When Thousands Flooded Seville for the Europa League Final

The official estimates had seemed inflated, deliberately aggrandized, exaggerated for dramatic effect, right up until the planes started landing and the streets started filling. Some 50,000 fans were making their way to Seville, Spain, in the midst of a blistering spring heat wave, from Germany. Twice that number were traveling from Scotland.

They came every way they could imagine, by land and by air, by hook and by crook. Flights had sold out so quickly that dozens more were chartered; some 400 aircraft touched down in Seville on Tuesday alone.

Those who could not make it directly got as close as possible — to Malaga, 150 miles south, or to Faro, across the border in Portugal — and continued their journey however they could. When those tickets disappeared as well, a handful of fans contacted a hot-air balloon company in Glasgow and asked if they could float them to the south of Spain. The firm assumed it was a joke. It was not. Nobody wanted to miss the Europa League final, not this time.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/18/sports/seville-soccer-fans-travel-europa-league-final.html