Champions Cup: More than 23,000 tickets sold for Leinster’s game against Leicester in Aviva

No plans to open upper tie of Aviva Stadium for Good Friday quarter-final clash

Leinster are playing Leicester in the Champions Cup on Friday. Photograph: Billy Stickland/Inpho
Leinster are playing Leicester in the Champions Cup on Friday. Photograph: Billy Stickland/Inpho

More than 23,000 of the tickets for the Good Friday Champions Cup quarter-final between Leinster and Leicester at the Aviva Stadium (kick-off 8pm) have been sold, with the remainder of the restricted 27,000 capacity on public sale via leinsterrugby.ie.

Leinster v Leicester: Kick off time, TV channel, team news and moreOpens in new window ]

While there are no plans to open the upper tier of the Aviva Stadium, the match is now on course to be a 27,000 “sell-out”. To open the upper tiers would effectively mean opening the entire stadium, the costs for which would outweigh the additional tickets sold in such a short time span. There has only been a six-day turnaround since the round of 16 win over Ulster at a full Aviva Stadium, whereas had Leinster another week or so to sell tickets, that might have been a different matter.

However, given the 18,300 capacity at the RDS, even a restricted 27,000 “sell-out” not only allows another 8,700 supporters or so to attend this quarter-final, it is also more commercially viable for the province to move the match to the bigger Dublin venue.

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Gerry Thornley

Gerry Thornley

Gerry Thornley is Rugby Correspondent of The Irish Times