Ticket desperation at the World Cup's last-chance saloon

DOHA: The football junkies started arriving an hour before the World Cup ticket centre opened on Saturday (Dec 10) even though loud speaker announcements proclaimed there is nothing to sell.

"I have been coming here for a week," said Indian businessman Ishan Ushath.

"It is like the last-chance saloon but there is never anything."

The hunt for tickets for the first World Cup in an Arab nation has become ever more desperate with just six games remaining in the 64-match tournament.

FIFA staff and even police outside the centre explain to hundreds of people each day that there is nothing left for World Cup addicts.

Some days there have been hundreds waiting in line before the ticket centre opens.

Saturday's quarter-finals between Morocco and Portugal and England against France brought in a new influx.

"I come here a lot but in the whole World Cup I have only got places at two games," said Bangladeshi hotel worker Sandeep Mazumder. "There has been nothing for more than a week, now I will give up," he added.

A Qatari government official said 3.09 million tickets have been sold to 1.33 million people. The official said Qatar has sold more tickets than Russia did in 2018. FIFA did not comment on the figures.

Qatar had predicted more than one million people would enter during the World Cup and by Dec 7, there had been 765,859 visitors, the official said.

Qatar had orginally limited entry to people with a match ticket or fan pass and their guests.

But its decision to give free entry to residents of other Gulf countries has intensified the ticket hunt.

Organisers opened up some stadiums for less popular first-round games when Qatari residents said they had been able to walk in for free.

Blocks of empty seats were seen at several games which