Conor McGregor vs Floyd Mayweather fails to sell-out as tickets available for $10,000 hours before fight starts

Tickets ranging from $2,500 to $10,000 are still available five hours before the fight starts

Conor McGregor and Floyd Mayweather’s blockbuster boxing bout has not sold-out with tickets still available five hours before the fighters are due to walk to the ring.

Tickets are still available at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, with prices ranging from $2,500 to as much as $10,000 for ringside seats.

In fact, every section bar one in the upper bowl still has availability, despite thousands flocking to Las Vegas for the biggest fight ever seen financially.

Approaching 04:00 BST [20:00 PT], there were still large areas in the crowd empty, with concerns growing that the main event will play out in front of a small audience.

Both McGregor, the two-time UFC champion, and Mayweather, the unbeaten boxing icon, are expected to earn more than $100m from the bout, yet the failure to sell-out the arena tickets will be seen as a rather embarrassing failure on their part to sell the fight.

Around 20,000 fans have travelled from the United Kingdom and Ireland in support of McGregor, but many will be watching the fight in bars dotted around Vegas rather than spend the extraordinary fees for tickets to the bout itself.

Despite the sell-out failure, Irish fans have been in good spirits ahead of the main event, with Sin City illuminated in emerald green thanks to McGregor’s loyal fans who have followed him throughout his UFC career an move into boxing.

"We've no tickets,” said one young fan in his twenties wearing a green Irish soccer shirt and drinking a beer in the hot sunshine.

"We're going to hit the black jack table and see if we can win enough money to buy some."

Mayweather, who is putting his unbeaten record of 49-0 on the line after coming out of a 23-month retirement, remains the heavy bookmakers’ favourite, but a wave of money has come on for UFC convert McGregor thanks to the generous odds available on the Irishman.