Moscow’s big match: truth and rumours

The Champions League final between Chelsea and Man Utd tonight at the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow has inspired countless rumours. The First Post aims to put you straight...

Some travelling fans are said to be taking the train from Cologne or Riga to get to Moscow, others squandering up to £1,000 on flights. TRUE - and it's just as bad on arrival: up to £500 for a bearable hotel room, £100 for a taxi from the airport, £10 for a beer.

Roman Abramovich, Russian owner of Chelsea FC, is to fill whole swathes of the stadium with his Muscovite cronies. FALSE. The rumour seems to have been started by Sir Alex Ferguson, the Manchester United manager. It now appears that Abramovich has limited his generosity to buying 500 tickets for Russian Chelsea fans, and that there may even be 2,000 or so empty seats.

The pitch is in a bad state - turf had to be flown in from Slovakia two weeks ago, and groundsman Matt Frost calls the finished result "a big personal disappointment". TRUE - there may well be bobbles on the night.

English fans are advised not to smoke or drink in Red Square. TRUE. Igor Konovalov, the head of Moscow's public safety department, has said: "If fans are drunk, don't you worry, we'll make them sober." He has at his disposal mobile cells, and, failing that, 'sobering houses', where drunks are chained down naked to metal beds.

After the game, Chelsea and United fans will be penned by a tight cordon of police into what the Russian police call settling tanks. TRUE. It could take as long as ten hours before they are released.

The Omon, Russia's machine-gun wielding elite police force whose motto is 'We know no mercy and do not ask for any', are going to be patrolling. FALSE. Reassuringly, the Omon are merely providing back-up if trouble flares, and regular Moscow police have been wearing their smartest white shirts in an effort to give a friendly impression of the city.

The match doesn't start until 10.45pm local time. TRUE. Muscovites had to sacrifice a normal kick-off time for the sake of TV audiences in Britain and elsewhere in Europe.

Luzhniki Stadium is the site of one of football's worst ever stadium disasters. TRUE. It took place during a UEFA cup tie in 1982 between Spartak Moscow and Haarlem of Holland, when a stampede after a Spartak goal caused a disastrous crush. The tragedy was barely reported. The official death toll was given as 66, but others estimate that as many as 340 died.

Anyone the English fans meet in Moscow will know the history of both teams - especially Chelsea FC, owned by a fellow countryman. FALSE. One Russian newspaper, Izvestiya, actually thinks the two teams are Irish. Their headline proclaimed that: "The countrymen of Oscar Wilde and Bernard Shaw are coming to Moscow". ·