Surrey County Council has lifted the 3,000 cap at the Laithwaite Community Stadium after safety work and a test run at the Sutton United game on 8 August.

Surrey County Council has lifted the restriction that capped crowds at Woking Football Club’s ground, the club said on 13 August. The limit had held attendances at the Laithwaite Community Stadium to 3,000 since the start of April.

The club’s statement says the restriction was imposed under the Safety of Sports Grounds Act 1975 and the Fire Safety and Safety of Places of Sport Act 1987, “following several health and safety related issues raised at fixtures earlier this year”, and that it “limited the capacity of attendees below national football league level in relation to safety measures”.

How the cap came about

The trigger was a home game in late March. In a statement on 5 April, the club said that “since our home fixture against Aldershot Town in late March, which required an increased level of matchday oversight”, it had been working with the local Safety Advisory Group to review how matchdays were run. A capacity limit of 3,000 would apply to home games while further recommended improvements were made and assessed.

That statement also apologised to supporters who could not get in to the home game against Eastleigh. “Demand on the day ultimately exceeded the available capacity under the measures in place,” it reads. “In hindsight, we could have communicated more clearly in advance.”

By 14 May the club had its National League licence for the 2026/27 season, reported more than 800 season tickets sold and said it “remains confident that the current restriction will be lifted”.

Timeline of the Woking FC stadium capacity restriction in 2026: late March home game against Aldershot Town needs extra matchday oversight, 5 April a 3,000 capacity limit is announced, 14 May the National League licence is granted for 2026/27, 8 August the Sutton United game is used as the test with 2,680 attending, 13 August Surrey County Council lifts the restriction
Graphic by Woking Online.

What changed at the ground

The club lists five things it did: installing thorough CCTV coverage, appointing a security company with football industry experience, retraining stewards, improving its safety culture and making safety improvements around the stadium.

Those arrangements were tested in public on Saturday 8 August, when Woking opened the National League season at home to Sutton United. Football Web Pages puts the attendance at 2,680, within 320 of the cap. The football was less encouraging: Woking lost 0-3. Five days later the restriction was gone.

Carl Bussey, Assistant Director for Emergency Management and Resilience at Surrey County Council, is quoted in the club’s statement: “The club has worked constructively with the council, Surrey Fire and Rescue Service, Surrey Police and other partners to address the safety measures required. The significant progress made by the club is welcomed and should be recognised as an important step in supporting safe, well-managed matchdays for supporters, staff and the wider community.”

Robin Byrne, the club’s managing director, thanked the county council, the fire service, the police and the wider Safety Advisory Group, “for their support, guidance and constructive approach throughout this period”, and the club said safety “will remain a key priority”.

Why the county council decides this, and not the borough

Football grounds are not licensed by the district or borough council in the way a pub or a takeaway is. Under the Safety of Sports Grounds Act 1975, a general safety certificate is required for grounds holding 10,000 or more spectators, or 5,000 if the club is in the Premier League or the EFL. The Fire Safety and Safety of Places of Sport Act 1987 catches everything below that by regulating covered stands: any “regulated stand” holding 500 or more spectators needs its own certificate. Surrey County Council, through its emergency management and Surrey Fire and Rescue Service functions, is the authority that issues and enforces those certificates, and it convenes the Safety Advisory Group of fire, police, ambulance, emergency planning and council representatives that sat behind this decision.

The capacity number also matters to the football authorities. The FA’s ground grading handbook for the National League System requires a Step 1 club, which is what Woking are, to have a ground capacity of 4,000, “as certified by the local authority or calculated by a competent person” under the Green Guide to safety at sports grounds. A cap of 3,000 sat below that figure, which is the plainest way of reading the club’s phrase about being held “below national football league level”.

What it means for you

The club has not published a new permitted capacity, so if you want a specific stand or terrace, check with the ticket office rather than assuming the ground is back to its full pre-April layout. What is clear is that the 3,000 ceiling that turned supporters away in the spring no longer applies.

Three home fixtures are already on sale for the rest of this month, on the club’s fixture list:

  • Tuesday 18 August, 7.45pm, West Brom U21 in the National League Cup
  • Saturday 22 August, 12.30pm, AFC Fylde in the league, an early kick-off that catches people out
  • Monday 31 August, 3pm, Southend United, on the bank holiday

April’s lesson still holds: buy in advance if you can. Kingfield Road is a walk or a short bus ride from the town centre, and matchday parking around the ground is limited, so our guide to parking in Woking is worth a look before a 3pm Saturday. If you are travelling in, the Woking train times and travel page has the station connections, and current roadworks are listed separately.

Sources