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West Ham have banned a season-ticket holder who held up a banner calling for the club’s owners to sell up. Joshua Wood said he was infuriated after receiving a letter accusing him of breaching ground regulations by taking from under his seat an oversized banner at last Saturday’s home game against Sunderland.
Protests have been held at many matches this season targeting David Sullivan, the largest shareholder, and Karren Brady, the vice-chair, and the anti-board sentiment was evident when a banner stating “Time 2 Sell – Name Your Price” was held up during the first half last weekend.
The letter to Wood made no mention of the message on the banner. It said the 27-year-old was seen on CCTV breaching regulations related to items allowed inside the ground, which include a ban on “any flags or banners larger than those maximum dimensions permitted by the Club from time to time (or, in the absence of such stipulations, 2m x 1m) and/or of an offensive nature”.
Wood, whose ban covers the next five games – two at home and three away – was informed that he was “observed reaching down to retrieve a banner which breached the permitted dimensions listed above”. Wood was told the club and the London Stadium had not received “prior notice from you or a request to bring a flag into the stadium to display at this fixture”.
The club’s published sanctioning policy recommends a ban of up to three home matches for the possession of prohibited items. Punished individuals risk being unable to attend away games during that period.
The letter to Wood does not state there is any video evidence showing that he brought the banner into the ground. Wood said he had no part in smuggling the offending item past security and had no idea whose it was. He said he and other fans had been asked to hold it up.
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Show“I was informed when I was getting a beer in the concourse that a banner had been dropped off by our seats and someone wanted us to hold up a flag,” he said. “I’m not too sure who that was but we’re all protesting against the board so we were happy to do so. When I got down to the seat, there was a big roll of paper there. I didn’t even look at what was written on it. I just knew it was part of the campaign. I’m fed up so I was happy to voice my opinion.”
Wood, a film-maker working on a project looking at how West Ham’s move from Upton Park in 2016 has hurt local communities, estimated that eight people lifted the banner.
“They’ve been clever in how they’ve approached it because they’re not saying I’ve been banned for protesting,” Wood said. “They’re saying I’ve been banned for bringing up a banner which doesn’t fit the regulations of their dimension sizes. I have no doubt that if it said: ‘We love you, Brady and Sullivan’ we wouldn’t be talking today.” He plans to appeal.
West Ham said they were unable to comment on a live investigation but are understood to dispute that the ban was an attempt to stamp out fan dissent. The club has made no attempt to thwart peaceful and lawful protest this season.
It is understood Wood was deemed to be in possession of the banner because the footage shows him as the first person to pick it up. This was enough to constitute a breach of the stadium regulations.
The banner was deemed to have posed a risk to supporter safety because it was larger than the maximum size allowed, had not been deemed fire retardant and was passed over the heads of other fans.
The club accepted that other fans who came into contact with the banner simply held it while it was passed along the stand, and it was felt it would have been unfair to take action against those supporters.
