The organiser of Wellington Phoenix’s preseason clash with Central Coast Mariners has defended ticket prices being charged for entry.
The two clubs are set to lock horns in a preseason friendly at Trafalgar Park, Nelson, on Saturday.
Ticket prices mean the match will be more expensive than any other Phoenix home game in the A-League season proper.
The most expensive ticket type will set fans back $45, while the cheapest kind is a child ticket at $15.
The $45 ticket is $14 pricier than the most expensive variety of Phoenix home tickets for the upcoming season.
But the pricing outlay has been defended by the event’s organiser Aldo Miccio in New Zealand publication Stuff.co.nz.
POPULAR ARTICLES
Talking Points: Melbourne City 4 Western Sydney Wanderers 1 – New signings star
Talking Points: Blacktown City 0 Sydney FC 3 – Bobo is the real deal
John van’t Schip: “We didn’t see that on the internet!”
Tony Popovic laments loose defending in Wanderers’ FFA Cup exit
“It’s just purely to try to cover as much of the costs as possible,” Miccio told Stuff.
“You imagine if you’ve got 23 players flying out from Sydney and you have to accommodate and feed them.
“Plus there are 44 players flying out from Wellington because we offered to take their reserve team as we thought it’d be great for Tasman United to play them in the curtain raiser.”
“To fund the Mariners to come to come out from Sydney, they would probably have to triple the tickets because they wouldn’t get the people along to see the match in Wellington.”
Miccio added the stadium was not hosting the event for money, rather, to secure A-League matches in future.
“We’re not doing this for profit, we’re doing this is to try get A-League games here in the future, which the Phoenix would run.
“If they can see there’s a reasonable crowd here then we would like to think they would consider alternating between us and Christchurch so every second year we can get a regular season A-League game.”
Stuff estimates approximately 5,000 tickets need to be sold for Trafalgar Events to break even on the game.
What are your thoughts? Let us know by dropping a comment below via our Facebook comment box. Make sure you follow us on Twitter @Outside90 and like us on Facebook.
