Former Chelsea winger Paul Canoville has added to the criticism of the UK government’s stance around ticket sales ahead of Wednesday’s vital Premier League game against Arsenal.
The club have been unable to sell tickets since owner Roman Abramovich was sanctioned on March 10 owing to his ties with Russian president Vladimir Putin and a stringent operating licence was imposed.
That means Stamford Bridge may only be two-thirds full this evening with the only Chelsea supporters permitted to attend being season ticket holders. Arsenal, however, have been allowed to sell a full allocation of away seats for a match that may have a huge say on who qualifies for next season's Champions League.
“Tonight will see [a] huge swathe of Chelsea members' seats empty while Arsenal [have] been allowed to fill out [the] away section,” Canoville wrote. “Ex players can’t even buy our two tickets allocated. These go to my foundation to support our work. This is nonsense.”
Canoville tagged culture secretary Nadine Dorries, sports minister Nigel Huddleston and local MP Greg Hands in the post, with an image that read: “Everyone has the right to be stupid, but you’re abusing the privilege.” The Canoville Foundation, founded by the West London club’s first black player in 2015, works with schools and youth organisations to promote diversity.
The Chelsea Supporters’ Trust has repeatedly called for the ticketing restrictions to be relaxed following an assurance from Huddleston last month that “fans should not be punished. “We still believe further amends must be made to the special licence,” the trust said in a statement on March 29 but no changes have been made.
Head coach Thomas Tuchel seemed to be caught by surprise when the ticketing issue was put to him during his pre-match press conference on Tuesday afternoon. “Oh, OK. Erm, that is not an advantage because we want to play home matches and in general we want to play in front of a full stadium and the game is for the spectators and supporters. That's bad news, actually,” he said.
“I was not aware of it. Maybe someone told me and I forgot it! Let's turn things around, maybe everyone [there] is aware of that and pushes a little bit more. We lack quantity but we should not lack quality of support.
“Against Leicester last season after Covid, it was the first time spectators were allowed at the Bridge, it was like 15,000 and the players said it felt like a full stadium. So hopefully, we can be the spark that can bring everybody into a [better] mood.”
