Organisers of the 2019 Rugby World Cup in Japan are expecting to attract the largest number of foreign fans in the tournament’s history, with only six months before it kicks off.
International fans could hold more than 600,000 of the 1.8 million available tickets.
Ticket sales for the tournament are entering their final stages and international fans are set to make up around 33 per cent of total ticket sales.
The top three countries that have purchased the most tickets outside of Japan include England with 23.9 per cent of the foreign fan contingent, Australia with 15.6 per cent and Ireland with 7.9 per cent.
Japan Rugby 2019 organising committee chief executive Akira Shimazu said: “With less than six months to go before Asia’s first Rugby World Cup kicks off in Japan, it’s encouraging to see such an incredible response from international fans. While we expected to see large numbers coming from the traditional rugby nations, I am thrilled that both the USA and the Netherlands are in the top 10 countries of international ticket purchases.
“From the very beginning, we set out to make Rugby World Cup 2019 a truly ground-breaking tournament, so to have such strong interest from fans in rugby’s frontier markets like the USA and the Netherlands, as well as countries like Germany, Spain and Brazil is absolutely wonderful. Asian nations are also well represented with more than three per cent of international fans coming from countries neighbouring Japan.”
The next opportunity for fans to purchase tickets begins on May 18 with first-come, first served ticket sales resuming.
The official resale service is set to open on May 31 giving fans who can no longer attend matches a platform to sell tickets they no longer require at face value.
TheTicketingBusiness team hosts its inaugural Ticketing Business Asia meeting on 16-17 October 2019 in Hong Kong. Request an invite/more details here.
Image: manuel | MC
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