FIFA happy with World Cup ticket sales

The international football governing body FIFA has expressed satisfaction with the different phases of tickets sales for the World Cup scheduled for summer of 2010. FIFA is angry with media reports that have emphasized the crime in South Africa and made it seem like a possible deterrent to fans. FIFA feels the fact that the demand being less than what it was in Germany four years ago is affected by factors such as distance for many European fans.

There are limited flights to South Africa and the air tickets are also relatively more expensive. These are big considerations according to FIFA General Secretary Jerome Valcke. Valcke was very critical of recent news reports in England and Germany. "It's sad that every morning when you wake up people are saying you should not go to South Africa ... it's insane and it is completely wrong." He feels that every country, including the United States and Britain, has security concerns. "Where can we organise the World Cup? On the moon? Where there is no-one? Don't kill the World Cup before the World Cup has taken place."

The organisers are sensitive to the issue of crime. South Africa does have one of the highest rates of violent crime with their being 50 murders a day. A police force of 40,000 is being mobilised specially for the tournament. Jordaan, however, feels that the reports are exaggerated and points out that South Africa does attract millions of tourists every year and that it has successfully hosted cricket and rugby fans in recent years. He feels that, "Some things that you read have no basis in reality anywhere. We are happy where we are. The teams are happy where they are, they are coming."

In the third phase of the ticket sales that ended last week 1.2 million applications were received from 192 countries and this bring the total applications to 2 million. There are 3 million seats for sale totally. South African fans account for 80 percent of the applications and most of the overseas demand is from fans in the US who have requested 50,000 tickets. Britain's applications stand at 41,529 and Germany, with lower than usual demand, is at 15,000. Recent reports that have spoken about low demand are factoring in only the ticket sales through national federations rather than providing a complete picture, say the officials. Danny Jordaan, the CEO of the South African organising committee said, "Since the draw (on Dec. 4), we have seen a flurry in terms of ticket sales ... the sales have gone very well, we are extremely delighted." Six matches including the two semi-finals and finals are oversubscribed.

There is also the feeling that the ticket sales among poor black South Africans will pick up once the counter cash sales points open in April and the bank and Internet sale points may not have been accessible to them.

In reporting low ticket sales earlier this month, the German soccer federation had said that security concerns and high travel costs may be affecting sales but also said that this pattern of sales is typical for how it happened with other distant locations such as South Korea and Japan.

Source: euFootball.BIZ