Letter: Too much fuel used by football fans
I read with dismay a report in the Shropshire Star, August 18, that the away fans of Shrewsbury Town FC will travel nearly 6,000 miles in 116 hours and costing £1,112 in fuel, to follow the club in one year.
These are average figures, of course, so some will travel less and some more.
Using these figures as an average over the Premier League (20 clubs) and Football League (72 clubs) the total for away fans from all of the 92 clubs is 552,000 miles in 11,040 hours and costing £102,326.
This does not include home games nor the myriad of clubs, around 7,000, in lower leagues. I find these figures astounding as well as dismal.
Without wishing to ignite more arguments on the rights and wrongs of claims on global warming, the amount of CO and CO2 and other harmful gases put into the atmosphere by these clubs alone is colossal and cannot be doing us any good.
Ordinary people are asked to limit their driving to work and other uses of a car while a leisure activity continues to pump dangerous fumes into the atmosphere we all breathe with apparent immunity.
Perhaps the time has come to explore ways of reducing this. Could not teams play in regional leagues initially with the winning team in each region playing winners of other region at national level?
It does seem perverse that a team from Cornwall may have to travel all the way to Northumberland to play one game lasting 90 minutes. What do others think?
Richard Camp
Wellington
