FC Barcelona’s president Joan Laporta has said that the Spanish club will make tickets ‘non-transferable’ after German Bundesliga side Eintracht Frankfurt packed Camp Nou for last Thursday’s UEFA Europa League quarter-final, which saw Barça eliminated.
Officially, Barcelona had allocated Frankfurt with 5,000 tickets but it has been estimated that between 25,000 and 30,000 fans actually acquired tickets. In total, 79,468 attended the game, meaning that almost half of the attendance was made up of Frankfurt fans.
Laporta has said that the Spanish club did not actively sell tickets to Frankfurt fans and that the club followed all the rules, including UEFA’s limit of 5,000 for away fans and 2,425 for UEFA invitations.
The tickets on sale could not be bought by German credit cards or by German residents, but could be bought by patrons outside of Germany. The president has said that tickets were bought outside of Germany and passed on.
Laporta said: “34,440 tickets were sold. Barça fans should know that we have those tickets because there are season ticket holders who have asked for a temporary suspension and we put those on sale. The club put those tickets on sale with restrictions: they could not be bought by German credit cards or via German EPP. The club did not sell tickets to German and established all the available restrictions as has been the case over the last six seasons.
“We insist that the 34,440 tickets that went on sale were tickets restricted to sales outside Germany. The club did not sell tickets to German fans. Who bought those tickets, did so and passed them on to German fans, that is obvious.”
The president apologised to Barcelona fans and said that the club had no option but to make tickets non-transferable in response. Laporta said the move was not one Barça “wanted to take because it is inconvenient for members and Barça fans who follow the rules” but that management “had no option but to adopt these measures”.
He added: “We will make tickets non-transferable, we will have to do it and I ask for your understanding so that what happened against Eintracht Frankfurt does not happen again.”
Barcelona fan club, the Grada d’Animacio (Animation Stand) group, boycotted the club’s game against Cadiz in La Liga yesterday (Monday) in response to the ticketing fiasco.
The statement said: “Last Thursday we experienced a day that will be marked forever as the greatest infamy at our home. As fans and members of FC Barcelona we have experienced many victories and many defeats on the field of play, but as a fan group, we have experienced a social humiliation that we will never forget.”
Image: Dmitry Tomashek on Unsplash
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