Chelsea fans will be ferried into holding camps for up to 10 hours ahead of the Champions League Final in Moscow to prevent fighting with Manchester United supporters.

The vast, fenced areas will have one entrance each, be guarded by Moscow police and will not sell alcohol.

United fans will be placed in their own designated camps.

The supporters will be expected to remain in them before kick-off and will be transported back to the airports following the game on Wednesday. The majority of English supporters are expected to fly in and out of Moscow within 24 hours to save on the high cost of hotel rooms.

Russian authorities are expecting 40,000 to 50,000 fans to travel to Moscow on 300 separate flights. In an attempt to keep fans apart, United fans will mainly arrive at Domodedovo airport to the south of the city while planes with Chelsea supporters are going to land mostly in Vnukovo, in the southwest, and in Sheremetyevo, to the north.

On arrival, fans will be "firmly encouraged" to enter the two guarded camps and not to wander off into the Russian capital "for their own safety", according to police sources in Moscow.

Moscow's deputy mayor Valeri Vinogradov said: "At the airports we'll put them on 700 buses in their teams colours and take to Luzhniki which will open at noon.

"There'll be two camps for fans with all the facilities: places to eat, toilets and even places to have a rest, since the fans will have to do without proper sleep for more than 24 hours."

Match tickets will be scanned at the entrance, making it "technically impossible" to then leave and re-enter the camp or the stadium at a later stage. Some fans could be in the fenced areas for up to 10 hours. Soft drinks, food and souvenirs will be available.

Police sources said: "We don't want people without visas wandering off around Moscow and getting drunk and missing their flights home."

After the game, losing fans will be put on buses to the airport. The winning supporters will be kept back for 30 minutes before also being taken to their point of departure.

Major Igor Konovalov, Moscow police public safety department chief, said: "It's a normal practice. We use them [camps] in our country and the fans call them 'settling tanks'."

In Russian football "settling tanks" are controversial. In one instance 5,000 fans were provided with only two toilets and surrounded for over three hours without food or drink.

Travelling British police will help Russian officers monitor the event. Chelsea are even hiring bilingual Russian-speaking stewards to accompany their fans and the mayor's office is drafting in English-speaking volunteers to help.

But Maj Konovalov warned that Russian police would crack down on any fighting.

He said: "It doesn't matter who comes here - even a bunch of Penguins. If our laws are violated we'll take full measures allowed by our law to clampdown. We will not differentiate."

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