Tickets For FA Cup Final

This years FA Cup Final is being contested by two teams in blue, namely Everton and Chelsea. Everton are one of the oldest names in world football and are founder members of the football league (1888) and the Premiership (1992), while Chelsea have recently come into prominence thanks to the billions of a Russian owner. With two very popular clubs, comes the problem of finding tickets for the FA Cup final. The Football Association (FA) allocate quite a small number of tickets for each club to sell to their supporters. Wembley, the stadium where the final is to be held, seats some 90,000 people, and you would expect the vast majority of the crowd to be either Everton or Chelsea supporters.

Not so, with both clubs receiving just 25,000 tickets each, meaning the remaining 40,000 tickets being offered to outside sources, and eventually the dreaded ticket tout! Both Chelsea and Everton's boardroom staff have voiced their concerns over the low ticket allocation to the FA about their meagre allocations, but we all know deep down, that nothing will change. Wembley cost a fortune to build and this is some way of clawing back all the expense.

It does seem crazy that there potentially could be only 50,000 supporters of both football teams in a 90,000 seater stadium. To make it fairer, the allocation should be around 35,000 tickets (as these are the average home attendances of both teams), with 20,000 to non supporters, if the FA must insist on having some of these people there.

So, basically, unless you are a season ticket holder of either Chelsea or Everton, you stand very little chance of getting a ticket from either official source. You must look elsewhere. And even season ticket holders are not guaranteed a ticket because there are more season ticket holders than the allocated ticket allowance. More than likely, it will go to a ballot to see who can claim their ticket.

This is the tricky part, as there are so many touts and bogus websites claiming to sell tickets that more often than not, do not actually have the official FA Cup final tickets to sell. So those of us who want tickets for the FA Cup final must be careful and seek official, reputable ticket companies that do sell exactly what they promise.

So the options are as follows:

1. We are a season ticket holder and can buy through our club.
2. We can search online and find a site offering tickets for sale, and hope they are legitimate.
3. We can go to the ground and buy from a tout, and again, hope the ticket is legitimate.
4. We can do nothing, and watch the game on tv at home or the pub. More comfortable, but the atmosphere's not the same.

FA Cup Final tickets are a real high value commodity and you are going to need to do a lot of research to make sure that you are buying the real thing.