TICKET TALK: CELTIC CUP FINAL ALLOCATION IS UNFAIR AND EVERYONE KNOWS IT
- BY LIAM CARRIGAN
- May 1
- 3 min read
Living as far from Scotland as I do, it’s been more than 20 years since I had the privilege of watching Celtic win a Scottish Cup Final at Hampden. However, I was one of the lucky ones.
For too many Celtic fans, who spend their hard-earned money week-in week-out to follow our team everywhere, going to the Cup Final isn’t an option.
Celtic Deserve More Cup Final Tickets
If, however, you’re an Aberdeen fan, or even just someone in that area with a passing interest in football, then you’re in luck.
Aberdeen’s average home attendance this season is 17,700 according to the statistics site transfermakt. Bear in mind, this is an average over the whole season, and includes visiting supporters.
Both Celtic and Rangers traditionally take large travelling supports to Pittodrie, which inflates the average figure considerably. Aberdeen’s average home attendance is probably more like 12-15,000.
However, they’ve been granted 20,000 tickets for the Scottish Cup Final.
So, in other words, assuming everyone who goes to Pittodrie every week (away fans included) takes up the offer of a ticket then there’s still at least 2,300 people who will get tickets for the Scottish Cup Final even if they’ve never been to an Aberdeen game in their life.
Meanwhile, Celtic will be looking at a similar, though slightly higher number.
Although Hampden has a Capacity of nearly 52,000, debenture seats and other hospitality reserved areas mean that somewhere in the region of 45,000 tickets will actually be made available for public sale.
Celtic took around 40,000 fans to their 5-0 semi-final win over St. Johnstone last month, Celtic also have well in excess of 50.000 season ticket holders.
Of course, the size of Hampden means that not every Celtic fan who wants a ticket can get one, regardless of how many games they have been to this season.
However, something more along the lines of about 35,000 tickets for Celtic and maybe 10-12,000 for Aberdeen fans would be a fairer reflection of the genuine demand from both sets of supporters.
Sure, it might sound entitled, condescending, or even disrespectful, but it needs to be said.
I for one am sick and tired of smaller clubs in Scotland moaning that they can’t fill their own stadiums, only to see a deluge of “supporters” demanding tickets whenever they reach a Cup Final.
The SFA has always said they favor “as close to a 50/50 split as possible”. Though, as far as I can tell, they’ve never actually given a justification for this beyond “it’s a tradition in Scottish football”.
So is Freemasonry, but we don’t want that at Hampden either, do we?
The 50/50 argument is outdated and fundamentally unfair to larger clubs. The only scenario where a 50/50 split for a Cup Final is justified is when Celtic play Rangers.
Say what you will about them and their supporters, but Rangers are the only other club in Scotland who could fill Hampden with 30-40,000 genuine supporters, and not just fair-weather fans looking for a day out.
I await the inevitable, embarrassing climbdown in about 2 or 3 weeks’ time, when Aberdeen are forced to return several thousand tickets they couldn’t sell.
I just hope that, by then, its not too late to reallocate at least some of those tickets to Celtic fans.
