England v Poland: Roy Hodgson confident 'our fans will out-sing theirs' despite FA doubling Polish support for World Cup qualifier at Wembley

Hodgson doesn't fear facing over 18,000 away fans in crucial Wembley decider

Staff
Tuesday 15 October 2013 13:16 EDT
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England fans in Kiev last year
England fans in Kiev last year (GETTY IMAGES)

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Roy Hodgson has accepted that the allocation of 18,000 tickets to Polish fans could help the visitors at Wembley, but said he under-stood the reasons behind it.

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The England manager said: “There are a lot of Polish people living in this country and I understand the FA was virtually forced into this situation because of concerns over safety problems with the infiltration of Polish fans into the English fans.

“Our players are pretty used to playing in matches where the opponents have a large number of fans, but I think 65-70,000 versus 20,000 is a pretty good margin for us and if our fans get behind us like they’ve done before I don’t fear that.”

The FA said that, as the fixture had not sold out by Friday, the governing body took the decision to double the visitors’ allocation.

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