Aberdeen: 'Small number' of cup final tickets cancelled amid concerns of Rangers fans infiltration
- Published
Hampden Park will host the Viaplay Cup final on 17 December
Aberdeen have "deactivated and refunded" a "small number" of ticket purchases after investigating claims some of their Viaplay Cup final allocation was bought by Rangers fans.
The Dons say they shut their ticket office on Wednesday and "stringently" checked customer accounts.
It comes after the club put part of their allocation for the 17 December game on general sale earlier this week.
Aberdeen are now "confident we have resolved any potential issues".
Their statement added: "We have standard protocols in place for high-demand fixtures to prevent non-Aberdeen fans from purchasing in the designated Aberdeen fans' sections. However, due to an unfortunate human error in our ticket office, an element of these protocols was missed on this occasion.
"As soon as we became aware of the issue, we worked quickly to rectify the problem with the ticketing team investigating all transactions purchased after 5pm on Tuesday.
"We have stringently checked all purchases made during this window to ensure they are compliant with our normal purchasing criteria, which includes a significant buying history."
The Dons were allocated 19,500 tickets, compared to Rangers' 25,000, and 17,000 of those were sold in a matter of hours and left many fans frustrated.
Chief executive Alan Burrows had apologised for the way in which tickets had been made available.
Initially, those with 200 loyalty points could buy a ticket, with the remainder going on general sale.
Burrows says that - in hindsight - this was an error and those with slightly fewer points should have been given the chance to secure their seat first.
Those with higher loyalty points will be prioritised when the relisted tickets and extra batch of 2,500 become available.
"We have been in dialogue with the SPFL and await the final number of additional tickets we get which will take us up to approximately 19,500 in total," Aberdeen added.
"When we receive these, the ticket office team will work to ensure all those who have registered for the waiting list, and meet the criteria, are given priority (based on priority points) to purchase both the small amount that will be relisted, and the approximate 2,500 South Stand Upper tickets to be provided."
Our coverage of Aberdeen is bigger and better than ever before - here's everything you need to know to make sure you never miss a moment