Ticket Sales for Women’s World Cup 2023: Australia Leads the Way, New Zealand Struggles

The international football confederation, Fifa, describes advance sales for the upcoming women’s World Cup as a success. In total, over 930,000 tickets have already been sold – which is significantly more than what was sold for the World Cup in France 2019.

But it is Australia, the one host country, which is the big locomotive in ticket sales. Only 220,000 out of a total of 930,000 of the tickets sold so far are for matches in New Zealand.

Sweden plays theirs group stage matches in Wellington (South Africa and Italy, July 23 and 29) and Hamilton (Argentina, August 2) in New Zealand’s North Island.

– An interesting thing about that culture in New Zealand is that New Zealanders often make plans very late and decide very late into a sporting event whether or not to go there. Which, of course, always makes you a little nervous as an organizer, says Sarai Bareman, who is the highest person responsible for women’s football at Fifa, to DN.

She herself grew up in New Zealand and has previously represented Samoa at national team level as a player.

Sarai Bareman emphasizes that overall sales are going very well. She lists a number of reasons why it has not taken off as much in New Zealand as in Australia:

Rugby is the big sport in New Zealand. In Australia, the women’s national team “The Matildas” are well known and the players, led by Chelsea’s top scorer Sam Kerr, are already big domestic stars.

In New Zealand, “The Football Ferns” – the ferns, as the national team is called – are not as well known.

– One of the more important things about this world championship, which I’m most looking forward to, is that the national team players will finally get the recognition they deserve in their home country, says Bareman.

The WC will be played on July 20 20th of August. The two host countries share equally in the group stage and play-offs up to and including the semi-finals. The final and the bronze medal match will be played in Australia.

The matches of the reigning world champion team USA have so far generated the greatest interest in New Zealand. The World Cup organizer expects between 20,000 and 30,000 American supporters to travel to New Zealand for the World Cup.

In Australia, interest in the home team’s matches in particular has been great. The World Cup opener between Australia and Ireland has had to be moved from a smaller arena in Sydney to the Olympic Stadium, which was only meant to be used for play-off matches, with a capacity of close to 90,000 people to cope with crowd pressure.

Jane Patterson who is head of the tournament in New Zealand admits there is some concern about ticket sales.

– What keeps me awake at night is being able to make sure that New Zealanders make sure to maximize this opportunity, she told local media according to the AFP news agency.

Next week, 250,000 new WC tickets will be released for sale. For the matches in New Zealand, the price will start at 20 New Zealand dollars (about 130 kroner) for adults and 10 dollars (about 65 kroner) for children.

– It’s cheaper than going to the cinema, says Jane Patterson to Radio New Zealand according to AFP.

Read more:

The minister: “Fifa should be less greedy”

Clear: The star misses the WC: “Tough decision”

Sees advantages in Sweden’s odd World Cup setup: “We have a good experience”