Chaos ensued on Monday when tickets for this weekend’s Nedbank Cup final between Orlando Pirates and Kaizer Chiefs at Moses Mabhida Stadium in Durban went on sale.
Immediately after tickets went on sale, the Open Tickets platform crashed due to the “unprecedented” volumes of people, leading to hundreds of fans queuing outside Shoprite and Checkers outlets to purchase their tickets.
On Wednesday, at a press briefing in Durban, there was finally some clarity about what happened, and how many tickets were sold.
According to Bertie Grobbelaar from Stadium Management SA, over 50,000 tickets were sold for this weekend’s clash, which was more tickets than the stadium can allow.
During the briefing, it was revealed that Moses Mabhida’s capacity for the Nedbank Cup final will be 49,000. However, after hospitality and complimentary tickets were given out to the clubs and other stakeholders, 41,000 were available for general sale to the public.
Stadium Management SA’s Grobbelaar said Shoprite and Checkers retail outlets sold 4,956 tickets, Open Tickets sold 2,435, while 44,121 tickets were sold by Computicket, bringing the number of tickets sold to 51,512.
As a result of tickets being oversold, all platforms ceased sales, and according to Grobbelaar, they then had to issue refunds.
“10,510 tickets were paid for, but were over capacity, and those people had to be refunded.” He went on to add: “There were no tickets issued than the capacity allows for.”
PSL acting CEO Mato Madlala said they were immediately aware when the Open Tickets platform crashed, and immediately started looking for solutions.
“We then spoke to Computicket, and asked them to use their server so that people can purchase tickets,” said Madlala. However, due to Computicket and Open Tickets not communicating, they could not update the number of tickets sold, which led to more tickets than seats available being sold.
Madlala concluded by saying she was happy that the ticketing issues had since been brought under control.
IOL Sport
