World Cup tickets: $11,000 tickets put on sale for final
Fans lined up for World Cup tickets around 15:20 BST on Wednesday, BBC Sport reported.
There was a hold message, and at 16:00 it turned into a red circle: “Almost there…”
The countdown clock appeared towards 17:00. I was two minutes off the lead when the time suddenly jumped to 15 minutes.
We experienced the same technical glitch with thousands of fans when we gained access.
Fans who entered early were mistakenly directed to the “PMA tickets” queue reserved for fans of this week’s play-off winners.
Once the transaction was completed, users were sent to a page where the code was required to initiate sales for those fixtures.
When the mistake was realized, fans had to start over from behind the correct virtual line. The chance to get a ticket to one of the more attractive matches was lost.
FIFA did not explain the reason for the error, but said that the connections were working properly as of 17:00.
Back in the queue, it took six hours and 14 minutes to be granted access to the ticket page.
Tickets were available for 35 of the 72 group matches – but when we initially made it through there were no allocations for England or Scotland matches or any of the knockout matches.
Prices ranged from $140 (£106) to $2,985 (£2,261) across 35 matches. The average price of those viewed was $358 (£271).
The most expensive group stage match seen was the first tournament between Mexico and South Africa for $2,985 (£2,261), with only a fraction of the 87,000-person capacity.
Additionally, we were able to view corporate hospitality packages including the England v Panama match costing $124,800 (£94,444) for a luxury suite with 24 match tickets, food and drink ($5,200 (£3,935) per person).
The availability of games seems to be constantly changing and FIFA has stated that new tickets may be issued for each game up until kick-off.
As of 8 a.m. Thursday, 13 games were still showing; however, six of these had only wheelchair companion tickets and were not supposed to be sold to the public.
Controversially, FIFA did not offer free tickets to assisting fans who use wheelchairs. Tickets must be purchased at full price and must not be placed side by side.
The USA’s opening game against Paraguay on 13 June had the most tickets still on sale, with 1,406 category one tickets priced at $2,735 (£2,072).
Canada’s first game against Bosnia and Herzegovina was the only other game in which supply was relatively good; 846 first category tickets are currently on sale for $2,240 (£1,697).
FIFA’s resale platform, which will likely fetch even higher prices (both buyer and seller will be charged 15%), reopens on Thursday.
