'Urge BCCI to Have More Transparency': Venkatesh Prasad Reacts to Shortage of World Cup 2023 Tickets

Former India pacer Venkatesh Prasad gave a piece of advice to BCCI after the recent fiasco over the tickets of the ICC ODI World Cup 2023. Recently, the first pre-sale tickets for the World Cup were made available on Bookmyshow exclusively to Mastercard holders but fans were asked to wait for as much as 11 hours and the app also crashed for many users.

Prasad took to social media and urged the BCCI to keep fans in mind and reserve the majority of the tickets for the supporters instead of giving them to corporates and members.

Cricketnext also reported that the tickets bought on the pre-sale were being resold online for as high as Rs 19,00,000 each for the India vs Pakistan game in Ahmedabad on October 14 and the tickets for India vs Australia game in Chennai were being sold at Rs 9,31,295.

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While saying that the BCCI should be more ‘transparent’ when it comes to the tickets.

“It’s never been very easy to get World Cup tickets. But this time has been harder than before. Could have been better planned and I feel for the fans who have had high hopes and struggled to get tickets. I sincerely hope one of the most important stakeholders, the Fans get their worth and I hope @BCCI makes it easier for the fans,” wrote Prasad on X (formerly Twitter.)

“I urge the @BCCI to have more transparency in the World Cup ticketing system and not take fans for granted. Definitely in a stadium like Ahmedabad, for an #IndvsPak clash more than the sold 8500 tickets need to be available when the capacity is 1 lakh plus,” read another post from the legendary India pacer.

He added, “Likewise for all other matches, a larger chunk needs to be for the fans. It will be more fulfilling if the diehard fan is kept happy and not deprived of this opportunity instead of reserving a large chunk for corporates and members.”

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With the ODI World Cup returning to India after nearly 12 years, no wonder the tickets for games featuring the Men in Blue are very much in demand, and thus, Venkatesh has come out to advocate the problems fans have been facing.

India will open their World Cup campaign against Australia on October 8, while the opening game of the tournament will be played at the Narendra Modi Stadium on October 5 featuring holders England and last edition’s runners up New Zealand.