"Up close and personable"

Lovely older ground situated close to the town centre surrounded by houses.

Even has those pay as you enter turnstiles too!

Your seating and standing options are extremely varied. Covered/uncovered, sit/stand, small/large capacity stand, old/newer....Memorial Stadium has all the bases covered.

What is most exciting about it is how close the pitch is, there is certainly no over the top security here. It was very refreshing to be that close to the action and feel the intimate atmosphere build as the game went on. We sat in the south stand, sun at our backs and under the roof. It was also fantastic to see the local support all decked out in their blue and white quarters standing in and around the clubhouse enjoying a pint and gossip

Location

It is not far from the motorway if traveling by car. We did hit some traffic filtering off the M4 that was due to a local music festival, other than that it was quite a breeze. Parking was also fairly straight forward as there is a lot of side streets near to the ground to make it stress free. I would advise parking closer to the route out of town towards the motorway, on that side of the road too. Your walk would be a little bit longer but not a bad jaunt in. The ground is surrounded by terraced houses which definitely gives it that old football match feel.

View

Seats were very comfortable, standing was our initial thought as it would have been our first for quite a number of seasons, however our old bones won out and we chose the seated south stand. The view was a bit hampered by the roof's vertical steel supports. Actually our seats gave us a decent view of the touchline, corner flag and the six yard box, so that made up for the stanchions issue.

Facilities

I didn't use the toilets but did notice where they were at the half while queuing for food.
The ones near our stand were of the portakbin style and seemed to meet the demands OK, i.e. not to much of a line up (on the Men's side anyways)!

Food & Drink

Well, what can we say? They definitely have the best pasties ever!!!

If we hadn't have stopped off at the Pit Stop (M4-junction 17, recommend the "Full Tank"), then I might have bought a spare for a second half treat. We chose the traditional pasties delicately washed down with a hot cup of Bovril. The ladies that served us were awesome, even thought they were stuck in a hot, sweaty booth, the pasties were quickly available at the half time rush.

Police & Stewards

One star cos they were nicely conspicuous by their absence as we were gently left alone to enjoy a good game of football.

However minus five stars to the away end stewards who while trying to be funny, incorrectly assessed our tickets and had no idea where the South Stand was.

Atmosphere

Loved the place. As the game wore on through the first half you could feel the nervousness changing into optimism as Rovers came from behind to win. It was very enjoyable, lots of singing, chanting from the home end fans. Our stand held a nice mix of young and old, couples, families, retired folk, students, mums and dads, even a local kids football team joined us all. One small end of the stand held some seated away fans while the rest stood in the uncovered terraces - which was a shame but at least the weather was dry that afternoon. Being so close to the football enhanced the experience at Memorial Stadium, very exciting day out really.

Write your own review of Memorial Stadium

Have you been to Memorial Stadium? Write a review!