Eight-year-old competition winner Ross Miller enjoyed the surprise of his life on Tuesday, as boss Slaven Bilic led him on a guided tour of West Ham United’s new Stadium.
The Brentwood-based youngster caught the manager’s eye with his sharp shooting from the spot in his #MyFounders home video, nominating his father Steve Miller and Godfather Dan Steggles to join him at the Hammers’ future home.
Ross and his family took a seat in the Hammers’ new dressing room, discussed tactics in the manager’s suite, before walking out of the players’ tunnel into the Stadium bowl itself.
Visibly wowed by the occasion, the young West Ham fanatic was even presented with his own signed shirt by the gaffer, who particularly enjoyed Ross’ spellbound reaction to the whole day.
“It is amazing for us, let alone Ross,” he told West Ham TV. “He's probably even more excited.
“The kids don't try to hide their emotions, so his jaw dropped and from his reaction you can see he's anything but disappointed! He's really so excited, which also proves that we have a good Stadium.
“We're all excited. It's my third, or fourth time here and each time I'm excited, because it's simply a great Stadium.
“We're in the middle of the season and we're totally focused on it, but we are looking forward to moving to this fantastic Stadium and a fantastic home.”
“We have to give everything we can to give a good farewell to our historic home ground and then try to come here on a high.”
The Brentwood-based youngster caught the manager’s eye with his sharp shooting from the spot in his #MyFounders home video, nominating his father Steve Miller and Godfather Dan Steggles to join him at the Hammers’ future home.
Ross and his family took a seat in the Hammers’ new dressing room, discussed tactics in the manager’s suite, before walking out of the players’ tunnel into the Stadium bowl itself.
Visibly wowed by the occasion, the young West Ham fanatic was even presented with his own signed shirt by the gaffer, who particularly enjoyed Ross’ spellbound reaction to the whole day.
“It is amazing for us, let alone Ross,” he told West Ham TV. “He's probably even more excited.
“The kids don't try to hide their emotions, so his jaw dropped and from his reaction you can see he's anything but disappointed! He's really so excited, which also proves that we have a good Stadium.
“We're all excited. It's my third, or fourth time here and each time I'm excited, because it's simply a great Stadium.
“We're in the middle of the season and we're totally focused on it, but we are looking forward to moving to this fantastic Stadium and a fantastic home.”
“We have to give everything we can to give a good farewell to our historic home ground and then try to come here on a high.”
Budding footballer Ross says he can play anywhere on the football pitch and Bilic reckons he has the right idea.
“He looks very sporty and he's young, so hopefully he's going to play for West Ham one day,” Bilic added.
Dad Steve, who had never before set foot in the former Olympic Stadium, insists it looks even better in the flesh than it does on television. And with he and Ross on the New Stadium Season Ticket Priority List, Steve is desperately hoping that they will be back for the first home game of the 2016/17 season.
“We've been loads of times to Upton Park over the last couple of seasons and we saw the Rugby World Cup on TV, it looked fantastic. But that's on TV, you can't really see it.
“Having walked around and seen, to be fair, how close the pitch is still going to be, we were trying to look for where the bad seats were, we couldn't find them to be honest. It looks absolutely brilliant.
“So all we've got to do now is to persuade mum to let us go to our Priority List appointment and get those Season Tickets.
“It’s an amazing deal for the kids, so when obviously when you're buying two, it equals out quite nicely. We've got a few friends locally, who are doing the same thing, so we'll be able to come up here for the day together. We’re really looking forward to it. It’s a great opportunity for us to have Season Tickets.”
Even in an empty Stadium, Steve said you could begin to imagine the sound of some 50,000 plus Hammers backing their team and has no doubts that the ground will be packed to the rafters.
He continued: “You can picture it. They were saying that the sound system's going to be great, really loud and the screens are massive. And when we walked out the tunnel, we were imagining the old bubbles tune going.
“You think of the Claret and Blue, the bubbles machines and a full Stadium. I do think it will be full, talking to people and how many people are going to get tickets and Season Tickets. I think it's going to be immense.”
Appointments for those on the Priority List will begin after a five-day Founders Amnesty Window at the end of the month, which follows the final Band 4 appointments for existing Season Ticket Holders.
The Amnesty Window is a final opportunity for Season Ticket Holders to invite friends and family to join them as Founders.
Supporters who, until now, have only invited one fellow Hammers fan, or indeed none at all, to join them as a new Season Ticket Holder, can take advantage of the window, which begins on Wednesday 27 January and runs until Sunday 31 January > amnesty.whufc.com.