CONTROVERSIAL proposals will be discussed on Monday (July 8) to make people pay £6 to use Wellington Playing Field when football matches are being played.

Town councillors are being asked to support a bid by Wellington Football Club to close public access to the playing field whenever its first team is playing there.

The club is in the premier division of the Western Football League and rents the playing field from Somerset Council, which next year will pass ownership to the town council.

The playing field is also the home of Wellington Cricket Club, which has changing rooms, a clubhouse, and practice nets there.

It is also used by other football teams, has Wellington Tennis Club on one boundary, and has been used by rugby teams in the past, and children use it for informal play.

Wellington Football Club's admission fees board at the playing field.
Wellington Football Club's admission fees board at the playing field. (Tindle News)

Football club chairman Mike Hall said a new interpretation of Football Association (FA) regulations meant teams which played at Wellington’s level had to have a ‘closed ground’.

Previously, Wellington met the rule by having a club member ‘escort’ anybody who wanted to pass through the playing field when a match was on.

But Mr Hall said that was no longer going to be allowed and the club would need to close the three public access points from North Street car park, Beech Grove, and Court Drive.

It would mean only people paying the current £6 spectator fee could use the playing field on Saturday afternoons and midweek evenings.

Somerset Council is considering the football club’s application but has first asked for the town council’s views, given the impending transfer of ownership.

Town councillors will consider the proposal at a meeting of the policy and finance committee being held in the United Reformed Church Hall on Monday evening.

Town clerk Dave Farrow said in a report to councillors the club had been subject to a stadium accreditation review which threw up a number of issues which had to be resolved by March, 2025, before the end of the next football season.

Mr Farrow said: “One requirement they now have to meet is that the ground needs to be classed as ‘a closed ground’ to satisfy match day requirements.

“Having the footpath running through the playing field and open access at Court Drive means that condition cannot be met.

“The implications of this condition not being met is that the club may no longer be able to compete at its current level and also that it will not be able to access funding from the Premier League Stadium Fund for other work that is required to enable it to meet the standards required.

“For example, it has recently applied for funding for new LED floodlights, which will address the clashes with the cricket club season and make the lighting more efficient.”

Mr Farrow said the FA would accept people being allowed to access the tennis club and cricket pavilion on match days, it was only the ‘public’ who would be banned, with appropriate advance warning notices and signage erected.