Zürich, 23 May 2002 - The ticketing operations for the 2002 FIFA World Cup Korea/Japan™ are on track despite the fact that certain delays have been experienced regarding the delivery of the tickets to the fans in the two host countries and elsewhere in the world, the FIFA Sub-Committee for Ticketing matters learned at its meeting today in Seoul.

Meeting under the chairmanship of David Will (Scotland), the sub-committee dealt with a series of issues regarding the final sales phase. It noted that for Korea, some 104,000 tickets were yet to be delivered, while for Japan some 188,000 tickets had not yet been received. In both cases, printing of the tickets has been finished and the tickets are en route to Asia to arrive in time for delivery to the customers in their respective countries. Likewise, tickets sold to the international public have been produced and dispatched by courier service to the purchasers.

While matches in Japan are practically sold out, there still are tickets available for certain matches to be played in Korea. A comprehensive and sophisticated structure consisting of Venue Ticket Processing Centres (VTPC) has been set up in the cities where FIFA World Cup™ games will take place to cater for ticket distribution throughout the period of the FIFA World Cup™. The VTPCs will also be the location where fans, who purchased ticket series for a specific team, can later on obtain tickets for second round matches onward, if applicable, by using the newly created “E-Ticket” smart card.

For ticket purchases, FIFA advises fans to visit the official ticketing website at www.fifatickets.com. Tickets purchased on the website must be paid by credit card and the credit card will be used to serve as smart card to collect the tickets in any one of the VTPCs.

Black market activity has so far been on a very low level thanks to the innovative approach taken by FIFA and the World Cup Ticketing Bureau and the stringent security measures accompanying the sale, which is scrupulously implemented by all parties.

Chairman David Will said: ”Despite having experienced certain problems, all ticketing operations are on track and I am confident that thanks to the excellent cooperation of the Local Organising Committees in Korea (KOWOC) and Japan (JAWOC) the system will work well throughout the event.”

For the 64 matches of the 2002 FIFA World Cup™, some 3 million tickets (minus 200,000 tickets for FIFA officials, the FIFA delegation, media and observers) were put on sale, with half of them being offered to the to the domestic general public in Korea and Japan and the other half going on sale internationally.

Enquiries to be addressed to:
FIFA Media Office
Tel: +41-1/254 9800
Fax: +41-1/384 9696

FIFA Communications Division
Zürich, 23 May 2002