Frustration, disappointment for Georgia soccer fans priced out of World Cup

Dave Marler has waited nearly his whole life for this moment — the World Cup in his home state.

Marler is a rarity — a 66-year-old LaGrange resident, he grew up playing soccer in metro Atlanta during the soccer boom. He was a supporter of the Chiefs, Atlanta’s professional soccer team in the defunct North American Soccer League. As a 10th grader, he was part of Morrow High’s first soccer team.

So when Atlanta was named a host for World Cup matches at Mercedes-Benz Stadium, he was elated.

“It would fulfill a lifelong dream and reinforce the love that I have for the game — to actually see it,” he told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Marler, though, is like a lot of metro Atlantans and Georgians who are frustrated and disappointed by the ticket prices for the eight World Cup matches at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. From a search of four different markets Saturday — two of FIFA’s (direct sales and resales), plus Ticketmaster and Seatgeek — the lowest get-in price for any of the matches was $155.

That was for the June 27 group-stage match between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uzbekistan, two of the weaker teams in the field in a match that may have no bearing on the tournament by the time it’s played.

Tickets for the more appealing matches in Atlanta, namely the two group-stage matchups featuring tournament favorite Spain and the three knockout-round matches, ran far more expensive. The least-costly ticket for either of Spain’s matches was $322.

Tickets for knockout-round matches started at $435. The least-expensive seat to be found Saturday for the July 15 semifinal was $2,070. And remember, those were the prices for some of the worst seats in the building. For the round of 16 match July 7, the least-expensive seat in the lower bowl was $720.

These prices might be tolerable for some people, particularly for an event that could be once in a lifetime. But they aren’t for a lot of others, particularly for the more desirable matches.

“I’m thinking, ‘Well, maybe I might be willing to go to $250 just for this type of experience,’ and then you start seeing four and five (hundred) and $750, $1,000, whatever,” Marler said. “It’s very frustrating.”

FIFA’s practices in selling tickets could reasonably be called shady. The prices are dramatically higher than in previous World Cups. Beyond that, the organization with a history of corruption has put tickets on sale in batches, not revealing what the remaining inventory is, and changed pricing.

This past week, attorneys general for New York and New Jersey announced that they had launched a probe into FIFA’s sales practices.

“For followers of the game who know of FIFA’s scandalous history, (the pricing) is not a surprise,” Marler said.

FIFA isn’t the only factor, though. The reality is that there are people buying tickets at the asking prices. A Seatgeek official told the AJC that demand to see Spain has been strong.

“Demand has strengthened consistently, and limited supply for a tournament favorite will keep prices firm,” senior marketing director Chris Leyden wrote in an email.

Edgar Castillo, a lifelong soccer fan from Stockbridge, had his appetite whet by attending the electric environment of a quarterfinal match in last year’s FIFA Club World Cup at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

He paid $300 for two tickets for that match between two powerhouse clubs. But pricing for the World Cup, “it leaves it out of reach to a lot of people,” he said.

He had hoped that discounted tickets might be allocated in a lottery for Georgia residents. There was no such opportunity.

“They’re going to get people who are from out of the country or out of town, have a lot more money than the regular resident from Georgia,” Castillo said. To him, the vibe will not be the same.

The adjustment of pricing in the remaining days before the start of the World Cup — Atlanta’s first match is June 15, between Spain and Cape Verde — will be fascinating.

Are there really that many people willing to pay $1,000 or more to sit in the lower bowl for a match played at noon on a Monday?

According to Leyden, the Seatgeek representative, the market for the three non-Spain group-stage matches — South Africa-Czech Republic on June 18, Morocco-Haiti on June 24 and the aforementioned Congo-Uzbekistan match — has drifted downward since December.

It may be similar to what happened last summer with the Club World Cup, when resale prices for group-stage matches sat in the mid-$200 range for months before falling by roughly half their peaks.

“Fans with flexibility on matchup may find genuine value closer to the event,” Leyden wrote.

Marler and Castillo are among those counting on it. Castillo said he is eager to go.

“But right now, realistically, it’s just out of reach,” Castillo said.

The frustration with pricing and lack of transparency led Rich Saleh, a Peachtree City resident and soccer fan, to create an online reverse market. On WantToBuyTix, fans can post the number of tickets they want to buy for a specific match and seating category with the amount they’re willing to pay. Saleh told the AJC on Saturday that more than 400 people had posted offers to buy and that a handful of sales had already been made.