If it is up to national coach Louis van Gaal, more Dutch people will come to Qatar, but that wish does not seem realistic. For the time being, no ticket can be obtained through the official roads, and the costs of the journey are high.
“It would be very nice if the country would get behind us,” said Van Gaal. “Now we were again overwhelmed in the stands by those Americans. I only saw a few tufts of Dutch people.”
He had seen that right. The Netherlands is in Doha with a historic small Orange Legion. Due to the discussions about human rights and the high prices of accommodations, tickets and alcohol, many supporters decided against the trip. During the group matches there were three thousand people, on Saturday there were about a thousand left, according to the KNVB. About a thousand tickets have also been sold for the duel with the Argentines, says a spokesman for the football association.
Anyone who responds to the call of the national coach and wants to go to Qatar on spec, can no longer turn to the KNVB. ,,In April and May, everyone had the opportunity to request tickets through us up to and including the final. If there are still tickets on sale, it will be through FIFA.”
However, FIFA’s ticket portal offers no options today. First, interested parties ended up in a queue of at least 45 minutes, only to find out that there are no tickets available for any match, not even for the Orange. It does state how expensive the tickets are: 75 to 400 euros.
Bewildered
The same prices are listed at the official FIFA ticket office in the center of Doha. But here, too, tickets are no longer available, for any match. Hassan, a Palestinian in an Argentina shirt, looks a bit bewildered. ,,It promises to be a great game, but for now I don’t have a ticket. Maybe something will become available later, I sincerely hope so.”
Hassan also wants to try it on the official FIFA resale platform. There are also no tickets available today. There were some options on Viagogo, another official resale channel, but prices only start at 700 euros per ticket.
It promises to be a great game, but for now I don’t have a ticket
In short: it is not easy to get a seat in the stadium. Prior to the World Cup, there was a fear that the matches would be played in front of half-empty stadiums, but that is not the case. Fans from the Arab region and Asian migrants living in Qatar know their way to the stadium very well. It seems that also for the knockout matches most cards already have an owner.
Incidentally, residents of Qatar paid significantly less for tickets in advance than people from abroad, various migrants told this site. Many Arab and Asian football viewers are fans of Argentina. Many fans have also come to Qatar from Argentina.
So only one conclusion seems possible: the Dutch national team will play against Lionel Messi and co on Friday in a blue and white colored Lusail Iconic Stadium, despite Van Gaal’s cry of heart. “We have now played four games and our fans have always been outnumbered.”
It is not known whether additional tickets will become available for the match in the 80,000-seat Lusail Iconic Stadium in the coming days. Possibly FIFA can still sell tickets that come back.
The trip: what do you need to arrange?
Fans who still manage to get a ticket for the match against Argentina must in any case take into account high costs. Anyone who wanted to book a return flight to the capital Doha for the coming weekend has lost about 900 euros today via Turkish Airlines. Pegasus Airlines has comparable prices and also tickets that are several hundred euros cheaper. For that you will be on the road for more than thirty hours on the outward journey.
Accommodation must then be arranged: the World Cup organization forces visitors to book a place to stay before departure. Those who want to spend the night in a hotel in or around the capital Doha will have to pay around 350 euros per night for a double room. It can also be more expensive, of course. In the Saint Regis, where the Dutch national team also spends the night, a suite is available for 2700 euros per night.
Cheaper options are the FIFA fan villages, where there are plenty of rooms available due to the elimination of many participating countries. The cheapest option there is a double room from 84 euros. Then you are well outside the city, in a complex with homes intended for migrant workers. There are also some more expensive, slightly more luxurious places, closer to the city.
Anyone who has a match ticket, a flight and a place to sleep still has one more hurdle to overcome: the Hayya card, a temporary visa to enter Qatar. According to the site of the Qatari government, it can take up to five days for an application to be approved, which is close to Friday’s game. However, the KNVB states that a Hayya is now ‘quickly done’.
Watch all our videos about the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar here:
Join the conversation.
You can respond at the bottom of this article. Only respectful comments with a full name will be posted. We do that because we want a conversation with people who stand by what they say, and therefore put their name to it. Those who still need to enter their name can do so by clicking ‘Login’ at the top right of our site.
Free unlimited access to Showbytes? Which can!
Log in or create an account and don’t miss a thing of the stars.
#Netherlands #plays #game #Argentina #tickets #sold