SPORTING EVENTS DRAW HUGE CROWDS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18785, 14 June 1929, Page 2

SPORTING EVENTS DRAW HUGE CROWDS.

ACCOMMODATION OFTEN BRINGS FANCY PRICES.

The lawn tennis championships are played in June each year. So keen is the desire for tickets that the authorities this year stated that all applications must be in by Friday, February 1.

There are 14,000 seats available, and by the stipulated date over 90,000 applications had been received. All this is four months before the actual event, remember (says an English writer). The seats will be balloted for, and something like £50,000 will be returned to the unlucky applicants. Very much the same position exists in connection with the Cup Final match. All the seats were “ booked up ” some months ago, and it is fairly safe to assume that not one in ten of the people whp want to see the match will have a chance of doing so. It is the same when a big fight is staged, or before an important Rugger match. This sort of thing leads to touting, and the selling of tickets at fancy prices. We may say what we like about touting being illegal—that no one is allowed to “ profiteer ” in tickets. Whatever we say means but little, for who is to stop the practice?

What is the remedy? Some people have already advocated the building of much bigger stadiums, but this would be only like putting a metal cap on a

volcano. Look what it would mean at Wimbledon, for instance. To hold the crowds who want to get in this year it would be necessary to make the centre court at least seven times as large as it is now. The remedy is not in larger stadiums, because no matter how colossal you make them this year, they will be too small next. Nor does it lie in the broadcasting of a descriptive commentary. This merely has the effect oi whetting the appetites of people who would otherwise never have wished to see a football match or a big fight, but who long to go after they have listened When will it all stop? There is but one answer, and that is—when a really practical system of television shall have been perfected. When it is possible to touch a switch, and not only hear the roar of the cheers, but see the actual match as well, then things will begin to find their proper level. Those who still want to be on the spot will apply for their tickets, but if they fail they will not be so disappointed that they will want to pay two or three pounds for a five shilling seat. And so the tout will die £l natural death.