Soaring World Cup ticket prices for players’ families and guests leave several FAs stunned

Numerous Football Associations have been hit by increased prices when buying World Cup tickets for their players’ family and friends, with teams competing at the tournament affected by Fifa’s dynamic pricing model. While Fifa offered all national associations that have qualified for the World Cup a six-week window to buy tickets at a fixed price after the draw in December, any requests for tickets from the end of January have been subject to what Fifa describes as “adaptive pricing”, with the cost rising for most matches.

An executive at one national association said they had requested hundreds of additional tickets in recent weeks and have been surprised at the size of the bill. An executive at another association claimed the average cost of securing attendance at matches for their players’ family and their guests has risen to about $3,000 (£2,200) a ticket after extra purchases, a significant additional cost that will eat into their tournament funding. Fifa sources insisted the average cost of tickets bought by national associations is far lower than $3,000.

In expectation of huge demand, Fifa opted to put World Cup tickets on sale in four phases – in October, December, January and April – before announcing an additional last-minute sales window. The main opportunity for national associations to buy tickets came after the World Cup draw in Washington on 5 December; prices have risen since then. A number of tickets were held over at December prices for the six countries that qualified via the confederation playoffs in March, while all qualifiers have also received a number of free tickets for their official delegations and guests.

Many national associations have privately expressed surprise by the price increases, although Fifa sources insist the terms and conditions of sale were made clear at the outset and that FAs who responded to their deadlines on time should not have experienced price rises. The English FA, for example, is understood to have bought all its tickets in December and has not been affected. There are concerns that smaller countries with the lowest budgets will be worst affected by the price rises.

At the beginning on May Fifa increased the minimum qualification and preparation money it will provide to each national association from $10.5m to $12.5m, as well as providing an additional $16m shared among the 48 qualifiers to assist with travel costs, but many of the bigger FAs are still forecasting losses for the tournament.