- Ben Blake reports from Versailles
IRELAND FANS ARE expected to be well-outnumbered when they take on France in the last-16 of Euro 2016 on Sunday.
After sealing progression to the knockout stages last night with a historic 1-0 win over Italy in Lille, the Boys in Green will head to Lyon for a mouth-watering match-up with the host nation this weekend.
Irish supporters have travelled in great numbers so far this month and the demand is expected to be huge for the game, which will be played at the 59,200-seater Parc Olympique Lyonnais.
However, many are set to be left disappointed as most of the tickets have already been purchased up by home fans during the general sales phase at the start of the year.
The FAI were allocated 3,500 through the Uefa ticketing portal, which first went on sale earlier this year, while the association got 1,000 as part of its internal sales quota and also secured an additional 104 tickets.
The ticketing portal reopened at 2pm today and a limited number of tickets have gone on sale.
“Irish fans are advised to go to the ticketing portal at 2pm today,” the FAI’s head of communications Ian Mallon said at this afternoon’s press conference.
The problem with this game is it’s against the host nation and they have snapped up the vast majority of tickets.”
Click here to go to Uefa’s ticketing portal here
Listen to The42′s Ben Blake on the 98FM Euro 2016 Daily podcast throughout the tournament
