It appears that the third International Champions Cup match at Michigan Stadium will not draw as well as the first two. Given an offer made by the University of Michigan, the institution that is hosting Saturday’s preseason friendly between Manchester United and Liverpool, ticket sales are not going near as well as they did for the first two matches in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
An e-mail obtained by The Sports Bank shows that the U of M is making a last minute ticket offer to current students.
As the screen-capped email above reads: “Michigan athletics is proud to host another exciting soccer match as Manchester United and Liverpool FC face at Michigan Stadium this Saturday, July 28th at 5 PM ET. As a currently enrolled student at the University of Michigan, we’d like to offer you a special ticket discount at $25!”
That’s pretty cheap! Especially when you consider the egregiously exorbitant prices for parking close to the venue. Most parking lots close to the stadium will charge 3-5 times as much as that.
The sum of $25 is also a lot cheaper than what scalpers are offering for this event. The cheapest tickets you’ll find on Seat Geek.com, before fees and other additional online costs is triple that.
According to Michigan students that we interviewed for this piece, the school did not make any last minute ticket offers comparable to the very low cost option available at the 11th hour here in 2018.
The 2014 match at the venue nicknamed The Big House (it’s the highest capacity sporting venue in the entire world outside of North Korea), between Real Madrid and United, was the highest attended soccer match in U.S. history.
The 2016 clash, between Madrid and Chelsea, provided the second highest attendance American history and also stands as the highest attended match in Chelsea history.
It seems apparent that Saturday’s clash won’t do near as well, and the Univ. of Michigan is doing everything they can to try and fill up the massive stadium that seats 107,000.
If 2018’s match ends up with a lower capacity than 2016, which saw a drop off from 2014, it may be indicative that perhaps the novelty of these preseason friendlies is starting to wear off; at least in Michigan.
It also doesn’t help that United manager Jose Mourinho keeps complaining about the state of his current team, with so many star players still on break after tours of duty in the World Cup.
Mourinho’s public despondency about the state of his side/how his preseason tour of the United States is going doesn’t help the cause of trying to sell tickets.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, is currently a regular contributor to SB Nation, WGN CLTV and Chicago Now.
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