22,000 ICC World Twenty20 tickets sold on day one

An amazing 22 200 tickets had been sold by 17h00, on the first day of ticket sales, for the inaugural ICC World Twenty20 South Africa 2007(T20). At lunch time (12h00), nine thousand tickets had already been grabbed.

This brings the total number of tickets sold to date, including preferential bookings, to 45 000.

Tickets went on sale to the public today (Thursday) on the internet, at all Computicket outlets nationwide and at all three of the host venues.

Johannesburg recorded the highest number of sales today, with 15 000 tickets sold, followed by Cape Town at 4 800 and Durban at 2 400 tickets.

In keeping with the vision of Cricket South Africa of making the game accessible to all, ticket prices for the tournament range between R20 - R160.

The most popular tickets, according to Computicket, are for the Protea games, the two semi-finals at Newlands, Cape Town and Kingsmead, Durban respectively and also for the final.

The final will be played at the Wanderers Stadium, Johannesburg, on Monday, 24 September - Heritage Day in South Africa.

Computicket, who have 600 nationwide outlets, have also reported high volumes of traffic on the internet.

Operations Manager at Computicket, Adrian Roodt, said: "We experienced up to a maximum of 20 000 people at any given point in time, who were either purchasing tickets or looking for information and that caused a slight delay in the flow of traffic on the internet.

"For this reason, many people experienced and, may still experience, a slower response rate and we urge them to please be patient."

Speaking on the encouraging ticket sales, Tournament Director, Steve Elworthy, said: "We are pleased to see that so many people have bought their tickets early and we certainly hope that sales increase for this inaugural event."

South Africa and the West Indies will open the tournament when they clash in the opening match at the Wanderers Stadium on Tuesday, 11 September 2007.