Liverpool Overhaul Ticketing: What the 2026-2027 Changes Actually Mean for Supporters | OneFootball

Can a club genuinely fix its ticketing, or is it simply better at telling you it has? That is the question I kept coming back to as I read through the update that Liverpool released, setting out the changes coming ahead of the 2026-2027 season.

The Reds have, in fairness, done something that plenty of clubs talk about and very few actually carry out, insomuch as they have run a proper, year-and-a-half-long review, asked supporters what they think and published the results.

Whether the substance lives up to the process is the bit worth picking apart, coming in the wake of protests towards the end of last season.

Eighteen Months in the Making

The review began back in the October of 2024, off the back of supporters making it very clear that buying a ticket to watch their team had become a frustrating and, at times, near-impossible experience. To the club’s credit, they didn’t simply nod along and quietly carry on. Over the following 18 months, they say that they received more than 100,000 responses through surveys and focus groups, whilst also digging into five seasons’ worth of data on how tickets were actually being used. The Supporters’ Board has been involved throughout, which matters, even if they felt slightly ignored by the powers that be at times.

One of the most common complaints about modern football is that decisions are taken in boardrooms by people who haven’t stood on the Kop in years, if ever. Having supporter representatives in the room from the start at least gave this process a layer of legitimacy that a top-down announcement never would. From all of that, the club identified three priority areas, which were improving access to tickets, enhancing the overall ticketing journey and strengthening protection from abuse. Nobody who has ever tried to get a Premier League home ticket through the general sale will argue with those being the right targets.

The Match Credits Question

The headline changes relate to match credits and there are two of them worth explaining. The first is the introduction of Multi-Year Loyalty, or MYL, which is designed to reward supporters who have shown sustained commitment rather than those who simply happened to buy in a single busy season. The second is a set of changes to credits for Premier League home fixtures. Together, the club says, these are about rewarding loyalty, giving supporters more flexibility and protecting ticket access. All of which sounds lovely. The trouble with loyalty schemes, of course, is that loyalty is precisely the thing that gatekeeps.

Reward the most loyal and you are, by definition, making it harder for the newer supporter, the young fan or the local who simply can’t get to as many games, to ever break into the system. There is a fine line between protecting genuine match-going regulars from touts and building a closed shop that only the already established can get into and it remains to be seen which side of that line MYL falls on. To be fair, the club has not pretended otherwise. The honesty in their statement is striking:

We recognise that these changes will not resolve all existing challenges, but they represent an important step forward.

That is a refreshing change from the usual corporate habit of declaring every announcement a total triumph. It is also, if you’re feeling cynical, a useful way of managing expectations before anyone has seen how the new system works in practice. Given the number of times that Spirit of Shankly and other supporter bodies have had to protest over ticketing issues, it is fair to view this entire process through somewhat dubious eyes. The club is always going to suggest that things are being done for the benefit of the supporters, even if the putting of things into action reveals something entirely different to actually be the case.

The Smaller Print

Beyond match credits, a handful of additional changes are coming in. A Young Adult area is being introduced for Premier League home fixtures, which is a genuinely good idea and the sort of thing that should help keep Anfield’s crowd from ageing out and stopping the next generation from being able to get tickets. There are also changes to the ownership policy for Season Ticket holders, improvements to the ticketing journey in the LFC Official App, an ‘Every Seat, Every Game’ policy for hospitality seasonal members and a wider rollout of Fan Update. The cynic in me notes that hospitality members are getting their own named, guaranteed policy while the ordinary supporter gets ‘improvements to the ticketing journey.’

That is the eternal tension at every big club now: the people paying the most are looked after first and everyone else is asked to be patient. It would be naïve to pretend Liverpool are any different to their rivals on that front, even though the club regularly sells the Anfield atmosphere as being what makes it unique. The last time I checked, videos and photos of the supporters in the ground focussed on the Kop, not on the people in the Main Stand who struggle to make it back out for the second-half after enjoying a decent amount of food and drink in the hospitality areas.

Credit Where It’s Due & Pressure Where It’s Needed

Here is my honest assessment. Running an 18-month review, gathering 100,000-plus responses and keeping the Supporters’ Board involved is exactly how this should be done and the club deserves real credit for the process. Far too many decisions in football are made to fans rather than with them and this one wasn’t

But process is not the same as outcome.

Conspicuous by its absence from the update is the one word supporters care about more than any other: price. You can streamline the app, tweak the credits and add a Young Adult section and still leave the fundamental issue of what it costs to follow the Reds completely untouched. The club has wisely flagged that it will keep reviewing ‘how match credits and ticket access should operate longer term,’ which is encouragement to keep the pressure on rather than a reason to relax. So this is a step forward and a welcome one at that. It is not the finished article, and the club itself is the first to admit as much.

The real test will come in August, when the 2026-2027 season kicks off and supporters find out whether buying a ticket to Anfield has actually become easier and fairer or whether it just comes with a better-designed app. We’ll be watching closely, as will supporters from all over the world.