Going to Qatar 2022: tickets, accommodations, etc. (non-politics)

No availability for the 3rd place game which is impossible so there is a good chance that the current state is not actual.

 

Availability will mean nothing unless you get into the portal quickly, especially for cat3 tkts and demand games

 

https://www.yasmarinacircuit.com/en/formula1
Vamos checo!

 

Question for the most experienced in WCs:
Can we say this is the big last opportunity to get tickets? I mean, I know that the next phase is "Last-Minute Sales" but it seems to me for that one the availability will be almost 0.
And ofc, we can still buy to the touts, but that's a different story

 

What gives you this impression? Ticket sales have been slow and they brag about an exaggerated inflated number of ballot applications as though they are all separate people.

The next FCFS, unless drastically different from any before it, should have quite a high number of tickets, as mentioned in the last hundred pages all the reasons why. But if for any reason any matches or categories are held back, they'll have to be sold later on.

But the Last Minute Sales phase having zero availability? It's impossible. Because the tickets will have to be sold once the tickets are put up for resale by people who can no longer attend. Tickets are returned by sponsors, federations, unsold hospitality. Tickets of higher categories are repackaged as cheaper categories to entice more buyers. They finalise areas of the stadium and sell restricted view tickets. Zero is impossible.

 

Anyone remember how many days before the last FCFS we were notified of the date?

 

It was pretty close to the sale, like 3-4 days before. But remember it was before the draw so they wanted quickly sell the tickets which could have been to less appealing matches.

 

2 days before actually

 

Would you happen to know when the "Last Minute Sales" phase was for the previous World Cups? Was it constantly open throughout the tournament? Something like, from 2 weeks before the first match until the final (a total of 6 weeks)? More? Less?

 

I did NOT know this! Thank you!
I decided to attend the World Cup to see my country (Canada) play a game. I thought to take a trip (southern India) and add a few days in Qatar at the end. I had bought my flights direct from Qatar Air, but this issue with quarantine was not evident to me. I will read about this and follow up. Better to be prepared that this might still be in effect than hope that it will be rescinded by November.

 

Two months before the first match.

Yes, constantly open throughout the tournament.

 

Approximately two months beforehand (mid April, to mid July for a June/July World Cup). Usually with one or two big announced sales where the portal would close and then reopen on a certain date/time, and then continuous daily "drops" of small amounts of tickets, which you had to be pretty much ready in the portal waiting to buy them, or using some sort of scanner or notification system to be aware of them.

 

Cairo is one of the main gateways to Qatar from Africa and the Americas. I am sure they will try hard to remove from the red list. But everyone must keep in mind that this year's organizers and sponsors are TERRIFIED of the media blow back should covid become a problem during this world cup. So I really do think they will keep precautions in place. If Egypt remains a hot spot, they WILL remain on the precautionary list and will get additional restrictions. The entire planet didn't just shoot itself in the foot by over-reacting to covid for nothing. Even if the utility of restrictions are dubious, large public entities are most interested in appearances and maintaining plausible deniability. If Qatar and FIFA just wipe out all precautions and covid erupts during the World Cup, it will be one gigantic publicity shit storm. Hope for the best but expect the worst.

 

Absolutely they will allow if via a formal request submission - how can they not? But two things: 1) your JohnSmith@gmail.com being changed to tickets2675@viagogo.com or JoseLuisHernandez@hotmail.com might raise some suspicion! 2) you won't be able to change name and country. So those wanting tickets legitimately to use for Hayya etc. aren't going to be happy with it.

Maybe if thousands request new emails, they might just open up that change email facility on their website exactly for the reason you state...

 

I have been to Oman and it is the nicest of Middle East countries in my opinion. Muscat is pleasant but renting an SUV and heading out across the country for a few days is a great trip. There are some great mountain and canyon roads that will take you through Oasis and small villages. I got so far off the beaten track that I found myself having rocks being thrown at me (not to harm but to encourage i move along) simply because the Bedouin-like women weren't happy that I was there with my SUV while they wanted to shepherd a flock of goats through that particular canyon bottleneck. Many other great stories too. Highly recommend Oman if you want to take a week's break from Qatar. It is the real Arabia, unlike Dubai.

 

Opaqueness is EXACTLY what they want at this time. They don't want to scare ticket sales away. But they DO want the ability to impose whatever precautions they feel are necessary to avoid a publicity shit storm in the event covid becomes an issue during this World Cup. Trust me, the organizers of this world cup want you to attend and have a good time, but they don't want to be blamed for anything covid that turns sour. They want plausible deniability and I'm afraid that imposing PCR tests etc. gives them just what they want. Everyone should read ALL of their T&Cs and policies for this World Cup. They have built in the right to take all sorts of precautions, including reducing the stadium crowd size. I only pray none of that will be necessary, but FIFA and their BIG corporate sponsors are very risk adverse when it comes to this f'in pandemic. Do you not realize that half of the Western world is still in a partial or substantial work from home mode? THAT is ridiculous but that is where we are STILL at.

 

I was in one of those oasis 2 weeks ago. Pict attached. Very beautiful

 

I think it is likely that Qatar wants keep a tight control on covid now (including restrictive entry) with the hope that covid will fall off a cliff domestically. THAT will give them the cover they need to freely open up travel during the World Cup. So although I believe they will be cautious, I also believe that precautions will be tighter NOW than come November. That means some restrictions will be dropped unless infection numbers dictate otherwise.

 

They are not sabotaging it, they're trying to mitigate risk. If you think Qatar is just going to completely open up 5 months in advance of the World Cup and let the chips fall where they may (which could include a serious spike in Doha), I'm sorry but that is just not how governments and corporate sponsors think. If they drop restrictions, it will be done much closer to the tournament... and if at that time certain countries are spiking again, those restrictions will not be dropped. Again, we just saw much of the world enforce crazy restrictions and lock downs for TWO YEARS, and yet you think they are going to just through all that caution away because of a soccer tournament? They are going to walk a very delicate line of encouraging attendance while reserving the right to mitigate or lessen the chance for a publicity nightmare.

 

Oh, this was very explanatory, thank you!
I see the demand for the "big matches" is too high. In the previous rounds, I created several accounts with some friends and we couldn't get any tickets, so I expect the same for the coming phases.
The only ticket I could get was applying blindly to random matches and fortunately, I got what I wanted (Yes, super lucky )

But I didn't think about all the sponsors, federations, people who cannot attend, etc. It seems It seems I need to improve my skills of web scrapping

 

I'm envious. If I could afford the time, I would append a visit to Oman to this World Cup.

 

if i attended 22:00 match and going to take the flight on 02:45 (few hours later) in Doha, this is pretty risky right? even if i could made the online check in. i am not sure how is the mid night transport out there

 

Well said. I think the availability will be good for the first few hours of this FCFS, and I think most matches will also be available in the Last Minute Sales because fans will be selling back some seats.

If one thinks demand is ultimately not very high for this WC, I would wait for the Last Minute. If you think otherwise, get what you can get next week.

The one thing that is throwing off our judgement is why there was such a low ticket volume sold in phase 2 random draw (only 400K)? I see many folks here complain that despite submitting dozens of applications, they didn't get what they wanted. My friends and I all submitted 1 application each and we got all but 1 match we wanted (and nearly 22 matches in all). So maybe it is time to ask whether FIFA did actually filter a lot of those "gamed" applications out? I'd like to hear from those who submitted dozens of application as to how successful they really were? As my single application hit all but 2 matches and 1 of those 2 were hit by my friend. I got popular matches like Mex vs Arg, Eng vs Wales, and most of the R16 an QFs I applied for. The only match I didn't hit was the Final and 1 R16... but that R16 was hit by my friend. At this time we have way more seats than we can use and will have to sell some.

 

Very risky, If you have to get back to your accommodations first, or if the match goes extra time, or if you're at one of the further away stadiums, probably impossible.

Please realize that transportation from stadiums after matches are going to be bottlenecks and may take an hour or more just to board a train, bus or taxi. Leaving the match early will mitigate that, if that is what you don't mind doing. Otherwise, choose a different departure.

 

It didn't stay constantly open , the way for them to stop the scanners running constantly was to close the portal every time they planned to do a major drop of tickets ..Then announce an opening time like an fcfs