The French XV may have suffered since the start of the Six Nations Tournament, but its popularity continues unabated.
This Tuesday, 48 hours after the pitiful draw against Italy, the last places on sale for France-England, the closing match of the competition, Saturday March 16 at 9 p.m. in Lyon, were all gone in less than two hours .
The “Crunch” is the most anticipated match every year.
It is taking place for the first time at Groupama Stadium, the OL venue in Décines-Charpieu (Rhône), due to the unavailability of the Stade de France, under construction for the Olympics.
The Groupama Stadium has a little less than 60,000 seats, so around 20,000 fewer than the Stade de France.
Given the enthusiasm for Blues matches over the past three years, we suspected that there would not be places for everyone.
More than 240,000 requests, or 4 times the stadium capacity, were recorded for this match.
We first had to serve the French Rugby Federation, the partners, the tour operators who sell packages, or the English federation.
“We had 5,000 places via the federation, they have been reserved for six months,” explains Thierry Tonnelier, president of the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes league, which brings together amateur clubs in the region and acknowledges still receiving requests for hundreds of places.
There remained the general public.
180,000 people were still registered for alerts to receive places.
They waited a very long time to find out when the sale would take place.
A month before the event, more and more supporters were starting to worry, still not being able to organize themselves.
Why so much delay?
The Federation recognized that “setting up the ticket office takes more time”, particularly because it is the first time that the FFR has organized a match at Groupama Stadium.
The French XV certainly played there against Italy on October 6.
But it was for the World Cup, and the ticketing was then organized by World Rugby and France 2023.
A technical bug on February 19
The sale of tickets was finally to take place on February 19.
But a technical bug, according to our information, had to postpone the sale.
Since then, the FFR has refused to communicate any new marketing date, apparently so as not to create an influx on its site and create frustration among fans.
However, it will be very real for many of them.
“Never seen such a grotesque organization for such an event,” denounced, on X (ex-Twitter), one of the main groups of supporters of the Clermont club.
Registered fans were finally alerted by email Monday evening that this famous ticket sale opened at 10 a.m. this Tuesday.
Well, less than three weeks until the event.
Less than two hours later, all the places were gone.
Some tried to connect very early, and, after a long wait behind their screen, were able to access the seats.
Others, who arrived too late or did not receive an email, were not so lucky.