Manchester United manager Marc Skinner has criticised the English Football Association (FA) for only allocating 7,500 tickets for his side’s women’s FA Cup final clash with Chelsea at Wembley on May 14.
United booked their place into May’s final with a 3-2 win over Brighton while Chelsea will take part in their third consecutive final following a 1-0 win against Aston Villa.
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The final is set to break the domestic attendance record after last year’s final between Chelsea and Manchester City was played in front of 49,094 fans but Skinner hit out at the FA for their ticketing allocation for the final.
“I don’t know how many it is in the men’s game, but to give clubs like Chelsea and Manchester United 8,000 tickets to sell, it’s just crazy in my opinion,” Skinner told a news conference on Tuesday.
“I don’t know how it works in all honesty, I haven’t really looked into it but to give two massive clubs 8,000 tickets is, as I say, crazy — that is as simple as I can put it.”
Last season’s men’s FA Cup final between Chelsea and Liverpool saw both teams allocated 30,500 tickets each.
An FA spokesperson told ESPN in a statement: “The Vitality Women’s FA Cup Final is the showpiece event of the women’s domestic season, and to date we have issued over 65,000 tickets. Finalists Chelsea and Manchester United have each been issued with an additional 7,500 tickets for their fans.
“This is to help meet the likely demand for each club and is almost double the amount of tickets that the finalists received last year.
“We look forward to hosting another memorable Final at Wembley Stadium on Sunday 14 May, and we are anticipating a new record attendance for the match.”
Information from Reuters was included in this report.