by Lynn Cox

lcox@thekmgroup.co.uk

Order seemed to be restored at Priestfield on Saturday after the chaotic scenes in the first few hours of tickets for Wembley going on sale on Friday.

The majority of season ticket holders secured their places at the home of football on Friday - which meant people who left it until Saturday morning were waiting for around an hour at the most.

That was in stark contrast to the previous day when a mad dash for play-off final tickets left supporters queuing for several hours.

Season ticket holders grouped together requests - with some buying for up to 150 fans in one go for the clash with Shrewsbury next Saturday.

Preistfield laid on more staff to deal with the rush, a measure which slashed queuing to two hours by late afternoon, according to Gillingham's chief executive Mark Jones. At its height, fans were forced to wait up to six hours for the sought-after passes.

Mr Jones described the reaction as "overwhelming", and said it was unacceptable that people had had to queue so long.

He said: "It always overwhelms us. You try to judge it, but we are so pleased people want to support Gillingham at Wembley."

Dedicated fans had started queuing outside the ground as early as 7pm on Thursday night and were not put off by the bad weather.

The line of queuing fans stretched back half-way up Priestfield Road waiting patiently for the ticket office to open at 10am.

Ground staff were letting people enter the stadium so they could sit in the stands waiting for the moment the tickets went on sale.

As staff opened the ticket office fans let out a loud cheer to celebrate they were just minutes away from getting a seat at the new Wembley stadium and their team's biggest game in a decade.

One fan who was first in the queue was Ian Woodhams, who started queuing at 7.20pm.

Ian 46, who lives in Gillingham, has been a fan for the past 30 years.

He said: "I’m glad I got in the queue early as it means I can now go home and get some much needed sleep.

"We’re ready for the match and have good seats. I’m really hoping we get promotion as it will mean we will be playing better teams."

Others who were excited to get their hands on tickets were, Jason Colman, 22, Christian Obray, 17, and Ashley Gearing, 19.

The trio who were with other friends joined the queue at 12.30am on Friday and were waiting to buy 37 tickets for the match.

Jason said: "We had quite a laugh in the queue, played a few games of cards and had a few beers.

"We are all going up on the train on the day there will be 34 adults and three children with us.

"We are very excited about it and glad we’ve now got our hands on our tickets."

Ashley added: "I’m looking forward to the game, hopefully we will go up a league and be one step closer to the Premiership."

Tickets go on general sale, between 3 and 8pm Saturday and then on Sunday between 10am and 8pm.

And during the week the ticket office will be open between 10am and 8pm.

Tickets are priced at £26, £36 and £46 and concessions are also available.
Gillingham have an allocation of 38,000 seats and an additional 3,300 Club Wembley seats priced at £56. The hotline number is 08451 220777.