Skripal effect blamed for poor England ticket sales

By Robert Mendick in St Petersburg

and Alec Luhn in Volgograd

JUST 2,000 England football fans will attend the nation’s opening World Cup game, in fear of both Vladimir Putin’s regime – and possibly the prospect of another dismal tournament showing.

The number of supporters in Russia is far lower than previously thought. The Daily Telegraph can disclose that only 2,000 tickets were sold to England fans for the match against Tunisia in Volgograd on Monday evening. It is unlikely that the total number of fans who have travelled to Russia for group matches will exceed 3,000.

According to the Football Supporters’ Federation, which coordinates overseas fans’ travel with the Foreign Office and the Football Association, 2,100 tickets were sold to England fans for the opening game, below its allocation. Kevin Miles, the chief executive, said 2,000 tickets had been sold for each of the other two games.

England are understood to have failed to sell their allocation for both the Tunisia match and the team’s sec- ond game against Panama.

The poor sales are being blamed on plummeting relations with Russia, trig- gered by the Kremlin plot to assassinate Sergei Skripal, the former spy, and his daughter in a nerve agent attack in Salisbury in March, and the simple reality that watching England in their previous two tournaments has been a miserable experience.

In contrast to Russia, it is estimated that about 10,000 fans travelled to Brazil for the 2014 World Cup. Reports suggested as many as 200,000 fans, that included English, Welsh and Northern Irish supporters, travelled to France for Euro 2016 although many did not possess tickets.

Fifa said that it had sold 32,400 tickets to fans living in England. It is understood that includes 5,000 allocated to the final which are given back assuming England do not make it that far.

Many other tickets, according to Mr Miles, may have gone to foreign fans who live in England. Currently England ranks 10th on the list of ticket sales. In total, some 2.4 million tickets have been sold globally, with more than a third bought in Russia. The US, which did not even qualify, has bought 89,000 tickets.

Sir Andrew Wood, the former British ambassador to Russia, said the turnout was as much to do with disappointments at previous tournaments. “There must be some sort of Skripal effect and warnings that phones will be hacked,” he said. “The other problem is expectation is pretty low.”

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