New Jersey Gives Away 770 World Cup Tickets, Undercutting NYC's 1,000-Seat $50 Lottery
Updated
Updated · Gothamist · Jun 10
New Jersey Gives Away 770 World Cup Tickets, Undercutting NYC's 1,000-Seat $50 Lottery
3 articles · Updated · Gothamist · Jun 10
Summary
New Jersey will distribute 770 free tickets for seven World Cup matches at MetLife Stadium, with recipients including underserved youth players, deployed service members' families, pediatric patients and first responders.
500 of the tickets are earmarked for targeted groups, while others will go to New Jersey communities, nurses and customers of small businesses in the Welcome World Rewards Program.
The giveaway lands as match tickets have climbed into the thousands of dollars, making it cheaper than New York City's separate lottery offering 1,000 tickets at $50 each; that program hit its 50,000-person daily cap on day one.
Even combined, the free and low-cost local-access programs account for less than 0.3% of seats at the 82,500-capacity stadium, where the first match is Brazil vs. Morocco on Saturday and round-trip NJ Transit service costs $98.
The move also follows friction with FIFA over host costs and ticket pricing, including Governor Mikie Sherrill's failed push for FIFA to cover transportation and a New York-New Jersey probe into ticket prices.