4th and last major of the season for men, The Open is back this summer in the cradle of golf, in St Andrews. Attendance should break all records.
For the 150th anniversary celebrations, The Open enjoys unparalleled enthusiasm.
Indeed, the box office received more than 1.3 million requests for seats and 290,000 fans managed to obtain tickets for this historic edition of one of the oldest competitions, all sports combined.
This is the largest number of general admission tickets ever issued. The previous record, which dates back to 2000, was 239,000.
No wonder then that in order to ensure the safety of such a large number of spectators, the Royal and Ancient approached the Scottish government.
Economic success
From a financial point of view, the operation promises to be “juicy” with around £200 million in economic spin-offs for Scotland.
Officials from the R&A, VisitScotland Tourist Board and the region’s Fife Council commissioned an independent body to carry out an economic impact assessment.
“The 150th Open at St Andrews will go down in history and this excitement clearly reflects the fans’ desire to be part of this historic moment,” said the managing director of the R&A, Martin Slumbers.
The tournament alone is expected to generate £100m and the sale of TV rights is expected to bring in a similar sum.
Lots of young people
In order to facilitate and attract growing interest from young people, the R&A plans to allocate 20% of its tickets to young fans and, among them, 20,000 people under the age of 16 will be offered entry to the website.
Finally, 80,000 spectators are expected during the training days against 61,000 at Royal Portrush in 2019.
