On May 7, 2026 | Updated on May 7, 2026
Gianni Infantino, the president of the International Federation of Association Football (Fifa), tried to justify the exorbitant prices of tickets for the World Cup, which will start on June 11th.
With a little over a month to go before the start of the 2026 World Cup in North America, Fifa is facing numerous criticisms. From the high ticket prices, which can reach $11,000, to speculative resales and the high cost of accommodation and transportation (as the matches will be held in three different countries), fans have many reasons to criticize the increasingly commercialized nature of the sport.
Gianni the clown: “If someone buys a ticket for the final for 2 million dollars, I will personally bring them a hot dog and a Coca-Cola,” joked Gianni Infantino, before explaining the price surge by citing the need to consider the economic situation. According to him, they operate in a country where the entertainment market is the most developed, so they must apply market prices. He also mentioned that 25% of the tickets for the group stages will cost less than $300. However, this overlooks the high costs of accommodation and transportation, with the World Cup taking place in three different countries, requiring fans to travel to various stadiums, some of which are far apart.
Moreover, who can truly afford a ticket to the final for $11,000? In the United States, the average annual salary is $55,000, while that of a worker barely reaches $36,500 – equivalent to three tickets for the final. If the said worker wanted to buy one of the high-priced tickets from the Fifa official resale website, it would amount to fifty-four years of work.
More disconnected: Behind these soaring prices lies the issue of an increasingly disconnected football world. Over the editions, the World Cup has become a luxury product strictly reserved for the elite – far from the historical values of the sport and the lifestyle of the vast majority of fans, over a billion of whom were glued to their TV screens during the France-Argentina final in 2022.
At the same time, Fifa continues to rake in more money. In December, they announced allocating a total sum of $727 million to the 48 teams participating in the World Cup, a 50% increase from the previous edition in Qatar (which had fewer participating teams) – an unprecedented amount in the world of football.
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