Everyone wants to con everyone else into thinking they're going at five to nine.

That at least is a very reasonable 10% of capacity which I'm sure the Chelsea Board fought very hard for!! P.S. See you at Highbury.

Simon ... why the 'eck should Rovers shoot themselves in the foot by only selling 25,000 tickets when they can benefit from this draw and sell 30,000 plus ? No-one's misjudged anything - how the hell can John Williams go into a meeting with his Celtic counterparts and argue we need more than 2,800 tickets there ? They'd say ha ha Mr Williams, you took 1,400 to Manchester, 800 to West Brom ... and you want us to alienate our own fans by going beyond the UEFA stipulation in order to allow your fair-weather brigade a ticket to Glasgow ... Their fans would be up in arms as we are now - as it is everyone's within the rules, Rovers are ensuring revenue is maximised (the opposite was true agsinst CSKA), and most importantly every measure is in place to stop Celtic fans watching from the JW and CIS. Again I say it, the fury and indignation from home fans surrounded by invaders goes far beyond the annoyance at a perceived shortage of tickets. Hi Tris, Not living in Blackburn I think you're misjudging the level of interest in this tie as it seems have the Rovers Board. No-one would suggest restricting away sales for the second leg to a level that wouldn't ensure a capacity crowd. It's just that by offering them five times what we were obliged to do for the second leg should have put us in a position to ensure a sufficient away allocation for the first leg. I predict many unhappy campers on here by Monday night, many of them regular fans.

Without wanting to be abusive towards individuals you make many good points Magnificent 17. As far as the database is concerned it was mentioned at one of the Fans Forums that there are 50 - 60,000 names on there. A large proportion won't be able to attend every game certainly but the potential is there to sell out the ground from the database alone for big games.

What SHOULD have happened. Celtic: "You're getting the mandatory 5%, we want the Darwen End." Rovers: "We will need 5-6000 tickets for the first leg. If we're only getting 5% you get 5% ie 1500 for Ewood." Celtic: "1500 for Ewood is no good for us, tell you what if you give us the Darwen End we'll give you 3k with an option for another 3k." Everyone happy. Instead Celtic have given us NOTHING for the first leg, only what they HAD to give us and we've given them FIVE TIMES what we had to for the second. Rovers have misjudged the first leg arrangements extremely badly.

OOPS Sorry, disregard points 1 and 2 it's seven days before first leg, 21 days before second. After all the guff in recent seasons though about giving up the entire Darwen End for segregation purposes I trust there's no question of Celtic having an additional option.

Lee if you're still on the board what is the procedure for the home leg? Tickets do not go on sale until just seven days before the game apparently. 1) Is there any priority for season ticket holders? 2) Do they then go on open sale to Rovers Fans. 3) Are the rumours about Celtic having an extra option in addition to the Darwen End true?

Well that was a hard week to ten days of negotiation then. "We're giving you the minimum 5%. Now bugger off." "Sounds great to us. Would you like over 25% of our ground?" Agree with everything Paul says. The Club have allowed themselves to be stitched up big time by Celtic. IF Celtic were being awkward and only offering the minimum 5% then we should have offered them the same amount. And unless my maths has gone to cock 2,800 is most definitely not 5% of 60,000 anyway. Yet again a lazy short term "let's maximise income on the night" outlook from the Club. If we want to expand the fan base for the long term you have to give Blackburn people the opportunity to see the big games. Unfortunately these are the ones people want to see, not Southampton and Charlton. Being there to see Rovers beat Celtic would be worth fifty "hearts and minds campaigns" As someone else said we have to TRY and start selling to Rovers fans for big games. Otherwise if we just automatically assume we won't the fan base will never grow much beyond it's current level. As far as criteria are concerned there should also have been something to reward the regular traveller. A person who hasn't been away for 20 years now has as much chance as the person who hardly ever misses an away match.