With less than a week until Celtic host Rangers in the first league meeting of the season, there has still been no public word on what will happen to the seats which had originally been earmarked for the visiting support.
It has now been 11 days since the SPFL confirmed there would be no away supporters at league meetings between the clubs for the remainder of the 2026/27 season.
That decision followed the breakdown of the agreement which had been reached around two years ago to restore away allocations of approximately five per cent at Celtic Park and Ibrox.
Ahead of this month’s League Cup tie, Rangers proposed reducing Celtic’s allocation to an unmanageable 300. Celtic rejected the proposal and the matter ultimately ended with away supporters being removed from the equation altogether for SPFL fixtures this season.
That leaves Celtic with an interesting, and rather welcome, problem ahead of Sunday.
Five per cent of Celtic Park’s capacity amounts to roughly 3,000 seats. Those seats were supposed to accommodate Rangers supporters. They won’t now be coming, so what happens to the tickets?
As of Tuesday evening, Celtic’s dedicated ticket page for the Rangers fixture offers no information on an additional sale. There are no dates, prices or details explaining what will happen with the seats previously intended for visiting supporters.
There should certainly be no shortage of Celtic supporters willing to take them.
A Glasgow Derby at Celtic Park will always attract huge demand and, should the club make a few thousand additional tickets available on general sale, it is difficult to imagine them hanging around for long.
Celtic also have considerably more flexibility than they once did.
The club have been using digital tickets this season, meaning tickets can be issued directly to supporters without the old headache of printing, posting or arranging collections at Celtic Park. In theory, Celtic could leave an additional sale very late in the week and still get the tickets into supporters’ hands before Sunday.
There may, of course, be operational decisions being made behind the scenes over precisely how many seats can be released. But with no Rangers support attending, there is no requirement to maintain the usual segregation between two sets of fans.
For now, Celtic supporters are simply waiting for an announcement.
The club have known since September 4 that there would be no visiting allocation for this fixture.
The only mystery left is when Celtic intend to press the button.
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