Contents · About 13 min read
- The Garibaldi Shirt Was Made in 1865 — and the Story That Arsenal’s Red Came from Forest
- What Kind of Club Is Nottingham Forest? — Back-to-Back European Cups and a Europa League Semi-Final Last Season
- How to Get to the City Ground and How to Buy Tickets — Based on Official Club and Stadium Information
- Attendance and Ticket Revenue — Gate Receipts Make Up 9% of Club Revenue
- The 50,000-Plus Expansion — What Was Approved and What Remains
- Shirt Sponsorship from Gambling to Finance — What the Marex Deal Tells Us
- Compared with the Hanwha Life Ballpark Expansion
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On September 16, Rushcliffe Borough Council’s planning committee resolved by 10 votes to 1 to approve Nottingham Forest’s City Ground expansion, subject to conditions. The ground, which Wikipedia lists at 31,212, could grow to as many as 52,500 seats, but according to West Bridgford Wire the detailed permission covers only the redevelopment of the Peter Taylor Stand and Trent End (about 45,000), while the Brian Clough Stand has only outline approval.
As a marketer, another question came to mind before the numbers.
How does a visitor from outside Britain get into a ground where tickets are known to be hard to come by?
I pieced together the announcements on the official club and Premier League sites, the official guidance that visiting clubs sent to their own fans, and press reports.
The directions and ticket information in this article were checked on October 22, 2026.
It starts with the story behind Forest’s red shirts and a short look at the team today, then covers directions and tickets based on official information.
After that I added the ground’s meaning through the club’s finances, the 50,000-plus expansion plan, the new shirt sponsor, and a comparison with the Hanwha Life Ballpark expansion.
Photo: Egghead06 · Source: Wikimedia Commons · License: CC BY-SA 4.0 · The Trent End stand before the match against West Ham on August 14, 2022
The Garibaldi Shirt Was Made in 1865 — and the Story That Arsenal’s Red Came from Forest
A banner on the Trent End barrier reads “The Garibaldi that we wear with pride was made in 1865” (as in the August 2022 photo above).
It is the club itself engraving into the stands the story that Forest’s red shirts come from the “Redshirts” of Garibaldi, the leader of Italian unification.
A feature in the student paper Varsity sums it up this way: after Garibaldi’s 1864 visit to Britain, amateur players in Nottingham formed a team in 1865 and wore red caps at first and then red shirts.
The same article adds that Garibaldi never made it to Nottingham, which is worth knowing.
The more interesting part leads to London. Arsenal’s own site, in its account of the club’s founding, says that Forest player Fred Beardsley joined the new club in Woolwich and brought an old red Forest kit along, and that a club on a tight budget chose the same colour as the cheapest way to get a strip.
By contrast, Wikipedia’s entry on Fred Beardsley carries a dissenting note saying that Forest did not hand over the original red shirts and that the shirts were bought locally.
I cannot say which is right, but it struck me that the story linking Arsenal’s red to Forest survives in both sets of sources.
As a marketer, I envied this story. A colour from 160 years ago lives on at once in a barrier banner at the ground and in another club’s history books, a brand asset that money can hardly build.
For a guide writer, it occurred to me that knowing the story of this red before entering the stadium makes the first view look different.
What Kind of Club Is Nottingham Forest? — Back-to-Back European Cups and a Europa League Semi-Final Last Season
Forest was founded in 1865 (per the Varsity article), and the City Ground opened with its first match on September 3, 1898 (Wikipedia’s City Ground entry).
The club’s golden age came under manager Brian Clough, and Forest won the European Cup (the forerunner of the Champions League) in 1979 and again in 1980 (AP report, republished).
Wikipedia explains that the Executive Stand, which opened in August 1980, was renamed the Brian Clough Stand after Clough’s retirement, and the outer wall of the Peter Taylor Stand carries a “CHAMPIONS OF EUROPE” sign.
Photo: John Sutton · Source: Geograph/Wikimedia Commons · License: CC BY-SA 2.0 · Taken on July 13, 2019, the outer wall of the Peter Taylor Stand
Recent seasons have been a roller coaster.
In 2025-26 Forest stayed up in 16th place with 44 points (TNT Sports preview), yet reached the semi-final of the Europa League.
In the semi-final they beat Aston Villa 1–0 in the first leg but lost the second leg 0–4 and went out 1–4 on aggregate (AP report, republished by a Malaysian outlet).
Five managers in the past 12 months is also worth noting.
Sports Illustrated lists Oliver Glasner as the fifth permanent manager, and Game of the People’s financial analysis says that after Nuno Espírito Santo was sacked in early September 2025, Ange Postecoglou (eight games), Sean Dyche (25 games) and Vítor Pereira took charge in turn.
Glasner is the Austrian manager who ended a Crystal Palace spell with a Conference League title, and according to Sports Mole the club announced the appointment as Pereira’s successor.
The new season began with a 0–1 loss to Leeds United on August 22 (30,739 spectators, per the 11v11 match record), and on September 12 Forest won 2–1 at Villa Park for the season’s first win and Glasner’s first as manager (Blueprint report).
After that they lost 1–3 away at Crystal Palace on October 11 and 0–1 at home to Arsenal on October 18.
In the table on Sky Sports (updated October 19) they are 19th with 5 points from 7 matches (1 win, 2 draws, 4 losses), and the next match is away at Ipswich on October 23.
Outlets differ between 18th and 19th and the table changes every week, so check the official Premier League table when planning a visit.
How to Get to the City Ground and How to Buy Tickets — Based on Official Club and Stadium Information
There is something to say first.
I could not read the ticket information on the club’s official site in my environment, and the club’s official ticketing platform (eticketing.co.uk/nottinghamforest) redirected me to a Ticketmaster Sport UK queue page.
So I relied on the club announcements carried on the Premier League’s official site (the July 15, 2025 membership notice and the April 2, 2026 Villa ticket notice) and on the official guidance visiting clubs gave their own fans, and I wrote down anything I could not confirm as it is below.
Before you go, be sure to check the latest on the club’s official site.
Access is about a 20-minute walk from Nottingham railway station.
Brentford’s away guide (August 2025) tells you to follow the signs for Trent Bridge Cricket Ground and lists buses 5 to 11 as an alternative.
The ground’s postcode is NG2 5FJ. From the airport, Football Ground Guide puts it at about 30 minutes by taxi from East Midlands Airport and about 50 minutes from Birmingham Airport.
Photo: Aethonatic · Source: Wikimedia Commons · License: CC0 · Taken on July 25, 2025, the City Ground seen from Trent Bridge
Driving is hard to recommend.
The same Brentford guide (for an August 2025 match) says parking at the ground is very limited, costs £10 per car and gives priority to home fans, and instead lists car parks at Meadow Lane (NG2 3HJ), County Hall (NG2 7QP), Cattle Market (NG2 3GY) and Lady Bay Sports Ground (NG2 5AA).
Meadow Lane is the home of Notts County. Wikipedia says Notts County’s Meadow Lane lies about 270 m away across the River Trent, making the two the closest pair of professional grounds in England.
With tickets, eligibility comes before price.
In the club announcement on the Premier League’s official site (July 15, 2025), MyForest memberships are split into Core, Junior Reds for ages 4 to 13, and International Reds for supporters outside the UK.
International Reds includes a small allocation of tickets on top of the Core benefits, so for a fan abroad it is the first thing to check.
However, that notice is for the 2025/26 season, gives no prices, and I could not confirm the 2026/27 terms.
The notice also says auto-renewal applies to all memberships and that you can opt out before the 2026/27 payment is taken.
How sales work shows up in the Villa ticket notice (April 2, 2026).
Everything was sold online only, with the windows opening on different dates for Pro, Plus and Core members, and for Core, Junior and International members the sale opened at 10 a.m. on March 25.
The member ballot opened at 2 p.m. the same day, allowing up to six tickets per application, with a limit of one ticket per customer number.
Results were announced at 4 p.m. on March 26 and the purchase window opened, a second sale began at 10 a.m. on March 27, and ticket exchange, forwarding and upgrades went live at noon the same day.
Adult prices for that match were £50–70, £40–55 for 66 and over, £22–35 for ages 14 to 17 and £18–30 for ages 4 to 13.
Football Ground Guide’s ticket guide lists three price tiers by opponent, with adult prices of £50–70 for Category A, £45–65 for Category B and £38–49 for Category C, but that is a secondary source and I could not confirm the full price list from an official document.
The same guide says Forest requires membership for most ticket purchases and that season tickets are hard to get, with a waiting list over 12,000.
It is not an official figure so treat it as a rough guide, but read together with the accounts showing 18,240 season-ticket holders in 2024-25 (see the finance section below), it suggests that the supply of single-match tickets is not generous relative to the size of the ground.
I could not find in official documents whether foreign-issued cards work, whether only mobile tickets are used, or the re-entry and bag-size rules.
The official guidance for away fans specifies thorough searches before entry, asks for photo ID when collecting away tickets and advises arriving 60 minutes before kickoff (Leeds United’s club guidance).
It is safer for general visitors to arrive with time to spare too.
The review site Stadium Journey advises assuming that all pubs near the ground are for home fans only. The review is old, so I did not use its price information.
From a marketer’s view, this structure is interesting.
For visitors from outside Britain, the barrier is not price but membership eligibility and the order of sales.
Managing high demand by queuing it up is efficient, but for a first-time foreign visitor it is also a structure in which “when and where to do what to get a ticket” is not obvious at a glance. That is why this blog puts the information together.
Attendance and Ticket Revenue — Gate Receipts Make Up 9% of Club Revenue
Putting together Game of the People’s analysis and ESK’s analysis of the accounts, Forest’s total revenue in 2024-25 was about £222 million, a club record.
Of that, broadcasting brought in about £158 million and gate receipts about £20 million, which works out to about 71% for broadcasting and about 9% for gate receipts.
Gate receipts rose by around 40% (40.5–42% depending on the source) from about £14 million the year before, but still account for a single-digit share.
Average attendance was 30,064 and season-ticket holders numbered 18,240, and ESK analyzes that while average attendance rose from 29,363 to 30,064, average ticket prices rose 24%, lifting income per fan per matchday from £23.20 to £31.30.
I did not use commercial income or the loss figures because the two sources classify them differently.
With 30,739 at the opening match of the new season, the ground is practically full, and so the logic of expansion becomes readable.
Broadcasting income depends on league position and league rules and is hard for the club to control, but seats, premium seats and matchday spending are among the few revenue sources a club can grow directly.
The more fans a club has who cannot get tickets, the more it must also manage the backlash over price and allocation when it adds seats.
The 50,000-Plus Expansion — What Was Approved and What Remains
According to West Bridgford Wire, the planning committee resolved by 10 to 1 to approve with conditions, and the detailed application covers demolition and redevelopment of the Peter Taylor Stand and Trent End (about 45,000 seats).
The plan to rebuild the Brian Clough Stand and bring the total to 52,500 was granted only as an outline application, so much more work is needed before full permission.
Planning officers attached extensive safeguards on transport, construction, noise and flood protection, and the safe movement of the additional supporters across the River Trent was a central issue.
The cost is reported as £790 million by City AM and £700 million by the trade outlet FM Now, so it differs by report.
City AM expected matchday visitors to rise 68% after completion, and the club agreed to contribute £4.17 million to improving surrounding transport.
That includes £424,900 for walking and cycling routes and £990,000 for a controlled parking zone covering about 4,800 street parking spaces, but it excludes the cost of residents’ parking permits, so residents may have to pay for them themselves.
According to City AM, phase one is the demolition and rebuilding of the Peter Taylor Stand and a major upgrade of the Trent End, phase two is the Brian Clough Stand, and no official start date has been set.
Because the figures differ slightly by outlet, such as 52,000 or 52,500 seats, I wrote “50,000-plus” in the title of this article.
What matters to visitors is how capacity and entry routes will change during construction, which I could not confirm, so please watch the club’s announcements when planning.
Photo: NottinghamNinja · Source: Wikimedia Commons · License: CC BY 4.0 · Taken on April 16, 2025, the Brian Clough Stand
Shirt Sponsorship from Gambling to Finance — What the Marex Deal Tells Us
On August 18, Forest announced the financial services firm Marex as its new Principal Partner.
Marex’s official press release names the front of the men’s and women’s playing and replica shirts, the netball team’s dresses, matchday exposure at the City Ground and digital channels as the scope, and says Marex will also be the club’s exclusive provider of foreign exchange and other financial services.
The term is “multi-year” and the value was not disclosed (Inside World Football), and City AM reported that it understands the deal to be worth about £25 million over three years, though that figure is unconfirmed.
The front-of-shirt sponsor for the previous 2025-26 season was the online gaming company Bally’s, on a one-season deal (Inside World Football).
City AM explained that the Premier League’s voluntary ban on gambling front-of-shirt sponsors was the background to the change.
The announcement came four days before the opening match, and the kit site Footy Headlines reported that Forest had played its pre-season without a front-of-shirt sponsor.
As a marketer, what stands out more than the move from gambling to finance is the change in the contract structure.
A one-year deal became a multi-year deal, and instead of a single shirt it became a package that bundles the women’s team, netball, ground exposure and the club’s financial services.
The value of such bundled contracts rises as the ground grows, which points in the same direction as the expansion plan.
Compared with the Hanwha Life Ballpark Expansion
The closest comparison at home is Daejeon.
According to Financial News, the city of Daejeon and the Hanwha Eagles signed an investment agreement on October 6 to add 3,000 seats to Hanwha Life Ballpark, taking it from 17,000 to 20,000.
The total project cost is up to ₩13 billion, the club bears 25%, and the target is to start construction in October 2027 and finish in March 2028.
As a rate of increase, 3,000 seats is about 17.6%. Forest’s 21,000-seat expansion is about 68%.
The two grounds differ completely in scale and funding structure.
Hanwha is a small expansion in which the city and the club share the cost and the schedule is set, while Forest is a large project the club must fund and has no schedule yet.
I see something in common. Both look to be based on the judgment that adding seats increases the number of tickets that can be sold.
That is my interpretation, though, not a reason either club has given officially.
What matters is who the added seats are sold to and in what order.
It will be worth watching how a club like Forest, with its tiered member sales and ballots, absorbs overseas visitors, and how a club like Hanwha, centered on general booking, allocates its extra 3,000 seats.
The City Ground is still at the approval stage and construction has not begun.
The riverside ground of about 31,000 seats that a foreign visitor sees today could change within a few years.
If you plan to go, I suggest starting by checking your membership eligibility.
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