Cricket Australia (CA) have seized close to 3000 tickets that were resold by unauthorised sellers for the upcoming third Ashes Test in Perth and will now put them back on sale on Monday through their official ticket agencies, the board announced on Wednesday (August 23).
CA revealed that 2890 tickets for the Perth Test scheduled for December 14-18 were being resold by ‘Queen of Tickets’ on eBay.
“Our team is working extremely hard to identify and stop tickets being re-sold at an inflated value across our venues,” Anthony Everard – CA’s Executive General Manager, Events and Leagues told Cricket Australia’s official website.
“We know that tickets are in high demand for this series and this is a very clear message to those who try to take advantage of the system and scalp tickets at inflated prices, that we will identify and cancel tickets, in accordance with our terms and conditions.”
There is a huge demand for the tickets owing to this, in all likelihood, being the last time an Ashes Test will be played at the traditional WACA venue with the authorities having decided to shift base to a higher capacity 60,000-seat stadium at Burswood.
The board’s seizure of the scalped tickets means that fans will now be able to purchase tickets for the first three days which were sold out previously.
The recovered tickets will now be available for sale at the original price for members of the Australian Cricket Family from 10 AM WST on August 28, while bookings will open for the general public from 1:00 PM WST.
“Our message to all fans is to not support this practice. Whilst we understand this leads to disappointment with some days of our Tests sold out, you should only purchase from official ticket agencies to ensure you only pay the official prices, and not risk your ticket being cancelled at the gate.
“Fans who purchase tickets from unauthorised resellers (such as Viagogo, Ticketmaster Resale, Gumtree, eBay, etc) risk paying too much, receiving invalid tickets or no tickets at all. Unfortunately, we are unable to assist fans or verify any tickets purchased through resellers,” said Everard.
