Planning on visiting Huish Park as an away fan? Here’s everything you could need to know about the hallowed turf in Yeovil. Huish Park is situated on the outskirts of town sandwiched between a commercial/industrial estate and ever-growing residential areas. The ground is signposted from most major roads in Yeovil itself.
BY ROAD
From the North, the West, the East
Get yourselves on the A303, it’s the only sensible way to approach Yeovil, whether your coming from The North, the South-East, Wales or the South-West. The A303 doesn’t actually enter Yeovil, it passes some miles north of the town. You have several choices where to get off the road, but the police have asked us to promote one exit in particular, the A3088 route:
From the West
Exit at the A3088 (signposted to Yeovil, Dorchester and Weymouth) Cartgate roundabout. Follow the road approximately 8-9 miles until you reach a roundabout on the outskirts of Yeovil with the Westlands Airfield directly in front of you. Take the first exit left here, pass straight on over another roundabout and the crematorium on your left before you reach yet another roundabout. Take the first exit left here and follow the road around until you reach the football club on your right.
Recommended pubs en route
Slightly problematic inasmuch that you’ll have to make a slight detour off the A3088 into Yeovil. Turn right at the sign to Montacute and Stoke-Sub-Hamdon, go up a slight hill to a T-Junction. Go right towards Stoke-Sub-Hamdon, or left towards Montacute. If you take the Stoke route you’ll travel around 2-3 miles before you get to the village. Drive through the narrow main street and you’ll see the Half Moon on your left, with the Fleur-De-Lis just beyond that. The Fleur is slightly more upmarket than the Half Moon, but they’re both well worth a visit. Twist my arm and I’ll admit to preferring the Half Moon myself, you may well disagree. If you go the Montacute way you’ll drive into the village with the Kings Arms on your right and the Phelips Arms about 200 yards further on, on your left. Both pubs do good food and beer and both welcome well-behaved kids. The Phelips has flat access for wheelchairs but the Kings is accessible only via steps.
Fleur De Lis; West St, Stoke-Sub-Hamdon, Somerset, TA14 6PU
Tel: 01935 822510
Half Moon Inn; Ham Hill, Stoke-Sub-Hamdon, Somerset, TA14 6RL
Tel: 01935 824890
Phelips Arms; The Borough, Montacute, Somerset.
Tel: 01935 822557
From The East
Exit the A303 at the A37 turnoff (signposted to Ilchester). You’ll come to a roundabout, take the second exit following the signs to Yeovil. Follow the road for 4-5 miles until you reach another roundabout and turn right (the 3rd exit). This takes you to a staggered double mini-roundabout(s). Take the second exit here (straight on in effect) and follow the road with houses on your left and fields on your right to another mini-roundabout. Straight on here and past a turning on your left which leads into a residential area. Keep going sraight on until you get to the next left exit which you will turn into with a song on your lips and joy in your heart because you are almost there. Drive up the hill and take the first turning right. The stadium is now visible on your left.
Recommended pubs en route
There’s several pubs in the village of Ilchester itself. The Ilchester Arms serves lovely food and has a good choice behind the bar. Halfway between Ilchester and Yeovil on your left as you travel towards Yeovil there is the imaginatively-named Halfway House public house – a top-notch boozer, do good food and have a pool table as well as a cracking juke-box. Couple of steps to get in which makes it awkward for wheelchair-users, but it’s worth the effort. They did free sausage and chips for the coachload of Cardiff fans that stopped there a few season’s ago, so ask – you never know your luck!
The Ilchester Arms, Church St, Ilchester, Yeovil BA22 8LN
Tel: 01935 840220
Halfway House Inn; Ilchester Rd, Chilthorne Domer, Yeovil, Somerset BA22 8RE
Tel: 01935 840350
From the South
Enter Yeovil on the A37. Keep on this road until you reach a roundabout with a pub (the Quicksilver Mail) directly in front of you. Turn left here and travel along West Coker Road, until you reach a roundabout and turn right (the second exit). Go down a hill to another roundabout and take a left (first exit). Travel along this road pausing only to wave at the folks working in the South Somerset Council offices to your right (the lego-like building) until you reach a roundabout. Straight across here and onwards to another roundabout which you also drive through (quietly, as the crematorium is now on your left). You reach yet another roundabout. Take the first exit left here and follow the road around past inummerable car dealerships until you reach Huish Park on your right.
Recommended pubs en route
The Red House on the outskirts of Yeovil has changed hands and gone more upmarket, focusing on food. It is wheelchair-friendly. The aforementioned Quicksilver Mail has been making real efforts in the last few years and now appears in good pub guides, particularly real ale ones. It is also one of the fewer and fewer outlets in the town that does proper farmhouse style cider. Food lunchtimes and evenings, and well behaved children and dogs are welcome. Not quite as wheelchair-friendly as the Red House. The Yeovil Court on West Coker Road is altogether more upmarket – recommended only for club directors, vice presidents and similar riff-raff. More of a restaurant than a pub really, but is very wheelchair-friendly should that be a concern.
Red House; Dorchester Rd, Yeovil, Somerset, BA22 9RA
Tel: 01935 477744
Quicksilver Mail; 168, Hendford Hill, Yeovil, Somerset, BA20 2RG
Tel: 01935 424721
Yeovil Court Hotel; West Coker Rd, Yeovil, Somerset, BA20 2HE
Tel: 01935 863746
Other Pubs/Food Outlets Near The Ground
There are three pubs within 15-20 minutes walking distance of the ground: A relatively new Brewsters establishment called the Airfield Tavern, The Bell which is part of the Hungry Horse chain and The Arrow. Having now been in the Airfield Tavern pub, situated just off the Crematorium roundabout on Bunford Lane, I hated it with a passion: standardised food and drink options that were frankly dismal. It’s also not really the sort of pub that we can imagine would welcome rowdy football fans – very much geared towards ‘family meals’ rather than serious drinkers.
On Preston Road you’ll find The Bell which is sometimes known as the Hungry Horse because of the chain that it belongs to, is a big pub that serves food of a typical ‘pub menu’ variety. They also do Sky Sports matches on a big screen in one bar. The pub was rebuilt in 2013 following a huge fire but the layout of the pub is almost identical to its original style. They have restored its real ale offerings in the last few years after a gap.
The Arrow, a modern pub situated on the Abbey Manor housing estate next to the ground has always been popular with home fans, personally I find it just a bit too soulless for my taste, though others swear by it. They do real ale options here. All above mentioned are wheelchair friendly. If you’re looking for something to eat but don’t want to use a pub, Palmers Fish & Chip Restaurant/Takeaway can be found on the other side of Bunford Lane from the Airfield Tavern, just off the Crematorium roundabout; and the Preston Road Takeaway is situated on the near side of Preston Road.
In terms of ‘safe’ pubs for away fans in Yeovil, they’re pretty much all away fan friendly. There’s the odd estate pub in the residential areas around town that might be a bit parochial, but certainly the ones in the town centre and around the ground itself shouldn’t give you too many problems. Yeovil Town fans are on the whole welcoming and chatty, and the annual Home Office figures regarding football-related arrests consistently have the Glovers as one of the best behaved in the land.
The Bell Inn; 207, Preston Rd, Yeovil, Somerset BA20 2EW
Tel : 01935 474077
The Arrow : The Forum, Preston, Yeovil, Somerset BA21 3TL
Tel : 01935 476972
Airfield Tavern : Alvington Lane, Yeovil, Somerset BA22 8UX
Tel : 01935 476311
Preston Road Takeaway, 174 Preston Rd, Yeovil, Somerset BA20 2EL
Tel : 01935 428587
Palmers Fish & Chip Restaurant Takeaway, Bunford Lane, Yeovil, Somerset BA20 2EJ
Tel: 01935 434258
BY RAIL
Yeovil has two stations, Yeovil Junction (situated 2-3 miles outside of the town, naturally) and Pen Mill Junction (about a mile outside the town centre). Both are on the opposite side of town to the football club. From Yeovil Junction there is usually a ‘Hopper’ Bus that leaves a couple of minutes after every train arrives that will take you to Yeovil Bus Station in the Town Centre, cost around £1.50. This still leaves you a couple of miles from the Football Ground, but gives you the possibility of doing some shopping or catching a cab or a bus from the town centre. The other alternative is to take a taxi directly from the station(s) to the club. See the National Rail Site for times of trains.
BY BUS
There was a dedicated Saturday shuttle bus between the bus station and the ground, but it was scrapped. The regular No.1 (Abbey Manor) bus leaves from the stop outside the Lloyds TSB Bank in the town centre every 15 minutes to travel to the Abbey Manor housing estate adjacent to the ground. You can also pick the bus up in Old Station Road if you’re down by Cineworld or the Bowlplex.
Last bus back into town on a Saturday or a weekday evening leaves from Abbey Manor at 18.48 (The Forum) or 18.52pm (Westminster). Note this means that you’re OK for getting to the ground for a midweek match, but after the game, you’ve got to make your own way back. You’ll either need to like walking or you’ll need a taxi to get you home.
Buses should be signed Abbey Manor Park for going up to the Football Ground, and Cavalier Way for those that are going from the ground back down into the town centre.
GENERAL INFORMATION
Huish Park has ample car-parking facilities for all but sell-out games. The charge is £3.00. However getting out can be a bit of a nightmare for higher attendance games; as much to do with the hopeless traffic system around the town as the inefficient stewarding of the club car park, though that isn’t blameless. Away fans are accommodated on the 1,500 capacity uncovered away terrace (clearly signposted at the stadium). A small number (500 seats) are usually made available for away supporters in the Screwfix (East) Stand. For smaller away followings you may find that everyone gets put into the Screwfix Stand and the terrace gets shut entirely.
Disabled and infirm away supporters should contact the Huish Park Ticket Office in cases where seating has not been specifically allocated through the visiting club, to see if special dispensation is possible. Segregation is in force for all matches.
Ticket prices
Note that tickets bought during the period leading up to kick-off carry a £2.00 surcharge for everything bar the Junior rate. The cut-off between pre-match and matchday rates is usually around three hours before kick-off. Tickets must be bought from the ticket office prior to admission to the ground itself – no sales on the turnstiles.
See our Access Guide for accommodation for disabled fans.
A fairly limited selection of hot food is available at the snack bars, and it has come in for some heavy criticism at times from home fans, both in terms of the quality of the food and its tendency to sell out of hot food long before the half time break. It has also recently got much more expensive. It’s not brilliant, and if you queue up around half time, brace yourself for missing five minutes of one of the halves due to the queues.
The only alcohol on sale at the ground to the ‘ordinary’ supporter is a fenced off Marquee Bar (known officially as the Hospitality Marquee, but more locally as The Beer Tent), situated on the corner of the Main Stand and the Thatchers Gold Stand Stand (home terrace). For the large majority of matches, both home and away supporters are welcome, but for local derbies and high attendance fixtures they sometimes make it ‘home only’ – expect a message on our news page if this is the case.
Under-18s are allowed in the Beer Tent. The bar, like much of Huish Park, operates a no-smoking policy so you have to go outside to smoke – but then security will have a pop, saying you can’t take your drink with you, even though you are still inside the fence. The selection of drinks available is very limited, and if it gets remotely busy the speed of service dire. After waiting twenty minutes, which I did once, one tends to give up. There are bars open in the upstairs areas of the Main Stand, but these require special membership, and have a strict dress code.
All in all, when compared to elsewhere in the division, we sadly have to admit the matchday experience of visiting fans to Huish Park is pretty poor, though there are worse.