UEFA will offer Real Madrid fans’ returned Champions League final tickets to locals in the Ukrainian city of Kiev after the defending champions failed to sell their allocation.
The La Liga side returned more than 1,000 passes for Saturday’s game against Liverpool, UEFA’s president Aleksander Ceferin said, according to EuroSport. 
The tickets have been returned due to travel issues surrounding the match, with a lack of flights and sky-rocketing local accommodation prices scuppering the plans of many fans.
“Unfortunately security reasons prevent us from selling these tickets to Liverpool, it would be too much of a risk,” Ceferin told reporters after an executive committee meeting on Thursday in Kiev, EuroSport reports.
“We have a good and fair distribution system, 17,000 each to fans of Liverpool and Real Madrid. We distribute more than 70 percent of tickets to football fans and on the black market we have a system in place (to stop tickets being sold).
“It’s a big problem that we know about. We cancelled tickets that were on the black market…we are trying to do as much as possible. There are still people selling tickets and we are looking to correct that.”
Trouble has dogged the build-up to Saturday evening’s final in the Ukrainian capital city.
About 1,000 Liverpool fans who were planning to travel to Kiev have been left stranded after three flights to the country were cancelled by officials at Boryspil airport due to a lack of landing slots. On Thursday Liverpool’s mayor, Joe Anderson, claimed to have found landing spots for two of the planes.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian police announced that two people were injured “in a fight” in the city centre. It is believed a group of Liverpool fans were attacked in a restaurant.
Liverpool’s chief executive Peter Moore criticised UEFA for choosing Kiev to host the final.
“To call it a challenging location would be an under-statement and I’ve had discussions all the way to the top of UEFA about it,” Moore told the Liverpool Echo newspaper.
“They just don’t have the airport infrastructure and the hotel capacity to cope with an event of this size and there isn’t another major city within real hitting distance of it. It’s not only affected Liverpool fans but Real Madrid fans too.”
Image: Rubén Vique
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