In terms of the crowd, Villa have come down very hard on needing a booking history for this one. Season ticket holders can buy 6, but need to fully register anyone they are bringing with a new booking reference if they haven't got one.
3 lads at work decided they were going, but couldn't get tickets because they had no booking reference. I managed to get them (knowing they are Villa) but needed to provide their full names and addresses.
Whilst I was in the Villa shop, a middle aged couple came up to me and asked me whether I could get them tickets on my season ticket, but there was no way I was doing it right in front of the ticket office staff even if I wanted to. They had gone down to the ticket office and been turned away due to having no booking history.
It's a tough one because Man City have sold their allocation, and we have moaned for years that the club do nothing to keep glory hunters out of our stands. It's not even as if those idiots know to sit on their hands anymore, they leap about giving it large as soon as they score and it does cause problems.
On the other hand, this game is really well priced to bring new fans in, but they are struggling to get tickets. It's clear from my experience that we could have sold loads more for this, there are people who want to be there but can't get a ticket.
The club are damned either way on this one.
