Rules state visiting teams must get around five per cent of the host stadium capacity but Rapid only received 1,400 tickets with Spartak Moscow only getting 1,0001
UEFA have revealed they have given Rangers special permission not to give visiting teams in the Europa League their full allocation of tickets due to safety concerns expressed by the police.
Rangers started their Group Stages campaign with a fine 2-2 draw in Spain against Villarreal before defeating Rapid Vienna 3-1 at Ibrox.
Willie Vass
Gers have special permission over away tickets from UEFA
UEFA rules state visiting teams must get around five per cent of the capacity of the stadium, which means Rangers should give up around 2,500 to visiting teams in the Europa League Group.
But Rapid received only 1,400 tickets for their game and next visitors Spartak Moscow will get just 1,001 briefs.
Spartak contacted UEFA to complain about their allocation as they wanted their full quota.
But they have been informed UEFA have given Rangers permission to slash the allocation of visiting teams because the police view the games as high risk encounters.
A Spartak statement said: “Rangers awarded us only 1,001 tickets for the game in Glasgow. This is significantly less than the quota stipulated by the regulations, when the home team must allocate five per cent of tickets from the stadium’s capacity.
Reuters
Rapid fans at Ibrox
“Rangers have said it is because of local law enforcement agencies, who have made this match a high risk game and one that poses ‘heightened danger”.
“We wrote to UEFA, who have informed us there is nothing they can do.”
And a UEFA statement explained: “We took note of the exceptional decision of the local authorities in Glasgow to reduce the number of tickets for Spartak fans.
“All parties involved understand that security issues are of the highest priority for UEFA.”
Rangers have already slashed the allocation distributed to Celtic to just 800 for the first Ibrox Old Firm showdown this season on December 29.
Celtic did the same to Gers for the Parkhead encounter in September.
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