[Saba Sports News] Fans thought they had grown accustomed to the wildly inflated ticket prices throughout this World Cup, yet the pricing for the final has still exceeded their bottom-line expectations. Initially, FIFA released four tiers of official tickets. Category 1, the most expensive, cost $11,000 apiece; Category 2 tickets were priced at $5,500; Category 3 tickets stood at $3,600; and the cheapest Category 4 tickets went for $800 each. Nevertheless, these already steep prices have surged over the past few weeks. Gianni Infantino, FIFA President, defended the pricing policy, stating: “The United States entertainment market is among the most developed in the world.” Speaking at a global economic forum held in Los Angeles in early May, he added: “That is why we have to adopt market-based pricing.” FIFA also noted that one percent of all tickets have been sold at a price of just $60.
The editor believes that overall, price comparison platform SeatPick has analyzed its own dataset of World Cup final ticket prices and estimated that the cheapest available ticket for the final costs $5,091. Meanwhile, the most expensive ticket on the market is now priced at $215,896.