Gold Coast ’falls in love’ with Games

THE vast majority of the more than one million tickets sold for next year’s Commonwealth Games were bought by Gold Coast residents.

GOLDOC is yet to crunch the final figures but event managers know the largest fan base for the event will be from the host city.

GOLDOC chairman Peter Beattie told the Bulletin: “The truth is the Gold Coast has fallen in love with the Games. Then it is Brisbane, the Sunshine Coast and Sydney.”

The other strong presence in the stands will be from overseas nations with ticket sales from England promising a great rivalry with the Australians in April.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk, on a visit to the Coast yesterday where she met with Mr Beattie, urged the public to be quick to obtain seats for Queensland’s biggest sporting event.

Ms Palaszczuk is predicting the Games will be a sellout with the final 250,000 tickets likely to be snapped up in the next few months.

A two-day pre-sale period for fans who missed out on tickets in last month’s ballot offer was staged on Monday and Tuesday and the tickets left available went on sale yesterday. More than 1.2 million ticket requests were received for the initial ballot which saw the opening ceremony, rugby sevens final and netball final sold out.