Las Vegas.- The Copa América is a tournament of great contrasts. While Argentina sold out the tickets in both matches who already competed in this first phase, the stands were seen half empty in other clashes of the competition, such as the one between Ecuador and Jamaica this Wednesday 26th in Las Vegas.
The stadiums seem to get too small when the world champion playsand very big when the rest of the teams do itwith the exception of Brazil, Mexico and Colombia, which, without reaching a full house, came close to it in their first games.
Lionel Messi remains the main attraction of this competition that, in a country as not a football fan like the United Stateshas great difficulties in offering an image that comes close to that of the Euro Cup, with stadiums that don’t fit a pin and cities that vibrate around the event.
In the country that will co-organize the 2026 World Cup, filling a stadium without the Argentine star is almost a miracle. With him on the poster, however, the inaugural clash between Argentina and Canada brought together 71,000 fans at the Mercedes-Benz in Atlanta. And another 82,500 at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey, in the second match of the current American champions against Chile.
Brazil, with Vinícius and Rodrygo at the helm, managed to bring together 67,158 people and was close to full capacity at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles. James Rodríguez’s Colombia had almost the same numbers (67,059) against Paraguay at the NRG Stadium in Houston. And, according to data from Conmebol, Mexico managed to break the record of spectators registered in a sporting event held at the SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles by attracting 72,773 spectators this Wednesday the 26th in its duel against Venezuela.
Most of the stadiums in this Copa América have a capacity of around 70,000 spectators, and when the poster shows a match without stars, half of the seats seem to be extra.
According to the portal Front Office Sportspecialized in sports and business, The duel between Peru and Chile brought together 43,030 people in a field with capacity for 80,000. The one who faced Ecuador and Venezuela remained at 29,684 spectators in a stadium for 68,500. Not even the host United States, which opened with a victory against Bolivia, managed to make the stands half full: of the 80,000 seats at the AT&T Stadium, only 47,873 were filled.
And it is that The financial outlay of watching a match live, if one does not live in the city where it is played, is very large. The size of the country requires in most cases to travel by plane. Accommodation prices are not affordable for all budgets. AND The stadiums are so far from the city centers that it is almost impossible to reach them by public transport. It is necessary to have a car, rent it or pay for an Uber, which does not usually cost less than $50 each way…
All that without counting the price of the tickets, which are not cheap either: to see the next clash between Brazil and Paraguay, on Friday the 28th, the cheapest ones are around $80while the most expensive ones go up to 350. If you add food and drink to combat the high temperatures of these days, the bill can easily go up to about 1,500 dollars to watch a single match.
Furthermore, the fact that the teams play each of the three games of this first phase in a different city does not make it easier for the fans to follow their teams, despite the large Latin community that resides in this country.
Mobilizing it and engaging the American public is one of the challenges that this Copa América is still far from achieving.
