Sunderland Under 23s played a behind-closed-doors cup match against Hartlepool last week.
They did so to save on the cost of stewarding. The venue was Eppleton Colliery Welfare, a quaint yet ramshackle outpost with a capacity of just 2,000.
If you make the effort to turn up on a cold Wednesday night in late October, you deserve to get in. Not so. It wasn't just the representatives of players turned away, but fans as well. One, an elderly gentleman who follows all of the Under 23 fixtures, could not understand why he was locked out.