Ticket sales for the highly anticipated Bangladesh-Singapore clash in the Asian Cup Qualifiers have been officially closed, with no clear information on how many tickets remain unsold.
Tickify, the online ticketing platform appointed to handle the sales, was operational briefly around noon on Tuesday. According to the site’s founder Iftikhar Ifty, the platform resumed selling tickets at 1:00pm and had already sold about 90 percent of its share by 1:45pm. By 3:00pm, when this report was being filed, the site displayed a message reading “ticket sales closed.”
Ifty declined to provide any figures on how many tickets had been sold, stating, “The official figures can only be shared by the BFF.”
Bangladesh Football Federation (BFF) competitions committee chairman Golam Gaus said he was unaware of the exact numbers. Speaking from a meeting on the ticketing issue, he promised to share more details later.
The statements came after days of chaotic experience for fans eager to secure tickets for the much-hyped June 10 fixture at the National Stadium in Dhaka.
The online sale was originally scheduled to begin at 12 noon on May 24 but was delayed by eight hours. When the site eventually went live, it remained accessible for only a few minutes before going offline, leaving fans frustrated. Authorities from both BFF and Tickify later attributed the disruption to a suspected cyber attack caused by massive demand. They issued apologies and promised smoother operations during the next ticketing window.
However, when the site reopened at 10:00pm on Monday night, many fans again found themselves stuck in virtual queues, with wait messages such as: “You are now in line. Thank you for your patience,” or “We are currently experiencing high levels of traffic.”
While some fans eventually managed to buy tickets, many others were left empty-handed and took to social media to express their disappointment.
The BFF is expected to release over 18,000 tickets for the galleries, along with several thousand more for hospitality and other boxes, all through the online ticketing system.