The Copper Box is home to the London Lions and, recently, to team GB home qualifiers. This is my local basketball venue so it’s the one I know best.

Venue – the venue is quite big for a BBL venue with two tiers of seating, though usually only the lower tier is open. The seats are standard plastic seats, and there is no VIP section. Away fans wanting to sit behind the away bench should aim to book seats in section 103. Once you get through the bag search area you are on the main concourse and it is easy to see around the arena.

Accessibility – the venue is next to Westfield Stratford in the Olympic Park. It is accessible by bus, tube (Stratford) and overground (Hackney Wick). You can drive but the venue itself has no parking so you will need to park in the shopping centre car parks.

Merchandise – on Lions game days there is a small stall but it does have a limited range. On GB game days I havne’t noticed a merchandise stall.

Concessions – first thing to note is that they often can only take cash payments. There is no cash point on site so come prepared.  There are a couple of stands selling hotdogs, nachos and sweets. They sell soft drinks, wine and beer  – not the most expensive but not cheap it’s about £4 for a bottle of beer.

They occasionally have seperate stalls selling popcorn, candyfloss and beer on draft, again you will need cash. I would not suggest relying on these being open though.
Overall this venue could do with some work, including more reliability of the concession stands, staff that are friendly and able to assist and better connectivity as most weeks there is a problem with the mikes, scoreboards or shot clocks.