Manchester United fans will go ahead with a planned protest before Sunday’s Old Trafford derby after launching another attack on the club over its clampdown on ticket touts.United issued a statement on Friday confirming that the investigation is complete. They revealed that out of a total of 1,617 accounts identified as suspicious, 685 have been hit with a ban for breaching season-ticket rules.Club sources denied claims that innocent fans have been accused without clear evidence, but that was dismissed by a spokesman for protest group The 1958 who will go ahead their demonstration on Sunday.He said: ‘There is still no apology from the club at the way they’ve treated time-served, loyal fans. The stress and aggravation caused has been immense for some.’The fans impacted by the bans have still not received clear reasoning. That is unacceptable and should be challenged. We are supporters and human beings, not cattle in a slaughterhouse!‘We protest against being treated like this, and we protest against the owners of our club. We urge all fans to turn up and let the club know what we think.’ Fans protested against the club on the opening game of the season against HullUnited defended the investigation by saying it has broken up large-scale organised networks involved in touting based on the strongest data ever gathered.Insiders insist that some examples of unfair treatment of fans shared on social media are untrue and don’t tell the full story. They acknowledge the frustration among supporters over the crackdown, but say a total of 468 cases have been resolved without any further action.A statement read: ‘Where satisfactory explanations were provided, restrictions were removed and no further action was taken. In many of those cases, the cause was sharing of account details and passwords, which is in breach of our terms and conditions.‘We recognise that many supporters have shared account login details in circumstances they regarded as legitimate, and we did not anticipate the extent to which this was occurring. In those cases, where there was no additional evidence of misuse, no sanction was imposed.’As a result of the investigation, United maintain that more tickets will now be available to genuine supporters rather than touts who they say were exploiting fans.Out of the 685 accounts that have been banned, there were 499 cases in which fans lost an appeal, 73 cases where there was no appeal, and 113 where there was no response despite requests for information. A further 464 supporters received a reduced sanction or final warning.The statement added: ‘Over the course of the summer, Manchester United undertook an operation to review accounts that showed irregular activity resembling ticket misuse. We committed to providing a further update once our investigation had concluded.‘The club’s guiding principle around ticketing is simple: to keep our fans safe and secure, to protect fair access to tickets for genuine Manchester United supporters and to tackle ticket touting, misuse and activity for financial gain.‘Bans were issued where there was significant misuse of the ticketing system. This included the operation of organised ticketing networks, which were controlling, selling and distributing tickets from hundreds of accounts. These actions undermine fair access to tickets for genuine supporters and have no place at Manchester United.‘Our focus now turns to ensuring these tickets are returned to our supporters. All season tickets released through this process will be offered to supporters on the season ticket waiting list. Refunds have been or will be issued to each of the season ticket holders who have been banned.‘We want to allow any sanctioned ticket holder the opportunity to refer their case to the Independent Football Ombudsman. Therefore, we will wait until after the international break before reallocating season tickets. Any seats used on a match-by-match basis before then will be sold at season ticket prices, not matchday prices. The club is not profiting from this process.’