I was unsuccessful in the (initial) ballot. I have a client who sells hospitality packages for events in this country, and through his contacts he was able to get tickets for us. A lot more than we were hoping to spend, but we just couldn't face the prospect of missing out on this.
Then yesterday, at 15.25, my brother and I both received emails with codes. Both of us were working, so didn't see them until after 5 - the communication from the club was that all codes had been sent out on Tuesday morning, so we weren't checking. Not that it mattered, we'd already paid for the more expensive tickets. But it's very frustrating to have gone through the much more expensive avenue when we didn't need to. Speaking to another fan this morning, we weren't the only ones to have gone through this.
I can't see how the club would benefit from doing it this way, with a load more codes being released at the last minute. I can only imagine it was incompetence, rather than greed. (Have I missed a more reasonable explanation?)
Obviously, I cannot wait for next week, and know how lucky I am to have a ticket. But it does leave a bit of a sour taste that we've spent a lot more money that we needed to getting there.