Thanks to everyone who communicated to us their concerns about the management of the Millwall game on Saturday. We have combined these with concerns expressed elsewhere and from our own experiences and have written to Jon Blythe (Head of Operations - CAFC) copied to Gavin Carter, Ed Warrick, Mick Everett and fans@cafc.com.

We are aware that some fans will be writing directly to the club - please copy secretary@castrust.org if you wish.

We will also be writing to the police.

Here is the letter to the club which was sent by email on Monday afternoon:

Dear Jon

re Incidents at Millwall match on Saturday

We appreciate it was a challenging day for the club on Saturday and that you and your colleagues put in significant work in the run-up and on the day itself. We also understand that some decisions were taken by the police rather than the club.

A number of incidents have been brought to our attention by Charlton fans regarding safety and security at and around the match. We are also aware of two direct emails from fans to the club concerning the incident at Lansdowne Mews exit and communications. We have attached a list, separating the issues into those within the ground which we understand are under the club’s control and those outside which we understand are a police matter. We will be writing separately to the police and will copy the club on that correspondence.

Please let us know if we can help with any further information or if it would be useful to meet to discuss – we can easily join an online call in the coming days.

We will inform fans of this correspondence via the CAST website. We are seeking a timely response from the club – this week if at all possible - regarding lessons learned and actions that will be taken to prevent repeat occurrence at any other high risk matches or the next time we face Millwall at The Valley. A swift and candid response that we can share with fans will reflect well on the leadership of the club in showing serious intent to address the issues.

Kind regards

Richard Wiseman, Secretary, on behalf of the CAST Board

Issues within the stadium which we believe fall under club control

• Lack of communication before, during and after game concerning the exit routing – many fans at the match were completely unaware
• Away fan who revealed his shirt in Curbs stand, took a long time to be removed and then was just put in Jimmy Seed stand rather than evicted
• Box in Curbs stand (Block E) sold to away fans, things got “heated” after the equaliser and only one steward to calm situation
• Half a box of away fans in West Stand too
• Not all gates open at full time, with large queues on exits from the West Stand, including on stairs down from upper tier
• Security gate (gate 21) between Curbs/Jimmy Seed/by Lansdowne Mews manned only by two stewards. Unclear if gate locked or unlocked. Bag of gravel thrown by away fans over the gate towards home fans. Two home fans goading significantly more away fans. Steward attempts to hold gate closed. Unclear what leads to gate being opened. Away fans storm through and at least one home fan is punched. Kids, families and older people already on their way out are scared. No additional security resource attended – it is unclear whether the stewards or supervisor had radio contact or whether this area was monitored from the Control Room. This was a serious and frightening incident for those involved. Will the club be making CCTV footage available to the police?

Please see below a detailed comment about the security gate incident based on a video that has since been removed from YouTube:

“I'm level 2 and 3 (supervisor) NVQ qualified in Stewarding and Spectator Safety. I don't work at football (too much shit for minimum pay) but work at other sports venues and am pretty experienced. There is so much wrong in that video. Why are there only 2 ordinary safety stewards manning that gate? A safety steward should not be expected to deal with a hostile crowd like that - their responsibilities as a safety steward are essentially to check tickets, tell you where the toilets are etc not get involved in serious crowd disorder. (In fact, huge credit to those 2 young stewards for at least trying to hold the gate shut - most people would have just walked away). Where were the SIA badged response teams who should have got involved? And as for the supervisor in green, what was he doing - he just seems to walk away leaving the two stewards to deal with the matter. And he doesn't seem to have a radio. If that is correct, how on earth could he get assistance to the area. In my opinion there are some serious questions to be answered there by those who are responsible for security in the ground. Multiple reports of large police presence in front of control room throughout the match, they wouldn’t have been far away from above incident”

Issues outside the stadium which we believe are matters for the police

• No information as to why away fans were not held back – is it now generally policy to clear the away fans quickly from the area? If so, this should be clearly communicated
• Lack of repeated communication about route and co-ordination of messaging with the club, and lack of signposting/ directing after exiting the home areas
• Ransom Walk eventually just opened to all after arguments with “people in wheelchairs and on crutches” that they couldn’t use it
• No road closures around diversion route – one report of a car stuck for a while on the rail tracks between the level crossing gates
• Police vans driven through crowd of home fans
• Away fans went to Rose of Denmark apparently looking for trouble. “About 40” police and 7 police vans arrived but away fans had moved on by the time they arrived
• “Police horses charging about dangerously, some mounted police after the game with batons drawn.” This seems to have been to prevent people going down Ransom Walk but no one has reported actual trouble from fans attempting that route