UAE: First batch of India-Pakistan cricket match tickets sold out

It was an hours-long and agonising wait for cricket fans in the UAE to get tickets to Asia Cup matches. Many residents were left disappointed as the first batch of tickets for the highly-anticipated India-Pakistan game on August 28 in Dubai was sold out in under two-and-a-half hours after they went on sale.

Organisers will release the next batch of tickets soon, Platinum List said.

"(Tickets for) all other matches remain on sale," the ticketing platform said. "Very few" tickets with rates starting from Dh2,500 were available at the time of filing this report.

Some residents had queued up from as early as 4.30am on Monday, only to be told in the afternoon that ticket sales would begin at 6pm.

Due to an “extremely high demand”, Platinum List set up a first come, first served purchase policy and created separate links for matches in Dubai and Sharjah. This meant fans had to get in an online queue, depending on when they logged in.

A resident, Zafar Mahmoud, said he remained in queue for nearly three hours, only to find out that the first batch of tickets to the India-Pakistan match was sold out.

After queuing up on the website at 6pm, he saw over 7,500 people ahead of him, with an estimated waiting period of over an hour.

"The one-hour waiting period remained the same for the next three hours," he said.

Fans were told to keep the page open as they waited for their turn.

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The Asian Cricket Council (ACC) had announced that the tickets would go on sale on Monday. The council did not specify a time, resulting in scores of residents queuing up on the website from early morning.