Fifa to factor in SA fans
Friday, January 15, 2010
The complicated online ticketing system has been blamed for poor ticket sales for Bafana Bafana's matches and those of other African teams.
New Safa chief executive Leslie Sedibe has said that the ticketing process would be discussed with Fifa at a meeting scheduled for later this month.
"One thing we need to do is identify a simpler way of ensuring they [South African fans] have access to the tickets. We are meeting Fifa before the end of this month, where the issue of tickets will also be discussed," Sedibe said.
Sedibe said he was disappointed that most World Cup tickets bought in the country were for teams like England, Germany, Italy, and Argentina.
This after Local Organising Committee chief executive Danny Jordaan announced this week that tickets for Bafana's matches were not even in the top 10 rankings. If the trend continues, the country would be the first host nation in the 80-year history of the Fifa World Cup not to top the ticket sales list.
As with the Confederations Cup event last June, pressure is mounting on the organising committee to persuade Fifa to allow over-the-counter ticket sales, which suits South African fans who are used to that ticketing process.
While Fifa will open over-the-counter sales to fans by April 15 at official ticketing centres in each of the host cities, it might be too late.
Chairman of the Fifa ticketing sub-committee Horst Schmidt said: "It seems that in South Africa this method [over-the-counter] has a higher importance than it did four years ago [in Germany]."
He did not, however, say that the over-the-counter sales would begin sooner.
Joe Mcgluwa, the Independent Democrats spokesman for sport, said: "It's as simple as bringing services to the people. Surely we have reached desperate times? Fifa needs to take into consideration that the majority of this country's population cannot access the same mediums as used in previous World Cups."
He added: "The organisers really need to be more tolerant and understand that this is the first time in the continent that such a massive event is being staged, so as a developing nation all possible resources will need to be used to carry out a successful World Cup."
Schmidt said, however: "The South African market requires us to take into account that a lot of people do not have access to the Internet or have credit cards, so Fifa added the opportunity to apply for tickets through FNB branches where tickets can be bought with various payments including cash."
He added: "It is true that at previous events the host nation's team tickets were usually the most popular within that particular host city, but we do hope that in the next few days South Africans make their applications to support the hosts."
Germany's Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper said that country's football federation has sold only about 1000 of the 21,000 tickets for the three group games against Australia, Ghana and Serbia.
The English and Dutch associations, which traditionally have large followings, have also not managed to sell their ticket allocation.
The Dutch, who have sold between 2000 and 3000 tickets per group match but had reckoned up to 10,000 would be sold, have now asked Fifa to extend the deadline.
Fifa's media officer, Delia Fischer, said that right now there was "no chance" of an extension for national football associations to sell tickets. She did reveal that meetings were scheduled to discuss the matter further.
posted @ 10:54 AM,
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