Danny Jordaan: Not a Happy World Cup Organizing Committee Member

Being the host of the World Cup comes with certain expectations. Aside from the obvious hopes of providing a clean, secure, family-friendly (or corporate sponsor-friendly) tournament, there are historical precedents to live up to, like the fact that no home nation has failed to qualify for the knockout round. There’s also the issue of ticket sales; who wouldn’t expect to see a packed house when the hosts are playing?

Well, South Africa are lagging on both counts; a tough Group A including France and Uruguay, but more worryingly, the locals are scooping up more tickets for England games than for those involving the Bafana Bafana. In some ways, it makes sense — the South Africans see their team play (and underwhelm) all the time, like the Confederations Cup for example. If they have precious little money to spend, why squander it on watching Steven Pienaar and the boys when you’ve got Brazil, Germany, Italy, England and Argentina showing up in your back yard?

Still, it has some suits concerned, like Danny Jordaan, chief executive of the local World Cup organizing committee. “We want this World Cup to be an African World Cup and yet so far none of the African teams involved are coming to the party… This will be the first time in World Cup history that the host nations are not topping the ticket sales list. Bafana are not even in the top 10. South Africa has more supporters of England than Bafana – the sales for England matches here are higher. It will be tragic if this trend continues and I appeal to local fans to come out and support their country.”

According to the latest figures, less than 100,000 tickets have been sold to fans of the six African countries competing at the World Cup, compared to 1m sold or requested worldwide. South Africa are way off the pace for previous host nations, but when you figure that they’re by far the worst team on paper at the tournament (that oh-so-accurate FIFA ranking pegs them at 85), it’s not entirely surprising. Plus, you factor in the poverty and the fact that it’s only January and I’m sure they’ll see the sales they’re hoping for in due course.

Until then, Jordaan will be canvassing the other African nations who qualified for the World Cup to figure out why more people aren’t buying tickets on their continent. Will he really like the reasons he uncovers along the way?