Our visit to Scunthorpe United is on Saturday afternoon at 3pm, and it’s likely to be a complete sell-out.

Glanford Park is on the outskirts of Scunthorpe, and is easy to get to if you’re going by car. Leave the M180 at Junction 3 and take the M181 for Scunthorpe. At the end of this motorway, you will see the ground on your right. Turn right at the first roundabout onto the A18 and right again into the car park at the ground, which costs £3. For most Scunthorpe games this car park is large enough to cope with demand, but with the larger crowds for Leeds games it often fills up, so cars end up parked in all directions round the roundabout at the M181/A18 junction.

Of course, the trouble with out of town grounds is that they are a lot harder to reach by public transport, and Glanford Park is over two miles from the town’s railway station. Turn left out of the station and head towards the crossroads (facing a church) and turn right into Oswald Road, going past a set of traffic lights and the Honest Lawyer and Blue Bell pubs. At the next traffic lights turn left into Doncaster Road Then just go straight down this road and you will eventually reach Glanford Park. Otherwise as you pass the Blue Bell pub on your left, turn left onto Doncaster Road where you can catch Bus Number 909, which runs every 20 minutes to the hour.

There is one pub right at the entrance to the ground called 'The Old Farmhouse', which usually admits away fans, but it remains to be seen whether they will do so for our visit. Another decent pub near the ground is the Berkeley, which is along the Doncaster Road heading into town from the ground. Other fine establishments are the Honest Lawyer (listed in the CAMRA Good Beer Guide) and Blue Bell (Wetherspoons) both of which are on the route from the station (see above).

Food-wise, there aren’t a lot of options near the ground, apart the outlets of a couple of horrible American multinationals in the nearby retail park, but you’ll probably get better value for money in one of the fast food joints in Doncaster Road near the town centre.  Inside the ground you can dine on the usual football ground stuff, such as Cheeseburgers, Bacon Butties, Hot Dogs and chips, etc. I also remember that one year I had a chicken pie that was surprisingly good.

Scunthorpe moved to Glanford Park from their former home at the Old Show Ground in 1988, making a million pounds profit by selling the land for more than the cost of building the new ground. Originally the away end was terracing, so it’s irritating that they decided to seat this section when they didn’t need to, while the identical terrace at the home end was left as it was.  Apart from that the facilities aren’t too bad, apart from a few pillars that block the view from some of the seats.

The usual away allocation is 1,650 in the south stand, but the bigger clubs usually get an extra block in the south corner of the West Stand. Ticket prices for away fans for Category A games are £21 for adults, with over 60's and under 21's at £18, and Under 16's £11. This means that we have to pay £3 more than the home fans at the opposite end, for the pleasure of occupying seats that we don’t want.

The total capacity of the Glanford is 9,088, which is already the smallest ground in the Championship, yet under the Football Licencing Authority’s regulations they will have to go all seater for the start of the season, which will obviously reduce this figure still further. The Scunthorpe fans have launched a campaign to try to keep the home and terracing and are holding a petition on Saturday, and Leeds fans are welcome to join them to help get a few more signatures.

Photo: Action Images

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