Welcome to the “Tour Of The 72” series, where I attempt to visit every EFL ground to find the greatest football experience there is to offer and rate each ground on five different factors: Pricing, Atmosphere & Quality of the game, Food, Facilities and the overall experience of the matchday.
For this edition, I headed to the West Midlands, to visit the Bescot Stadium, home of Walsall FC for their Sky Bet League Two fixture against Colchester United on the 15th of November 2025, but how does it rank compared to their fellow League Two sides?
Pricing & Ticketing 6/10
My match ticket in the designated “away stand” cost £25, slightly higher if you opted to sit on the side of pitch, inflated by £2, and reduced to an incredibly fair price of £8 for anyone Under-18.
Fortunately, I didn’t have to wrestle with yet another shambles of a ticket office (I’m looking at you Watford), as the whole process went smoothly purchasing my match ticket.
After a quick bit of research, I concluded that the average match ticket price is between £22-£23 pound, not £25 like I’d previously stated, but I’m not going to criticise to harshly, as Walsall are undoubtably one of the bigger clubs in League Two, so can warrant slightly higher prices.
My view from my seat was decent, although on occasions having to navigate a way to watch the game, rather than the support pillars of the scoreboard!
Another factor on pricing I always like to mention is the programme price, which Walsall do continue to produce, edging ahead on their League Two rivals as they continue to produce a programme, but at the cost of £4, this mirror the prices of Championship clubs I’ve visited so far this season, perhaps higher to sustain printing costs, but still steep in my opinion.
Other than that, the pricing overall didn’t stand out in either a positive or negative manner, hence why I’ve got middle of the road with a rating of six.
Atmosphere 5/10
I’m a firm believer that Walsall are one of the better supported sides in the division (albeit without much competition in League Two), and I was decently impressed with their atmosphere during my previous visit last campaign, but it didn’t quite match my personal expectations on the day.
In all fairness, I was probably in the complete wrong end to fully experience a majority of the atmosphere, but for a team going so well in the league like Walsall, I did expect a bit more noise from the Lower Poundland Stand.
Perhaps it was due to the frustrating nature of the game, with plenty of delays in play for simple fouls stopping either side gathering any form of momentum, causing plenty of anger towards the referee and the opposition players.
The main chant of the day from the Walsall supporters, was a bellowing of “Roooooofe”, to serenade their new star signing, boyhood Walsall supporter Kemar Roofe, who joined on a free agent until January, after a lengthy spell away from first-team football with injury issues.
On a different basis, the staff members inside the ground, particularly the stewards outside the ground were particularly nice to speak to, despite a few being quite hard to understand due to their thick West Midlands accents, being relatively easy-going, which always adds to the rating!
Food 6/10
The category I tend to have the most to say on is food, with Walsall’s scoring a solid 6/10 rating, due to a range of factors.
Starting with availability, outside the Bescot stadium, there was a surprising number of outlets and vendors on offer, especially besides the “fan zone” area (more on that in the facilities section) where there were two burger vans within the space of about 20 metres of each other!
I’m not sure whether they are arch-rivals, but the 6,000 supporters have a big decision to make if they fancy a burger! These food hotspots are situated in the main congregating area for supporters, as well as directly outside “the locker”.
Inside the ground however, things took a minor turn for the worse, as despite the options being decent on paper, all were mass produced products, mostly being Pukka and Rollover products, which albeit were fairly reasonably priced in comparison to other grounds I’ve visited in which these products are on offer, it’s still a tad disappointing, despite my Pukka sausage roll definitely hitting the spot.
Additionally, I must say that despite getting quite thirsty at half-time, I couldn’t justify paying £3.40 for any form of drink from the kiosk, that’s a bit outrageous!
Facilities 8.5/10
Without a shadow of a doubt, The Bescot Stadium is up there with the highest quality stadiums in League Two, being opened around 35 years ago, right alongside the M6, being somewhat of a landmark for drivers and football fans in general making the journey.
Surrouding the ground itself, there’s plenty of entertainment for all ages to keep people occupied, including an area for younger supporters with a burger van and football-based activities, whilst the older supporters will defienetly be drawn towards “The Locker”, a large bar area with TV screen displaying Sky Sports (unfortunately no live game was displayed due to the international break) with plenty of varieties of beer on offer.
I can’t comment too much on the facilities available inside the ground, as most of the dare I say “nicer” facilities wouldn’t be on offer in the away end, so I can only comment on what I saw, but inside the away end, my only critique was the lack of space in the concourse areas, it felt a bit cramped at times.
Walsall’s kiosk for food is situated outside the concourse, with both sides open to reduce queuing times.
Overall Experience: 7.5/10
A rainy matchday in the West Midlands doesn’t exactly sound like an ideal day out, but to me, this summarises the peak experience of English football, not the nonsense in the Premier League.
Regarding the game itself, Colchester clearly came with a plan and executed it to a tee, targeting the centre-backs to drag them out of position, and restricting Walsall’s creativity going forwards, with three centre-backs starting rather than the usual two in Cowley’s defensive setup, time-wasting well throughout the second half.
Things certainly turned to “parking the bus” for the away side in the second half, failing to register a single shot throughout the second half, inviting plenty of pressure onto them, because Walsall didn’t seem like scoring one bit.
Walsall seemed to go into this game with supporters fairly optimistic about picking up a result, boosted by the arrival of striker Kemar Roofe at the club.
However, any optimism quickly faded away when Samson Tovide broke the deadlock in the 21st minute, causing quite the stir in the home end with his dancing antics, and just 20 minutes later the away sides total was doubled, making it quite a bad day at the office for the Saddlers, losing their top spot in Leaguer Two to Swindon Town.
Final Score:
Walsall 0-2 Colchester United
Goals: Tovide 21’, Lisbie 42’
Lineups:
Walsall: M. Roberts, R. Browne (P. Farquharson 70’), A. Flint, J. Weir, C. Barrett (A. Adomah 70’), C. Lakin, C. Clarke, R. Finnigan, V. Harper (J. Okeke 55’), A. Pressley (J. Matt 55’), D. Kanu (K. Roofe 76’)
Colchester: M. Macey, E. Iandolo, H. Araujo, T. Flanagan, J. Tucker, K. Vincent-Young, T. Bishop (R. Hunt 78’), A. Read, H. Anderson, K. Lisbie (J.K Gordon 55’), S. Tovide (M. Mbick 71’)
