England fans claim they have been “slapped in the face” by FIFA after it was revealed a run to the World Cup final would cost supporters over £5,000 for tickets.
The pricing policy was described as “laughable” by the Football Supporters’ Association’s England Fans’ Embassy, while Football Supporters Europe (FSE) called the prices a “monumental betrayal” of match-going fans and urged FIFA to call a halt to the sale process.
Fans hoping to access tickets through their national associations’ travel programmes and loyalty schemes discovered on Thursday that the cheapest final ticket would cost 4,185 US dollars (£3,120).
The Football Association shared pricing information with the England Supporters Travel Club (ESTC) on Thursday evening, which showed that if a fan bought the cheapest ticket for every game through to the final it would cost 7,020 US dollars (£5,228).
These tickets are the ring-fenced, fixed-price tickets FIFA had pledged to set aside for national associations, known as the participant member association (PMA) allocation, following the controversy over FIFA adopting a dynamic pricing strategy in earlier ticket sales.
The PMA allocations equate to eight per cent of a stadium’s capacity for each game. An England fan buying a ticket in the most expensive category for each game would end up spending 16,590 US dollars (£12,364).
An England fan who managed to buy tickets in the ‘fan first’ category at Euro 2024 could have watched every game for 375 euros (£328), while even a supporter who bought all their tickets in the next category up would have spent 860 euros (£753).
In a post on X, the England Fans’ Embassy said: “These prices are a slap in the face to supporters who support their team outside of the flagship tournament that appears every four years.
