The Court of Appeal (by a majority) held that it was not unjust for the football club to refuse to pay for policing at the additional level stipulated by the Chief Constable.

As the passages in Goff & Jones on restitution to which I have referred make clear, a benefit from services rendered which is neither "incontrovertible" nor requested may be established by their "free acceptance".

But the concept of free acceptance, as explained in para 1-019, requires that the recipient "did not take a reasonable opportunity open to him to reject the proffered services".

In my view it is clear that there was no free acceptance of the services in dispute because the Club were, in practice, unable to reject them alone.

Either they accepted policing at the level Mr Mason required and paid for it or they stopped playing their home matches at the Stadium.