FIFA U-20 World Cup ticket policy: No reentry allowed
I received my tickets to the FIFA U-20 World Cup and was a bit surprised to see that there is a no reentry policy in effect. With 2 games per day happening in the Group stage, this means that once you enter the stadium you are there for the day.
Now, I was planning on going to both games anyway, but I am still disappointed about the policy. With 2 games per day, I was planning on splitting my game tickets with my friends, taking one to the early game and a second friend to the late game. With this policy, that is impossible.
But what really irks me was that this policy wasn’t communicated to me at the time I bought the tickets. I clearly believed I was buying 2 sets of tickets to 7 games, not 2 sets of 4 day passes. In fact, until I received the tickets and saw the policy stamped on the ticket, I had no idea that I wouldn’t be able to leave after one game and come back again for the second.
I heard an interview on the CBC this morning with Victoria organizing committee head Harold McNeill. McNeill was speaking to a grandfather in Cobble Hill, BC about the restrictive reentry policy. This grandfather had planned on taking different grandkids to each game, not knowing about the policy ahead of time.
I was a bit disappointed with MacNeill’s response. Rather than clearly explain why FIFA has developed this reentry policy (and I can hazard a few guesses like preventing resale of tickets, control crowd flows, sell more products inside the stadium for partners just to name a few), MacNeill spent quite a bit of time selling the event. It would have been better if I could have heard MacNeill explain FIFA’s reasoning behind this ticket policy. Instead, I have to wonder and speculate as to why this is the case.
At any rate, I’m still pumped about the event and it’s not a huge problem that I will be there between games. I’m sure there will be plenty of $16.95 pints of beer to be drunk and $7.50 hot dogs to be eaten plus atmosphere aplenty. But still it would have been nice to know beforehand that I would have to remain inside the venue or else forfeit going to the second game.
