Manchester City Branded A 'Disgrace' For Failing To Sell Their Full Ticket Allocation For FA Cup Semi-Final

Manchester City have been branded a "disgrace" for failing to sell out their ticket allocation for their FA Cup semi-final defeat to Liverpool.

A significant number of empty seats could be seen in the City end for Saturday’s match at Wembley, which ended in a 3-2 win for Liverpool.

A huge banner featuring City’s crest was also spread across a section of the upper tier of the stadium in an apparent effort to mask the empty seats.

Both City and Liverpool supporters experienced difficulties getting to Wembley, with no direct trains running from the north west to London on the day of the game.

Despite the travel disruption, talkSPORT football correspondent Alex Crook believes City should have been able to fill their allocation like the three other FA Cup semi-finalists, Liverpool, Chelsea and Crystal Palace.

“Manchester City not selling out their allocation yesterday was a disgrace,” Crook said on talkSPORT.

“I know there were travel issues form the north west but if Manchester United were here they would have sold their allocation twice over.

“When you get the underdogs come to Wembley, like [Crystal] Palace, they do tend to out-sing the bigger clubs. It was great to see.”

Former Tottenham striker Darren Bent points out to Crook that London club Palace were always likely to sell out their allocation.

“I’m guessing it was pretty easy for Crystal Palace to sell out their allocation. They’re in London, Man City are in Manchester,” Bent said.

To which Crook replied: “It doesn’t matter. Manchester United come from Manchester, Liverpool come from the north west.

“Those two football clubs will sell any allocation that they’re offered at Wembley.

“The fact there were empty seats in the Manchester City away end… bearing in mind that 20 years ago this was a club that was playing Gillingham in League One for the right to get back into the Championship.

“I think it’s poor.”

City supporters have hit back at Crook on social media, reminding him that fans travelled to Madrid for their Champions League game against Atletico just days before the FA semi-final.

“A lot of them will have just been to Madrid with another trip to Madrid to come and could’ve been another trip to Wembley too. Not all football fans are loaded,” wrote one fan on Twitter.

Another wrote: “Why is it a disgrace? An expensive day, in an expensive season, two trips to Madrid in the space of a month for some for example.

“The desperation for clubs to fill seats with irregular match goers and fail to understand core fanbases and the limitations is ridiculous.”