Evening Telegraph (First Edition)
Lord Coe angry at Paris Olympics ticket prices
WORLD Athletics president Lord Seb Coe fears fans – and athletes – could be priced out of next summer’s Olympics in Paris.
Coe is concerned over sky-high costs, with tickets for an athletics session at the Stade de France as much as £850 on the official Paris 2024 website. The cheapest for an evening session is £170.
Athletics remains the numberone Olympic sport and, after sellout crowds at August’s World
Championships in Budapest, Coe is mindful of the costs.
“These are going to be the most expensive ticket prices witnessed at an Olympic Games,” he said. “We asked for a balance.
“The most important element is you want fans in the stadium, you want fans within affordable prices.
“I know the challenge on a budget – 25% of our budget in London was tickets.
“Our ticket strategy was built three years before the Games. We knew more about our fans at the end of that. We had some expensive tickets in there but we also had a lot at affordable prices.
“These are difficult balances for any organising committee, but if I am wearing my World Athletics hat, I don’t want fans costed out of the stadium and I certainly don’t want athletes and their families being costed out of the stadium.
“If you look over the course of an athlete’s career, there are very few able to sit down and say they got more in commercial sponsorship than what their families put in.
“Most at the end of a 15-year career say it was family that bore the brunt of what I did, in terms of funding, time, commitment and all the things.
“It is important that our stadiums are full of people that love our sport, not people that can afford to get to an Olympics.”