Fan uproar over ‘elitist’ prices for GAA tickets
Supporters attending tomorrow’s All-Ireland hurling semi-final between Cork and Kilkenny face paying out €45 for a seated ticket or €30 to stand on the terraces. However, family area tickets are just €5 for children.
The GAA has stressed that various cheaper ticket options are available for groups and those who purchase tickets through clubs.
Earlier this year, a number of players voiced concerns over ticket prices, including Waterford’s John Mullane.
Another Waterford resident hurling supporter Philip Hearne contacted the Irish Examiner to express his dissatisfaction with the pricing structure, which he said was turning Gaelic games into an “elitist” sport.
Citing the Facebook campaign Give Us Back Our Games: Petition for the GAA to lower its ticket prices, Mr Hearne said: “The prices for the upcoming hurling and football semi-finals are an absolute joke.
“I would like to know how any of the 400,000 people who have recently lost their jobs will be able to afford to attend any of these games, when you factor the extra costs of travelling to Dublin to support your county. It is a scandalous situation.”
The GAA has said it has frozen its ticket prices in light of the impact of the recession on the economy and on people’s livelihoods.
But there has been growing criticism of the association’sunwillingness to go a step further and lower ticket prices.
Mr Hearne said: “The GAA is supposed to be a people’s organisation. It was never supposed to be elitist, but with the direction in which the current administration is taking the GAA, it will not be long before it will be indistinguishable from its rugby and soccer counterparts.
“The common man is being priced off the terraces; he can no longer partake in the great spectacle that is our national games because the GAA insists squeezing every penny from its loyal spectators.”
Full-price GAA ticket prices bear comparison with match-day tickets for English Premier League Games.
For example, a ticket for a Category A match between Liverpool and Manchester United at Anfield will cost Stg£45 (€54), while a Category B game costs Stg£41 (€49.20) and a Category C game costs Stg£39 (€46.80).
General match-day tickets at Wigan Athletic cost just Stg£30 (€36) for matches against clubs like Chelsea.
A spokesman for the GAA said yesterday that the association was not complacent about the ticketing issue and prices would be reviewed at the end of the Championship.
Alan Milton said: “We have not had a ticket price increase for five years, and 82% of revenue generated through ticket sales is re-invested back into clubs and the infrastructure.”
He stressed that cut-price tickets were available to club members, families and group bookings, as well as through match combination packages, and that the €45 figure wasbeing taken “in total isolation”.
Attendances have dropped by just 2% this year and he claimed people would vote with their feet if they believed ticket prices were too high, while the GAA offered “fantastic value for money” compared to other sports.
* http://www.facebook.com/pages/Give-Us-Back-Our-Games-Petition-for-the-GAA-to-lower-its-ticket-prices146811772011609?v=info&ref=mf
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