Old Trafford - How does a fake bomb go unnoticed for four whole days?

So I'm there doing my gardening, and my phone sends me an alert from the Sky Sports' score centre app saying that Manchester United V Bournemouth has been abandoned due to a suspect package found in the stadium. I run to the internet and I'm looking at pictures of a bomb disposal van and we're being told there's going to be a controlled explosion at the Old Trafford shortly. I turn to my girlfriend and say "this is the real deal, it's no longer safe to watch football in this country, this is horrible", I feared for the other matches going on that day, I'm in a state of confusion and disbelief, then I'm relieved to find out before bed that it was just a fake bomb that was left over from a terrorist drill recently on Wednesday. Relief, everything felt okay in the country again, football wasn't being attacked on this soil. My state of confusion and disbelief was gone... Oh wait, no it wasn't. What do you mean a fake bomb was left over from Wednesday!?

Yeah, Wednesday. Four whole days before the match was meant to take place. The "bomb" was apparently very real looking, a mobile phone looking device that was attached to some piping in the toilets in the north west quadrant of the ground. A very suspicious looking object indeed.So how on earth was it left there in the first place, and what the hell was the ground staff doing for four days? did they not check there? Somebody's getting fired.

Stan Collymore made some tweets:
1. Nobody knew of Wednesday drill amongst stewards, #MUFC staff?
2. Experienced company leaving shot behind in heightened security times?
3. Every news outlet putting "accidental" narrative out without any questions?
4. Police calming genuine fears with "accidental" line?
5. Wednesday to Sunday Man United have no cleaners on site checking/cleaning loos?
6. Company left one rogue device but took the rest?
7. Security company walks away from Old Trafford Wednesday without an inventory check and does nothing till Sunday till Police check?

As much as Stan normally annoys me, he has 7 valid points here. The last one being the most egregious. Surely when you're driving away someone would count the fake bombs, you can't just leave one behind, it's not one of those jobs where it's okay to be lazy sometimes. You have to be on the ball when it comes to security pretty much all the time.

That being said, the Man Utd's security did a great job of evacuating the stadium, and it was the right call to do, but spare a thought for the Bournemouth fans who woke up at 3am, made the journey to Old Trafford to be told to go back home. The match is rescheduled for Tuesday night, and fans have been given a refund, and free entry to the game if they choose to make the trip again. Eases the pain a little, but I bet it was one of the fixtures their fans were most looking forward to after their promotion to Premier League last summer.

Despite the events of the day, the bomb being a result of someone so incredibly bad at their job is the best possible outcome. We don't want our Football being attacked, we can't have fans feeling frightened for their lives when they go to these grounds, we're all there to watch a football match, So I'm glad it all unfolded the way it did, but like I said before... somebody is getting fired.







Dan