In the "No More Miamis" thread, Northside suggested an idea where fans could buy tickets to all of the home World Cup Qualifiers at once, similar to a season ticket package. Would other people be interested in this idea? If there is sufficient interest, I'd be willing to run this up the flagpole at the USSF and see if anyone salutes. I know the idea of buying tickets to games scattered around the country is a bit strange, but it may be the thing for the growing number of fans who do plan to attend a large number of home matches. If the current CONCACAF plan goes through, the USA would have 10 home World Cup Qualifiers. Perhaps we can break them up into first round (2), semifinal (3) and finals (5) ticket packages. Let me know what everyone thinks. If someone could post this to NAS with replies going to soccer@sachinshah.net, I'd appreciate it. Sachin
Hell yes I'd be interested. It would also mean that if I couldn't go to a game I could either scalp my ticket to a US fan or leave a seat empty in lieu of having an opposition supporter in it.
With the way the airline industry works and with everyone coming from all over the country, I think this would be implausible. Perhaps, a hotel package would be more feasible.
I like that idea, don't let the Enemy get any seats in the stadium. On a side note, anyone know how the Lawsuit agsinst the USSF ended up from the game at RFK during the last round of qualfying? If I remember correctly, the Honduran community was trying to sue the USSF because they claimed that they were denied access to good seats.
Not a bad idea, but it might help to put together smaller, regional packages. I live in DC, so for me personally, games at RFK, Giants Stadium and Foxboro are easy enough to get to. Maybe a Midwest package of Columbus, KC, Chicago would work. And West Coast with the new training center whose name escapes me, Portland, Seattle. I think it would be a hard sell to get folks to fly cross country, but 3 game packages in a sort of local area might work. Of course, it all depends on the site announcements. Thanks.
I live in NJ so for me your idea would work greately. I am driving distance from both Boston and DC. Now if they could include hotel as well imagine everyone at the hotel talking soccer, and a USA supporter would be awsome.
it may also be a great idea to establish what soccervacations.com does without the profit that they make.... i did it for the miami game for 5 people, there's no reason we can't coordinated airfare, hotel and tickets through this board...using paypal or something.... no offense to soccervacations, but one could normally book the trip for 1/2 the cost.... if we put our heads together, i'm sure someone out there has a connection for hotel, airfare and us tix..... stinky
It's easy to do it for a few people coming from one area, but for a scattered fanbase like ours, it's extremely difficult. The only way to do something like this is to run it as a business. Perhaps someone works for a travel agency? Sachin
I think a "flex-plan" idea similar to what most MLS teams do with their season tickets would work out the best. Each package would include a number of vouchers that can be used in any number at any game. Different packages could include different numbers of vouchers, or broken-up over different rounds. The overall flexibility of these plans would be attractive to our scattered fan-base. To help local hosts with planning, season-ticket holders could have a deadline of 2 weeks before the game in which to redeem their vouchers for actual tickets. Once the number of reserved tickets is known, things like group hotel packages and such should be a extremely easy to setup. For any season-ticket package to work, however, the Fed is going to have to be more proactive about where and when it plans on holding qualifiers, as travel and work scedules can change rapidly. In an ideal world, the Fed would release a complete list of planned stadia, and some kind of statement saying that all matches would be held on weekends, or something to that effect. In short: I'd buy one.
OK.. I've given this idea a fair amount of thought, and here are some roadblocks I see in front of us. Any suggestions for overcoming them would be appreciated: 1. US Soccer does not always handle the ticketing. For matches held in MLS stadia, the local team handles the ticketing, while matches not held in MLS stadia, are handled directly by US Soccer. Not sure what to do about this. 2. Some, but not all, matches are MLS doubleheaders, which are more expensive. So there's some variability in ticket pricing, which has to be accounted for. 3. There's a wide variety of preferred seating options. Not everyone wants to be behind the goal. I'm not sure it's feasible to offer more than one seating option at the moment. 4. Resale. There has to be some mechanism for the controlled resale of tickets. Putting them up on EBay cannot be allowed. 5. Flex plans. I'm not sure that we can offer anything other than buy them all or buy them one at a time options. I'll have to work with US Soccer to see if they are willing to do something like this. Remember this, US Soccer really has no incentive to work with a small group of fans. We need to build our supporters sections into the high hundreds of people (500+) before it really becomes worth it to US Soccer to offer such packages. Any ideas on getting past these hurdles? Sachin
Definitely with you on this one. Given what people were paying for tickets for the Honduras game, the scalpers/"brokers" would be all over the qualifiers.
Re: 1, 2 and 3, once the sites are announced, hopefully far in advance, would it be possible to work directly with MLS on packages for the MLS stadia? Personally, I think if folks are willing to pony up way in advance for their tickets, doubleheaders should be a freebie. Re: 4, the only thing you can do is abuse the people rooting for the opponent in a section obviously filled with US fans. Of course, since every qualifier I have been to other than Columbus has turned into general admission seating, those fans will probably just go sit with their compadres. Thanks.
Sort of cross posted from the USA Supporters mailing list: It may not be what you're looking for, but maybe a Yahoo Group list / ticket board could be set up. People could post they have a ticket available, and people could contact them off list. I suggest a separate list so ticket requests don't get lost in the shuffle (had to make an edit there) of another list/board.
Sachin - I think that the DC United fiascos may have soured the USSF on having the MLS teams handle ticketing. By fiasco, I mean the pro-Honduras crowd at RFK (helped by DCUs really stupid, group only purchase plan) and the discrimination claims.