Thrillseekers infiltrate Darlington's football arena (From The Northern Echo)

"Urban explorers" enjoy uninvited tour of Darlington Arena

8:00am Saturday 18th February 2012 in Darlington By Lauren Pyrah, Deputy Business Editor

FOOTBALL fans have expressed their anger after three “urban explorers” enjoyed an uninvited tour of a North-East football club’s empty stadium and posted videos and pictures on the internet.

The photographs show the three mystery men – whose faces are covered or otherwise unidentifiable – in the changing rooms, playing on the pitch, and even dressed as the club’s mascot, the Darlo Panda.

The photographs have appeared on urban exploring internet forum 28 Days Later, with a video of two of the men also uploaded to YouTube on January 21 by Smithy66042.

Urban exploration, often shortened as urbex or UE, involves entering and taking photographs of normally unseen or off-limits parts of urban areas or industrial facilities.

Its rise in recent years has been attributed to popular television shows, such as Urban Explorers, on the Discovery Channel, and MTV’s Fear.

The video footage and pictures have sparked outrage from Darlington FC fans on message forums.

One of the cheeky trio, known only as Bigjobs69, has even responded to an angry fan’s comment that the group was trespassing, claiming the three of them had simply walked in through unlocked doors.

The exchange started on YouTube when a user known as and1long wrote: “@Bigjobs69 maybe you should be called ‘no jobs’.

Urban exploring my a***, pure trespassing!”

Bigjobs69 replied: “Awww, are you upset about me and my mates wandering about the whole of your stadium?

“Maybe next time you lay off all your staff you might consider locking some doors, it’s really not that hard.”

The controversial video and pictures also prompted a string of messages on Quakers’ fan forum Darlo Uncovered, with some supporters expressing concerns about security at the club.

One fan said: “How did they get in? Do we not have any alarms or anything?”

But another said: “It sounds like they did this the day before the administrator made all the staff redundant, so I guess they just slipped in when the reception was open, but no one was about.

“Bit worrying though – some other people on there were asking how they got in and what security was like, so they could plan their own ‘visit’.”

Darlington MP Jenny Chapman said: “I think we need to identify these people and see if we can persuade them to buy some shares in Darlington FC 1883.

“They would be far better turning up with a ticket at 3pm on Saturday afternoons than doing this.”

Durham Police said no complaint had been made.

Darlington Football Club was not available for comment.