{"id":110299,"date":"2026-06-30T15:56:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-30T15:56:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/110299\/"},"modified":"2026-06-30T15:56:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-30T15:56:10","slug":"scoring-tickets-to-watch-cristiano-ronaldo-play-in-torontos-last-world-cup-game-could-break-the-bank-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/110299\/","title":{"rendered":"Scoring tickets to watch Cristiano Ronaldo play in Toronto’s last World Cup game could break the bank"},"content":{"rendered":"

Soccer superstar Cristiano Ronaldo will play in Toronto\u2019s final World Cup match on Thursday, but if you\u2019re looking to score tickets, soaring resale prices could get in the way.<\/p>\n

By Monday morning, tickets for the knockout match between Ronaldo’s Portuguese team and Croatia at Toronto Stadium were sold out on all official FIFA platforms.<\/p>\n

But tickets are in high demand and are going for thousands of dollars on resale sites.<\/p>\n

Portuguese fan Paulo Pereira bought his tickets for the match from FIFA in February. But he said he knows many other fans are now spending thousands of dollars to attend the match.<\/p>\n

\u201cI actually have a friend of mine today that paid almost $6,000 for two tickets,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd they weren’t guaranteed by FIFA. They’re on a secondary platform, so he’s sweating.\u201d<\/p>\n

High-profile events like the FIFA World Cup often see reseller platform failures, where thousands of tickets are cancelled or never delivered to buyers.<\/p>\n

On StubHub, the cheapest tickets available for the big match were just under $3,000 Monday morning. Most tickets were between $4,000 and $5,000 and some were listed at more than $8,000. Tickets on SeatGeek ranged from about $2,600 to over $11,000 later that day.<\/p>\n

Prices on both platforms had come down slightly by Tuesday morning but there was still nothing available for less than $2,000.<\/p>\n

In Ontario, it is illegal to resell tickets for concerts, cultural, and sporting events for more than their original cost. In early June, the province announced that maximum penalties for repeat offenders would increase from $10,000 to $25,000.<\/p>\n

StubHub Canada and SeatGeek Canada are both listed on the province\u2019s Consumer Beware List, which identifies businesses that don’t respond to consumer complaints or that have been charged for breaking the law. Both businesses have been ordered to comply with the province\u2019s resale laws.<\/p>\n

StubHub is also under investigation in British Columbia after a CBC News investigation revealed thousands of FIFA World Cup tickets had been cancelled for matches across North America.<\/p>\n

Still, some fans are taking their chances.<\/p>\n

Thursday’s match to be \u2018game of a lifetime,\u2019\u00a0says fan<\/p>\n

Pereira said the opportunity to see Ronaldo play is a significant draw for the match.\u00a0\u201cThe community loves Ronaldo, there’s so many people that are trying to get tickets to watch him,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

This summer, Ronaldo made history, becoming the first player to score in six different World Cup<\/a> tournaments. In October, the 41-year-old striker set the record<\/a> for most goals in World Cup qualifiers.\u00a0There has been a long-running debate whether he or Lionel Messi is the greatest soccer player of all time.<\/p>\n

But with the end of Ronaldo\u2019s career looming, there may not be many more opportunities to see him play, Pereira said. \u201c[For] Portugal\u2019s greatest star [to] come at the end of his career, playing his last dance against, ironically, a [Croatian] team in Toronto it\u2019s like a storybook script.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Portugal's<\/p>\n

Portugal’s Christiano Ronaldo and Croatia captain Luka Modri\u0107, pictured here in the 2014 Champions League semifinal, previously played together on Real Madrid. (Kerstin Joensson\/The Associated Press)<\/p>\n

The last time Ronaldo played in Toronto was in 2009 with Real Madrid<\/a>. Luka Modri\u0107, who joined that club a few years later, is now captain of the Croatian national team.<\/p>\n

Pereira said Modri\u0107 may also be close to retirement, so it\u2019s a big moment for fans of both teams. \u201cIt’s a game of a lifetime,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Communities want to get in on the action: expert<\/p>\n

Vijay Setlur, a sports marketing expert and instructor at York University\u2019s Schulich School of Business, said it\u2019s rare that European soccer stars come to Canada. \u201cWhen big stars come, people know who they are and people want to see them,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

But he said the chance to see Ronaldo isn\u2019t the only factor driving demand for tickets.<\/p>\n

Toronto has large Portuguese and Croatian communities, and this match is the last opportunity for fans of all backgrounds to see a match in the city during this World Cup.<\/p>\n

\u201c[People] want to be able to say they were a part of something, take pictures, share that on social media, tell other people and show that they were there,\u201d said Setlur.\u00a0 \u201cThat’s something they can keep and cherish for the rest of their lives.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Soccer superstar Cristiano Ronaldo will play in Toronto\u2019s final World Cup match on Thursday, but if you\u2019re looking…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110300,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[17,38595,20290,1314,3544,38598,38596,1891,37129,11604,48,33222,38597],"class_list":["post-110299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-toronto","tag-canada","tag-cristiano-ronaldo","tag-croatia","tag-fifa","tag-lionel-messi","tag-luka-modric","tag-paulo-pereira","tag-portugal","tag-real-madrid","tag-stubhub","tag-toronto","tag-world-cup-match","tag-world-cup-qualifiers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110299"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110299\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}