Rangers fans made to suffer for UEFA greed and a baffling Europa League venue choice

Rangers fans will travel from every corner of the globe to Seville for their team’s Europa League Final against Eintracht Frankfurt.

It’s just a pity so few of them or their German counterparts will actually get into the stadium to see it.

There are two burning questions with that.

One, why is a 40,000-capacity arena such as the Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan being chosen for one of Europe’s showpiece games?

And, two, why are so many of the seats going to be filled by people who are not genuine fans of either club?

Rangers have received around 9,500 to distribute and it seems the Germans are the same.

If that’s the case, that still leaves about 21,000 tickets unaccounted for. Over 50 per cent. Where are they going? To whom? Dignitaries? Sponsors? Come on.

Jurgen Klopp addressed this issue perfectly when he spoke out in support of the Liverpool fans who are deeply upset at the arrangements for their Champions League Final against Real Madrid.

In fairness, you can see their point.

Liverpool have been allocated just 20,000 tickets for this month’s showpiece against the Spanaiards, despite the Stade de France boasting a capacity of around 75,000.

Pricing is another issue with supporters union Spirit of Shankly writing an open letter to UEFA urging them to reconsider the extortionate ticket charges, set between £50 and £578, with 20 per cent of their allocation priced at £410 or higher, and the majority £150 or more.

UEFA president Aleksandr Ceferin has suggested that 4000 of the tickets each given to Rangers and Eintracht as freebies is a way of saying thank you to supporters for following their teams in Europe during the Covid-19 pandemic.

But Klopp nailed it when he hit out at UEFA’s greedy pricing and allocation of tickets