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EPL clubs take over Europe

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A general view of Arsenal flags being waved by supporters during the FA Community Shield at Wembley Stadium, London.

Football fans face a scramble for tickets for the Champions and Europa League finals after English teams completed a clean sweep of the continent’s top two competitions.

Arsenal and Chelsea booked their places in the Europa League final on Thursday night following the thrilling progress of Liverpool and Tottenham into the Champions League showpiece.

But the battle by their supporters for the chance to be there is only just beginning.

The Reds and Spurs have each been allocated 16,613 tickets for the Champions League final, which will take place at Atletico Madrid’s 67,800-capacity Wanda Metropolitano stadium on 1 June.

But Arsenal and Chelsea will only receive approximately 6,000 tickets for the Europa League final in Baku’s Olympic Stadium on 29 May. The arena in Azerbaijan, 2,850 miles from London, has an official capacity of 68,700.

The Gunners have already insisted they are working with Uefa to gain a larger percentage of seats to add to the ‘disappointing ticket allocation’.

‘We are in active discussions with Uefa for more tickets for our fans, but this disappointing ticket allocation obviously presents us with extreme difficulties in how we allocate tickets to you, our loyal supporters,’ the club said in a statement.

‘It is inevitable that with an allocation of just 6,000 tickets for the final, there will be thousands of fans who have supported the club for years and have been part of our Europa League journey this season, who will be unable to attend this match. This is a disappointing situation.’

Chelsea said their official allocation was 5,801 tickets. They did not say whether they would be asking for more.

The all-English Champions League final also promises to give England manager Gareth Southgate a headache ahead of this summer’s Nations League Finals.

He may have to deal with the delayed arrival of up to 10 players to the squad.

England play Holland on 6 June in Guimaraes, Portugal, five days after the Champions League final.

‘Although it makes our preparation a bit more complicated, that is a challenge that we have to deal with as a group of staff,’ said Southgate.

‘We have got to adapt. We are always telling our players to adapt so we have got to do the same. We can still prepare the team for the game with Holland.’