Uefa 2016: Over 70,000 Irish fans apply for tickets

More than 70,000 Irish fans have applied for tickets for Uefa 2016, the FAI has revealed.

The full total of applicants from fans based in the Republic of Ireland was 70,480. Between them they applied for 275,190 tickets.

Thousands of Irish fans based overseas also applied for tickets.

Ireland had the fifth highest number of applications for tickets for Uefa 2016 after Poland, hosts France, Austria and Switzerland.

However, the Irish allocation to date is just 33,334 tickets over the three matches against Sweden, Belgium and Italy.

At present, just one in eight Irish applications for tickets is likely to be successful.

By contrast Northern Ireland has 50,000 applications for 30,000 tickets.

FAI chief executive John Delaney said the association remains "continually in talks and correspondence with Uefa for more tickets, and this policy has proven successful up to now".

Uefa began taking money from the credit cards of successful applicants on Friday, a process that will continue until February 29th.

FAI spokesman Ian Mallon said the association is confident that loyal fans who travel to away matches will be catered for despite the demand for tickets.

The association is keeping back 2,000 tickets for the each of the three games to ensure that fans who go to Irish matches regularly are catered for.

A number of associations have been angered by the allocations given from Uefa, which have seen long-term fans miss out on tickets.

The Irish Football Association (IFA) has demanded an explanation from Uefa as to why those on its priority list were not given tickets for the match.

In a statement the IFA said: “It was our understanding that the priority list would be the basis for all ticket applications for Northern Ireland’s group games at Euro 2016. We are currently asking Uefa how the list was applied, particularly in relation to the game against Poland in Nice.”

Uefa subsequently made almost 1,000 extra tickets available after many fans with significant numbers of loyalty points had lost out, especially with regard to higher priced tickets, to fans with no firm record of attending national team games.

There was anger in Belgium too over the way the tickets had been distributed there, with many fans complaining that that the association’s guidelines on loyalty points had not been properly applied by Uefa.