associated Sandhills with them, Kirkdale with us.

As I've said, a lot of pressure can be taken off Sandhills if those travelling from a certain direction use Moorfields or James Street.

The Winslow and others are putting on shuttle buses from County Road.

I could walk from there to be honest. It's 2 miles.

We'll always find a way, just like we always did at Goodison.

You said “If it can cope with more than 60,000 then our 53,000 should be manageable in the short term”. That is a current concern and not a historical one. Far more Evertonians will be tempted to use Sandhills than Liverpool supporters do for games at Anfield due to the immediate proximity of the ground.

The lack of nearby parking facilities is a disgrace but it is not the immediate safety issue. Whether or not you travel into / out of Sandhills from the North or the South will impact queue lengths but it does not alter the fact that the platform is a single island and is not designed for large numbers embarking or disembarking at the same time. I used it during the second test event and shudder to think what might happen with twice the number of supporters present (including away supporters).

It doesn't matter that you can walk the 2 miles either. Many will choose not to or won't be able.

The safety issues surrounding Sandhills concern me far more than any to do with the ground.

Much of this can be done in a simulated environment / desk top exercise, but it is a test of co-ordination between multiple agencies.

Things like which hospitals will deal with what sort of injuries in a mass casualty event; how the triage is managed at the site; the routes that will be taken etc. It's all worked out, documented, personnel are trained, and tested.

Lots of learnings from previous disasters and mass casualty events go into developing these plans.

We don't need to know how it was done, just that it was (and that's for the regulator and licensing authorities to establish).

I did also say I could walk it, but not everyone can. I understand that, like you.

You will know more about Sandhills than I do. I've probably only used it twice, and one of those was on the way to Anfield. I did also cite historical experience.

My approach to the stadium will be from town.

Maybe in part to avoid a full capacity stadium emptying all at once?

https://www.evertonfc.com/news/2024/july/14/everton-v-roma-ticket-news/

It's all on the club website. Pretty clear, including what dates tickets are on sale and to what categories. Season ticket holders wanting their own seats, membership holders and then general sale.

It would great if Totti makes an appearance by the way.

I can understand Mourihno for Roma. But Benitez? Why spoil an occasion? I doubt he would want to and his reception would be hostile at best.

Sheedy seems to stay out of the game now. I don't know if Colin Harvey's hips are up to it. Joe Royle didn't look in good nick at the last Goodison game, unable to walk around the pitch and being taken straight to his seat with his walking stick.

Maybe Peter Reid, Duncan Ferguson, Leon Osman or Tim Cahill? Carsley even?

Just not Benitez. Too much bad blood.

Please follow the link provided by me @83,

I think I must have been sent it by email and it clearly attempts to undermine the official website information regarding the Roma game.

Could it be revenge for the blue flares incident?

"Roma Day". Saturday 9 August, 3pm kick off with the Legends fixture starting at 5:15 pm.

Tickets on sale for season ticket holders on Monday 30 June. Forever Blue Plus members on 7 July. Forever Blue Members on 9 July and then on general sale after that.

Seems quite clear to me. I'm not sure if that is a spoof email.

Here's the link to the club website.

Legends Fixture Added To Everton v AS Roma Day

I agree that the club website is clear on dates etc but was concerned that a very convincing fake appears to be doing the rounds.

Just spoke to a fellow blue who had also been sent the fake.

A bit like some of the dodgy ticket websites doing the rounds towards the end of last season. We have to be careful what we read and click on.