Man Utd played Rangers in the Europa League in January and hundreds of away fans bought tickets in the home end.
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A Rangers fan celebrates in the home section at Old Trafford.
(Image: 2025 Simon Stacpoole/Offside)
Manchester United have calculated just over 1,500 Rangers fans obtained tickets in the home section of Old Trafford in January, and 70 of those were ejected from the stadium.
United beat Rangers 2-1 in the Europa League and the Scottish club were supported by a sold-out away section, but their fans also acquired tickets in the home section of Old Trafford.
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Footage of Rangers fans chanting in a home concourse went viral on social media before kick-off and United fans reported that stewards warned them of their presence around the ground.
United said they took the "strictest possible measures to prevent sales to away fans in home areas" and launched an investigation. The findings of that investigation were shared at the latest fans' forum and the club confirmed they identified 1,532 Rangers supporters in the home section.
The fans' forum revealed a "full investigation" had taken place whereby CCTV footage was reviewed over hundreds of hours to determine how each individual got into the home section.
It concluded that 353, roughly a fifth, of the tickets that were obtained by Rangers fans had been forwarded by season ticket holders, but the majority were bought by 'official members'.
The minutes from the fans' forum explained the situation and a representative from United said: "Following the game, we received around 400 formal complaints coupled with the significant coverage online in relation to the volume of Rangers fans visible inside the stadium.
Rangers fans in the home end at Old Trafford
Rangers fans invaded the home section.
"Whilst this is a widespread issue with all football stadia, due to this fan feedback, we have taken and prepared a number of measures to mitigate this from recurring in the future.
"As a reminder: In anticipation of the risks around this game, we took the strictest possible measures to prevent sales to away fans in home areas.
"Tickets were only allocated to people who existed on our database prior to the draw taking place in August, with Hospitality tickets having the same restrictions applied.
"These restrictions were also in place on all forwarded tickets by season ticket holders and members to ensure that they could only be forwarded to fans on the database prior to the draw.
"Executive club members were asked to use the app to distribute their tickets for the first time. As advised at the time, we regret and were extremely disappointed by the issues relating to away fans in home areas and any impact this may have had on our fans’ experience.
"We therefore undertook a full investigation whereby CCTV footage was reviewed over hundreds of hours to understand how the situation arose with the view to preventing it from happening again from the same source.
"As you know two main groups of Rangers fans, in seating blocks E236 and S229 were visible to all. Fans in these areas were all tracked back via CCTV to the turnstile so we could establish which ticket they used to scan into the stadium. Fans migrated to these areas from elsewhere and did not all hold tickets for these areas.
"We did not sell hospitality packages to Rangers fans, or allow Rangers FC to do this, as part of the competition rules, Rangers FC were allocated 200 tickets, in the South Stand. How they allocate those tickets is at their discretion, and despite various requests as to how these were allocated, that information has not been declared to us.
"Outside of these 2/3 main groups, we have then looked more broadly at seats in every area of the stadium where people celebrate when Rangers scored.
"As a result of these investigations: 1,532 tickets were identified as having Rangers fans in the seats and the ticket holder for all seats were issued with a sanction.
"This is further broken down into; 567 official members, 105 club/competition contractual tickets, 367 hospitality tickets and 493 season tickets (of which 353 were forwarded to other people).
"The 353 fans using forwarded season ticket holder tickets is representative of an increasing problem. We know fans list tickets for sale on websites and social media and advise they will forward to anyone, providing they are a member to avoid sanctions.
"Moving forward, we recommend, and will implement retrospectively, that where a season ticket holder’s ticket has been forwarded, and then touted or misused, that we prevent that ticket holder from forwarding for future matches (but leave other options available to them)."
It is prohibited for away fans to acquire tickets in home sections, and United's game against Galatasaray in the Champions League in October 2023 was marred by 2,000 away fans surfacing in the home section, which forced the club's chief operating officer to issue an apology.
United reiterated at the fans' forum they not have fined by UEFA for the Rangers debacle.