With just over three months to go until the opening games for World Cup 2026, FIFA seems to have ticket problems, perhaps serious ticket problems. For the USMNT matches against Australia, either Kosovo, Romania, Slovakia, or Turkey, and the opener against Paraguay June 12th, there might be cause for alarm and it isn’t exclusively around the USA matches. Many top-flight matches in all three host nations still have unsold tickets while even more tickets are available for the less popular match-ups such as Uruguay vs. Cape Verde, Jordan vs. Algeria, Croatia vs. Ghana and surprisingly even Tunisia vs. Netherlands. Those games are not sold out as FIFA and Gianni Infantino have implied to fans the last two months. Why is this? What is really going on?

From The Athletic:

“Six days after FIFA president Gianni Infantino claimed that “every” 2026 World Cup match is “already sold out,” FIFA, out of nowhere, launched an effort to sell World Cup tickets” [again this month].

It emailed fans advertising an “exclusive additional chance to purchase,” and warned that “availability is extremely limited.””

The later price points for these “exclusive” matches were substantially reduced in price compared to their first lottery prices. Hmm. 🤔 Was this the case of carefully planned sales and marketing by FIFA and Infantino to get the most money from purchases, or something else?

Again from The Athletic:

“The unexpected sale was, some experts suspect, the clearest evidence yet that FIFA has perhaps overstated demand for some World Cup games—or, rather, that is has priced out segments of that demand.”

This begs the question, What fans anywhere in the world with their own nations’ playing in the 64-team tournament, tiny or large, competitive or not, can realistically afford October 2025 price-points such as $2,735 (US$ Category 1), $1,940 (US$ Category 2)? Category 3 tickets at $1,120 (US$) have supposedly sold, but fans have even balked at these higher prices. In all phases sales windows so far Category 3 and less so Category 4 seats have quickly sold out. Yet hours after purchasing access had begun, many lower profile matches still had plenty of seats.

Then, in another twist, FIFA stated in early February 2026, saying to remaining ticket applicants that “the next opportunity to secure tickets… will be during the Last-Minute Sales Phase,” in which the website said would start “in early April.” And once again another twist. Some of those same applicants later received emails about the ‘previously unadvertised sale.’ So what is actually going on? This seems so eerily similar to The Circus that happens daily in the U.S. White House… lots of mixed and conflicting explanations and narratives from various cabinet members.

However, Barry Kahn, the inventor of Dynamic Pricing In Live Entertainment, particularly in the sports world dropped a bomb on FIFA and World Cup fans what he thought was really going on:

“When you have an organization that announced a plan, like FIFA did, and [then] when you deviate from the plan, clearly something is wrong.”

Once again, I can’t help but say this sort of skirting, maneuvering, and mixed messages from president Infantino and FIFA sure looks and sounds like The Circus acts we Americans get from the White House every single day. Is tRump-Dumb-ass putting his hands where they don’t belong like he does around women’s vaginas? Is this unusual lack of interest/purchases in the USMNT and the World Cup tournament connected somehow to the very poor state our fake president has nurtured today? Or is this simply a struggling, scrambling sales-marketing team not reaching projected sales? What are your thoughts, opinions, and theories? Share them.

“Football-Soccer: The language the world speaks fluently.”

The Professor’s Convatorium © 2023 by Professor Taboo is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0