After each matchday programme this season, we publish the regular column from the Coventry City board on our website. You can read Coventry City Chief Executive Dave Boddy's column from our game against Stoke City below:
Good evening and welcome to the Coventry Building Society Arena for tonight’s game as we face Stoke City in the Sky Bet Championship.
I would also like to welcome the players, staff, officials and supporters who join us from Stoke City.
On Saturday, we faced Queens Park Rangers and felt unlucky not to come away with anything from the game. For this game we wore our special ‘Ricoh Return’ Membership shirt, which was given to supporters as an acknowledgement of their support in buying the Membership last March when there was such uncertainty around the return of supporters. I’m sure fans will agree that the shirt looked excellent, adding to the array of quality kits that our partnership with Hummel has produced.
I am very pleased to inform supporters that the kits for next season have already been signed off and we are confident that these will again prove very popular with supporters. Already we are excited for revealing these fantastic kits during the Summer.
As we enter the second half of this season, work is getting underway to prepare for the 2022/23 campaign. In Saturday’s column I spoke about the preparation in terms of recruitment, but we are also preparing ‘off-field’ already for next season.
With more certainty around fans in stadiums and also where we will be playing, we are planning to put Season Tickets on sale earlier than we have been able to in recent years.
We have already looked at how we can price Season Tickets to ensure that they provide good value for money for our supporters and attract new fans, while also generating the revenue that the Club needs to continue to support Mark Robins and the team in continuing to progress and grow sustainably.
Work has been put in to look at how things have worked this season, and what areas could be changed or that have worked well and need to maintained. This season we suspended the Premium Zone pricing area, due to the potential we had then for social distancing in the stadium and trying to manage the seating plan for supporters.
What we have seen and heard this season is a much improved atmosphere at the stadium, and it is our belief that the suspension of the Premium Zone has contributed to this, helping to attract supporters to different seating locations and also meaning that supporters are able to group together more. With this in mind, we have decided that there will be no Premium Zone seating area again next season.
Other work will continue around next season, including working with the stadium to look at further improvements that we can make to the matchday experience and environment for supporters. While we made considerable improvements upon our return, including the new Club Shop and Ticket Office, new Wall of Fame signage and Club Crests around the stadium, having a longer and more stable period to do this will allow us to hopefully make further improvements as we look to continue our progress both on and off the field.
Thank you for your support as always, enjoy the game.