football stewards

[tali122]

given that football stewards spend most of their time with their backs turned to the action- are most of them therefore non -footballing fans?, as the clubs i assume would be wary of supporters as stewards given the desire to watch the game for free as a "perk" of the job

[Buenchico]

Football clubs used to draw their stewards from those people who were keen supporters of the club (as a whole) and not just the first team. (i.e. they would be the really loyal supporters who attended all the reserve and youth team games as well as first team matches). This, however, was before the Hillsborough disaster and later concerns regarding the costs to the public purse of policing football matches.

Clubs were faced with a choice of paying massively increased bills for having an large police presence in the ground or convincing the authorities that they could operate a uniform, properly-managed security system. It is for this reason that professional football clubs now use paid security staff to serve as stewards (although there may still be some volunteer stewards assisting at the turnstiles or elsewhere in the ground).

Chris

[Kos]

Being an ex-steward I can tell you that whether you are a supporter of the team or not, you are paid to be a steward at a match and are supposed to watch the crowd NOT the game! A lot of people complain to the clubs when they see stewards watching the matches, especially on televised games. Any steward where I worked caught watching the game would be dismissed.