England coach Sven-Goran Eriksson last night warned fans planning to travel to Turkey for next month's crucial Euro 2004 qualifier: "You're risking your lives."

The England coach issued the alert after weekend reports that the Turkish football federation is prepared to sell tickets to travelling supporters, even though their English counterparts have rejected their allocation.

The Football Association turned down the chance to take tickets following the history of ugly scenes surrounding games between the two countries.

Two Leeds fans were killed in Istanbul three years ago, and home supports were accused of racist abuse when the national sides clashed in April at Sunderland's Stadium of Light.

However, about 250 England fans bought black market tickets for Saturday night's game in Macedonia, even though the FA warned supporters not to travel.

North-East supporters' spokesman Kevin Miles said many fans would heed Eriksson's warning, but he was critical of the moves to stop supporters travelling to Macedonia.

Speaking from Skopje last night, the Football Supporters' Federation official said: "Most England fans are well aware of the troubled history between England and Turkey and, of course, will consider carefully the risks involved before deciding whether to travel.

"Many England fans I spoke to have said they regard Istanbul very differently and don't intend to travel.

"Unfortunately, the FA's own linkage of the two games with one no-travel policy has undermined their ability to be taken seriously when issuing these warnings."

The FA is seeking an urgent clarification from the Turkish football federation after the reports that they are prepared to sell tickets direct to England fans.

If there is any trouble at the Turkey game, Europe's football chiefs could kick England out of the competition.

Eriksson warned: "Of course, I should like to see fans at games but, if it's a security problem, then it's better not to travel because you can risk being injured and can even risk your life - which happened when Leeds were in Turkey.

"If the security men say it's a problem, then you should listen to them."

Haluk Ulusoy, the president of the Turkish federation, was nevertheless quoted as effectively inviting England fans to travel to Istanbul for the match.

He told a national newspaper: "Even if the English FA are not going to sell tickets and not going to bring fans over to Istanbul, we will do it for them.

"If there are fans who want to watch this game, they can come and get tickets from us.

"We will sell as many tickets to them as they want - 1,000, 2,000 or even 3,000."

FA head of media Adrian Bevington said last night: "We will be discussing this with the Turkish federation over the next 24 hours to establish what their view is with regard to this article.

"We would like to strongly reaffirm the position of ourselves, the Government and the police that no fans should travel to Turkey."

The FA adopted a similarly unequivocal stance towards the game in Macedonia, only for tickets to be freely available on the black market.