体坛英语新闻：Ticket sales for Russia 2018 World Cup expected to be a great success

MOSCOW, May 3 (Xinhua) -- Ticket sales for the 2018 Russia World Cup will be a great success as 89% of tickets have already been sold, CEO of the Local Organizing Committee Alexey Sorokin said Thursday.

"As for the tickets, sales have been going quite successfully. As of today, 2,374,000 tickets, which amounts to 89 percent of the total number, have been sold. Russian fans have bought 46 percent while foreign fans bought 54 percent. The leading nations are the United States, Germany, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, and Argentina," Sorokin said during a meeting of the Supervisory Board of the Russia 2018 World Cup Organizing Committee.

Sorokin added that a large number of tickets had been sold to fans from the United States and China.

"More than 80,000 tickets have already been booked from the United States. About 20 percent of all the tickets are Category 4 tickets for the Russian citizens. Taking into consideration such a great interest, we can say that we expect sold-out arenas at almost all the matches," Sorokin said.

The 2018 World Cup will be held from June 14 to July 15 in 12 stadiums of 11 Russian cities.?