The hype around a cricket match between India and Pakistan is, in the simplest words, insane. This is substantiated by the price that you may have to pay for their encounter in the ICC World Cup in Manchester this June. Tickets for this match are being sold for as high as $3519 on private websites like viagogo.com.
Although, the ICC website, which is the official seller of the World Cup tickets, has halted the sale of tickets between January 28 and February 18, private websites are making a killing by scalping hundreds, sometimes even thousands of dollars for these tickets from cricket enthusiasts.
The price of a ticket for the June 16 match between arch rivals India and Pakistan to be played at the Old Trafford cricket ground can range between $1920 and $3519.
Compare this with the low key match on June 24 between Afghanistan and Bangladesh at Southampton: the price range plummets to anything between $88 and $356. With a seating capacity of 26,000 in Old Trafford Cricket Ground, less than 350 tickets are available at the moment.
Another set of arch rivals on the cricket pitch are Australia and England, whose biennial face-off, The Ashes, is a big ticket cricket tournament. For the ICC World Cup 2019, they’ll meet at London’s iconic Lord’s Cricket Ground on June 25. If you are interested in watching this match, a private website can shave off anything between $960 and $1454 from your pocket.
If you want to enjoy the biggest draw of the tournament, the July 14 final at Lord’s, and can’t wait for ICC to resume sales, a private website will charge you anything between $1920 and $5214.
A screenshot of the ticket availability of the India-Pakistan cricket match. Source: viagogo.com
A screenshot of the ticket availability of the Afghanistan-Bangladesh cricket match. Source: viagogo.com
A screenshot of the ticket availability of the England-Australia match. Source: viagogo.com
Some cricket enthusiasts, discouraged by the hefty price tags on such tickets have jokingly told SBS Punjabi that they’d rather watch the matches for free, on TV!
Due to a high demand and low supply of tickets, the International Cricket Council (ICC) has stopped the sale of new tickets. They have also announced a website for the resale of tickets already bought by people in their previous tranche. It appears private websites are selling the ticket that they might have purchased in bulk before ICC halted their sales.
A screenshot of the ticket availability of the ICC World Cup final. Source: viagogo.com
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