World Cup is the largest rip-off on Earth – and actual followers are being priced out
The Daily Star says that while the World Cup remains one of the best sporting events going, the ticket pricing strategy is a scandal that prices real footie fans out of the experience
The World Cup will go to the United States, Mexico and Canada this summer(Image: Getty Images)
The World Cup is the greatest football spectacle on Earth. But it’s about time it was renamed the greatest rip-off.
Once again fans are being totally priced out of the sport’s biggest event. Astronomical ticket prices have sadly become par for the course in recent years.
But this summer’s tournament is set to take the biscuit. Incredibly, one chancer has been trying to flog a ticket for England’s clash with Panama for £1million.
That’s the cost of a mansion.
And it’s not even a decent seat either! The original price for the ticket was just £164. Of course, its unlikely anyone would be mad enough to pay that sort of sum – but you never know.
However, the fact someone even had the nerve to pitch it at that price highlights just how ridiculous the whole saga has become.
Now only those with huge chequebooks have any chance of watching the Three Lions. Tickets for England’s other group games against Croatia and Ghana are going for almost £100,000 on resale sites.
And Fifa is flogging tickets to the final for £8,000 – the most expensive ever general admission price to a football match.
Some have then popped up on secondary sites for £62,000. Football’s world governing body has peddled out the same old excuses.
It says it can’t stop scalpers in the US and Canada because neither country has laws to prevent it.
But surely there must be some way of tackling such outrageous profiteering?
Scotland’s First Minister John Swinney has pleaded with football chiefs to introduce a “fair, affordable ticketing model for fans”.
He’s right when he says the World Cup is now the opposite of what it should be about. In essence, a corporate jolly reserved for the super wealthy.
Meanwhile, the real fans, whose passion make the tournament what it is, are forgotten.
The truth is out there
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