Euro 2008 organisers promise easier, cheaper ticketing

BERNE, Switzerland, Feb 26 (Reuters) Tickets for next year's European soccer championships are set to go on sale this week, with organisers promising cheaper prices and a simpler ordering system than last year's World Cup finals.

Organised on a lottery basis, the sale begins on Thursday via the tournament website (www.euro2008.com) and runs until the end of March.

''We will be giving out full details on the cost of tickets on Thursday, but on average they will be cheaper than the tickets for the last World Cup,'' Euro 2008 CEO Martin Kallen told Reuters.

Tickets for the World Cup finals ranged from 35 euros for the lowest category seats at group stage matches up to 600 euros for top category seats at the final.

Fans can apply for up to four tickets per match.

The March sales are expected to account for nearly 35 percent of the tournament's tickets.

Teams involved in the individual matches will each receive 20 percent of the tickets after December's draw for distributing to their supporters. The remaining 25 percent are set aside for sponsors, participating teams, UEFA and the media.

Since only co-hosts Switzerland and Austria have so far qualified for the tournament, fans buying tickets in March will not generally be able to choose which teams they get to watch.

The system ensures that many fans could end up with tickets for matches they are not interested in but Kallen denied that the blind sale would greatly benefit the black market.

''I'm not sure it would help in that regard to have the ticket sales happening after the draw, because ticket touts could then focus their efforts on the high-interest matches,'' Kallen said.

''With this system they also don't know what matches they will get, so it makes their risks higher.'' Euro 2008 gets underway in the Swiss city of Basel on Jun. 7 and finishes with the final in Vienna on Jun. 29.

Geneva, Zurich and Berne are the other Swiss cities staging matches, with Salzburg, Innsbruck and Klagenfurt making up the other Austrian venues.

REUTERS PM ND0910