In the most unsurprising news of the year so far, Tranmere’s match against Manchester United tomorrow is now officially sold out.
While Rovers allowed season ticket holders to pre-purchase tickets ahead of the Watford replay, most tickets have been snapped up since Rovers secured their place in round four at approximately 10:30pm on Thursday night. A staggering rate of selling.
It means that a capacity crowd will greet the two teams at 3pm tomorrow afternoon for a game which will also be televised live on BT Sport. While the original stadium capacity was in the region of 16,500, a loss of seats at the front of the Cowsheds as well as some reduction in both the Kop and Bebington Paddock means it is now somewhat lower.
Therefore, it’s difficult to judge exactly what the attendance will be tomorrow, but we’d estimate in the region of 14-15,000 being stated. It will also depend on what seats, if any, have been given up for segregation.
The ticket sales process has been plagued by technical difficulties which have caused anger among fans who have not been able to get to Prenton Park to buy tickets. Sadly, some regular fans will likely miss out if social media and forums are anything to go by.
The TYG Tickets service has been dire for a couple of years, even going back to the National League days it was fiddly and slightly farcical to try and book tickets for matches. Remember the weirdness around buying ‘seats’ for the open terrace at Macclesfield?
While the huge amount of traffic in a short period of time may have been problematic, fundamentally the ticketing platform and mechanisms for fulfilling demand for a fixture like this simply have not been good enough.
Anyway, let’s forget all of that for now and look forward to what is going to be a special day at Prenton Park tomorrow. The club, players, staff and of course the fans deserve this.
Enjoy it.
