Johannesburg: More than 100,000 World Cup tickets have been sold in less than two days since cash sales began in South Africa, but the likely number of foreign fans has been halved, chief organiser Danny Jordaan said.
Over-the-counter sales of tickets in South Africa, which began on Thursday, ignited real World Cup fever here for the first time and there was chaos as thousands of fans rushed to buy, crashing the computer system.
MATCH, the travel agent arm of soccer's governing body Fifa, apologised for the problems, during which fans fought in queues after waiting for hours.
Violence
Police used pepper spray on brawling fans in Pretoria and a pensioner died of a heart attack in Cape Town.
Jordaan, boss of the local organising committee, told media yesterday that 101,000 tickets had been sold in the final phase before the World Cup kicks off on June 11. Some 12,000 were international sales and the rest in South Africa.
He said only seven of the 64 matches still had tickets available in the special $20 (Dh73,44) category available only to South Africans.
All matches of the national team Bafana Bafana and most games with the other five African squads were sold out.
But Jordaan said estimates for the number of foreign fans coming for the World Cup, hit by the global economic slump, high air fares and accommodation costs, had been revised to around 200,000, compared to the original forecast of 450,000.
Jordaan appealed to South Africans last week to snap up the remaining 500,000 tickets from a total of 2.7 million, after seats were returned from overseas and corporate customers.
