Liverpool city mayor Steve Rotheram swapped tickets with an unknown man so that person could sit with his friends - and he still doesn't know what happened to him
21:39, 01 Nov 2025
Steve Rotheram
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Steve Rotheram has been haunted by the fact he swapped his ticket at the ill-fated Hillsborough game in 1989(Image: AP)
A mayor has spoken of his 36 years of torment over a football match ticket swap that saved his life.
Steve Rotheram agreed to the exchange 15 minutes before Hillsborough disaster in which 97 Liverpool fans died. But he never learned the fate of the young supporter who took his place - and has been haunted by it ever since.
Liverpool city region mayor Mr Rotheram, then a young bricklayer from Kirkby, Merseyside, had a ticket in the ill-fated Leppings Lane end of the Sheffield stadium for his team’s FA Cup semi-final against Nottingham Forest. But he agreed to swap it for a seat in the stand above so the unknown fan could be with his two friends.
Hillsborough tragedy
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Mr Rotheram has campaigned consistently for justice for the 97 victims(Image: Getty Images)
Mr Rotheram, 63, said: “I remember it was chaotic outside. We had been there a year before but this time there didn’t seem to be the same order and control.
“I was next to two men and a third came. He offered me his seat in the stand in exchange for mine on the terrace. I agreed so he could be with his pals.
“The last time I saw him he was walking down the tunnel towards the enclosure where many people died.”
Hillsborough
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Hillsborough is the deadliest disaster in British sporting history(Image: Getty Images)
Mr Rotheram told of his private torment during a West End political event with a fellow Labour mayor called An Evening With Andy Burnham and Steve Rotheram.
He said: “It was a quirk of fate that save my life but it’s been on my mind ever since.
“I got to my seat in the stand above the Leppings Lane enclosure and watch events unfold below. It was surreal.
“I never found out what happened to the person I swapped tickets with. I often think about him. It’s always on my mind.”
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Mr Rotheram has campaigned consistently for justice for the 97 victims and also pushed for a new Hillsborough Law to protect bereaved families and create a legal duty of open-ness from public authorities.
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