Filed under: Other Sports, Olympics
If you are one of the many to miss out a ticket to the Olympics in the confusing first round of sales you can perhaps take a shred of comfort from the fact you are not alone; more than half of the 1.8 million applicants were left empty-handed.Less warming will be the knowledge that only around 40% of 80,000 seats in the £547 million Olympic Stadium were made available for the public, with the rest allocated to corporate sponsors and other well connected people considered to be more deserving by the organisers.
Even more frustrating given the recent farce conducted in Switzerland is the knowledge that Sepp Blatter and some of his Fifa cronies will be seated in the best seats of all when the most eagerly anticipated drama unfolds.
We should be used to this by now, after all almost every sporting event is attended by its fair share of people on a jolly. Roy Keane was at his withering best when he condemned the prawn sandwich brigade at Old Trafford, striking a chord with every regular sports fan who has to stump up hard-earned cash just to have the privilege of sitting in one of the cheap seats.
The arguments are well worn. Without the promise of allocated seats with which corporate sponsors can reward customers, competition winners and, most likely, themselves, sponsors won't pay the big money that ultimately allows the event to be staged with further recourse to public funds and higher ticket prices.
There is a tipping point though. And when an event has become so bloated and expensive to stage that those who are given the opportunity to actually witness it are there because of their connections to big business or the organisers out-number genuine fans, something is fundamentally wrong.
The Fifa link is particularly irksome, of course. The Daily Mail reports that the free tickets are just part of £1.5 million worth of benefits the football body will receive, including discounted hotel rooms and VIP travel throughout the games.
"Less than one per cent of the total ticket allocation has been sold to the sports federations," said a London 2012 spokesman said in defence of the allocation. "Around 95 per cent of each sports federation's allocation is for tickets to their own sports."
Perspective is always required when it comes to matters like this but some things are symbolic of a wider problem. The organisers want the nation to own the games but a bizarre ticket allocation policy and the reminder that for many, the Olympics is a publicly-funded junket doesn't help.
There are still some people who are able to attend a sporting event without the need to glad-hand their patron for the day and can survive without the three-course meal that, if the Club Wembley seats are anything to go by, is seen by some as more important than the sport itself.
It's not enough to say they will get the chance to go and see the minority sports that the sponsors can't be bothered with. Let Blatter go to the water polo or the handball and release his stadium ticket to the public.
Nice idea, except it would most likely be made available as part of a tour package with obligatory hotel and meals.
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