Glastonbury co-organiser Emily Eavis claimed Jay-Z was exactly the sort of artist they should have headlining at the Festival

Co-organiser Emily Eavis counter-attacked after Oasis star Noel Gallagher blamed the failure to sell all the festival tickets on the decision to recruit the rapper to perform.

The 40-year-old singer, who headlined the Pyramid stage at Glastonbury on two occasions, had said it was "wrong" to have a hip-hop artist at the top of the bill.

But Eavis, writing in the Independent, dismissed the idea Jay-Z was responsible for poor sales and said they were "delighted" when they booked the star.

She wrote: "There is no reason why we should not have the greatest living hip-hop artist on at Glastonbury.

"In fact, he is exactly the sort of act we should have performing."

She insisted choosing the rapper was in keeping with the festival's history, which has seen De La Soul, Cyprus Hill and The Roots all perform there in the past.

"The critics do not understand the Glastonbury audience", she continued.

"It is a bunch of really open-minded people, who come to the festival to learn and experience new things, new music, new food, new people, new politics and a whole range of new experiences.

"This is what, I hope, makes our festival special - Glastonbury is about more than just the music."

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In a thinly veiled reference to racism, she added: "Maybe what the critics have really revealed is something about attitudes that are still all too prevalent in Britain: an instinct to go back to base and play safe.

"An innate conservatism, a stifling reluctance to try something different.

"This is not something that Glastonbury has ever embraced.

"And there is also an interesting undercurrent in the suggestion that a black, U.S. hip-hop artist shouldn't be playing in front of what many perceive to be a white, middle-class audience.

"I'm not sure what to call it, at least not in public, but this is something that causes me some disquiet."

Eavis, 28, said feedback from fans of the festival had been "overwhelmingly positive" and that there were "blown away" by selling 100,000 tickets on the first day of sale this month.

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Gallagher had earlier told the BBC: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it. If you start to break it then people aren't going to go. I'm sorry, but Jay-Z? No chance.

"Glastonbury has a tradition of guitar music and even when they throw the odd curve ball in on a Sunday night you go 'Kylie Minogue?'

"I don't know about it. But I'm not having hip-hop at Glastonbury. It's wrong."

Oasis headlined the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury in 1995 and 2004, with the event selling out on both occasions.

Last year's festival sold out within two hours but there are still tickets available for this year a week after they were first released.

Around 40,000 out of 140,000 available tickets were unsold for the three-day extravaganza after the first day the online ticket office opened and the Glastonbury website was still open for business yesterday.

The festival even took out an advert in Monday's Guardian newspaper to encourage ticket sales.

It invited people to "take a five-day break at Worthy Farm and enjoy the most extraordinary festival anywhere in the world".

The left-over tickets are a contrast to last year's event when 177,500 tickets sold out within two hours.

Some 400,000 hopefuls supplied a passport photograph and contact information in advance, almost double the number that pre-registered this year.

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Emily Eavis had already told NME magazine that they were expecting slower sales after bad weather in recent years.

She said: "We kind of knew it'd be slow, as we've had quite a few muddy years and there was a lot of people p***ed off that Radiohead aren't playing.

"But in my opinion we're going to be left with the most amazing crowd we've had in 10 years.

"I imagine sales will trickle along and when we announce the line-up on May 1 we'll nail the last few.

"The fact people knew the headliners beforehand has been quite a blessing.

"If people thought it was going to be Radiohead or Led Zeppelin they would have been misled."

"Some of these performances are going to be historic.

"It was due for a bit of a shake-up and we're left with the distilled Glastonbury goers, who are amazing people."

The youngest daughter of Michael Eavis, who founded Glastonbury in 1970, she gave up training to be a teacher to help run the festival in 1999 when her mother died of cancer.

Hip-hop mogul Jay-Z, who married pop diva Beyonce a week ago, is due to headline the Pyramid Stage on the Saturday night, in what is traditionally the biggest gig of the weekend.

Organisers have already been forced to deny that the star is considering pulling out altogether after criticism from fans.

A full Glastonbury line-up will be announced on May 1, but Goldfrapp, Leonard Cohen, the Editors, Panic at the Disco, Jimmy Cliff and The Cribs are among the bands known to have signed up, along with fellow headliners Kings of Leon and the Verve.

Last year's festival featured Lily Allen, The Who, and Shirley Bassey.

The festival this year runs over the weekend of June 27-29, with tickets priced at £164 including booking fee.