Exeter and England back Jack Nowell has criticised the decision to limit the capacity for Saturday's Premiership final at Twickenham to 10,000 fans.

Wembley had 19,000 for England's game with the Czech Republic and will have 60,000 for the Euro 2020 semi-finals and final after UK Government approval.

"It just doesn't make sense to me," Nowell said ahead of the game.

"Wembley had 19,000 (for England against the Czech Republic) and they are going to 60,000 next week and you've got other sports events going on as well (with crowds).

"At the end of the day, we are outdoors. Twickenham is an 80,000-seater stadium. There is no reason why we can't have more in there, but I don't know who is making the decisions.

"From a players' point of view and the team's point of view, we are just gutted that we can't have a lot more people watching it."

Premiership Rugby had hoped for a crowd of 20,000 at their annual showpiece event, which will see Exeter take on Harlequins for the title.

But they were forced to cancel people's tickets after being told the game would not get any special dispensation, meaning rules which state stadia can only have either 10,000 fans or 25% capacity - whichever is lower - had to be obeyed.

As well as the Euro 2021 matches at Wembley, the Wimbledon tennis finals will have capacity crowds while Royal Ascot and England's second Test match against New Zealand at Edgbaston also had bigger attendances.

"If there were valid reasons for it and there are a few reasons, our safety comes first, we can't deny that," added Nowell.

"But that fact that there are other events going on and other amounts of people coming in to watch it who seem to be getting on fine - there's absolutely no reason for us not to be doing it."

'It seems very odd'

Exeter, the reigning Premiership champions, won the title last season at an empty Twickenham and also claimed their first European Champions Cup behind closed doors in Bristol.

The club has had fans at their last five matches after restrictions were eased in May - with just over 3,300 people attending their semi-final win over Sale last week at Sandy Park.

"It is fantastic there are some supporters there, because we went to two finals and semi-finals last season with zero supporters, so that's great and is a very positive step forward," added Exeter director of rugby Rob Baxter.

"I don't think anyone involved in rugby isn't shaking their head a little bit when they see the crowd numbers that are going to be happening at other sporting events, both now and very quickly, especially when you consider Twickenham is an 82,000 capacity.

"It seems very odd. Why rugby has been singled out, I don't know."