Cape Town -
The anticipation before the World Cup 2010 in South Africa is huge.
10,000 fans are expected from Germany, 450,000 World Cup visitors from around the world. But FIFA boss Joseph Blatter has one big worry: empty stadiums for the tournament.
On Saturday starts the third sales phase, in which up to 22 January one million tickets are sold. So far, the rate of 674 203 tickets sold - an occupancy rate of 92 percent - not bad, but clear signals will have the World Cup organizers only, if high demand commitment to the now stationary game pairings.
"It has always been by far the most important sales period, as the fans now know who aufeinandertrifft in the group matches," said the German World Cup adviser Horst R. Schmidt. Tickets are available at this stage for all 64 World Cup games. And that is precisely the problem.
The enthusiasm of the South African World Cup is very selective. The home team is supported with great passion and a streak of fatalism. England "Three Lions" will be admired, Brazil, Italy and Germany also quite interested in pursuing.
All other teams hardly arouse enthusiasm. "There will certainly be games for which the interest less pronounced," says World Cup chief organizer Danny Jordaan.
Some games will be so hopelessly overbooked, with others, the demand is extremely limited. This problem was already evident at the Confederations Cup in the summer of 2009, when the South Africans were lure to play New Zealand, Egypt and Iraq and even European champions Spain with free tickets to the stadium.
The King of Bafokeng bought 10,000 tickets for games at that time alone in its territory Rustenburg. About TV's in all world broadcast images of empty stands the image of South Africa had damaged too much. A replay at the World Cup now out of closed leaves. The FIFA premium product should not there be a dumping goods. But for many - especially black - South Africans are themselves the low Category 4 tickets from 13 € too expensive.
