UEFA blocks Euro tickets recently sold to England fans based in UK

Italian health regulations mean supporters travelling from Britain face five days of quarantine. To avoid these regulations being abused, "a specific ticketing policy has been put in place" for Saturday's last eight tie, the Italian interior ministry said in a statement.

UEFA, at the behest of Italian authorities, decided to block the sale and transfer of tickets from Thursday night, but also to cancel tickets sold to UK residents from midnight, Monday, on. The number of blocked or cancelled tickets was not given.

England's governing Football Association (FA) was entitled to a ticket allocation of 2,560, equating to 16 percent of the permitted capacity of 16,000 at Rome's Stadio Olimpico. Andrea Costa, Italian under-secretary of state for health, repeated on Thursday that any person arriving from Britain would face five days of quarantine.

"That will not allow fans who have left over the last couple of days to come and see the match," he told Radio Capital. "We'll be vigilant on this quarantine, we're not talking about a big number so the checks will not be difficult."

The English FA has said it was working with UEFA and the British embassy in Rome to "facilitate" ticket sales to England fans resident in Italy. But the embassy said in a statement to AFP it was not selling or distributing tickets for the match.

British government advice is fans should not travel to Italy, an "amber list" country requiring 10 days of self-isolation upon return. Britain is experiencing a surge in new coronavirus cases, blamed on the Delta variant that was first detected in India, despite a successful vaccination drive.