After having unveiled in December, with a lot of visuals, an unprecedented off-stadium opening ceremony entirely on the Seine, the invoice for which has not yet been posted, the organizing committee (Cojo) looked into Ticketing.

Of course, the pandemic scenario is still lurking, after the camera in Tokyo, and very few spectators in Beijing.

A year ago, the boss of the Cojo, Tony Estanguet, told parliamentarians that the committee was working on several models for this reason.

The president of the Paris 2024 organizing committee (Cojo), Tony Estanguet, poses in Yanqing at the alpine ski center during the Beijing Winter Games on March 6, 2022. WANG Zhao AFP

More than 13.4 million tickets will be on sale: 10 million for the Olympics and 3.4 million for the Paralympics.

Everything will be sold in 2023, via a draw system (registration from December 2022) which will generate purchase slots in February and May, then at the end of 2023.

- "accessible rates" -

Price level, one million Olympic tickets, will be sold at 24 euros for all sports.

And 50% of Olympic tickets will be sold at 50 euros and less.

For the boss of the Cojo, Tony Estanguet, the idea is to have "Games open to the greatest number, popular, unifying", with "a large volume of tickets at accessible prices, for all sports".

The Cojo's budget, which now stands at nearly 4 billion euros, is based on sponsorship revenue, ticket sales and a contribution from the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

On the sponsor side, the round table -1.1 billion euros- is not yet complete.

The inter-ministerial delegate to the Olympics, Michel Cadot, recently gave a thumbs up to the Cojo: "in terms of progress in terms of respecting the schedule (...) as well as in terms of the budget, the files are very well controlled", he explained to the Assembly.

After the 2020 review, which resulted in 300 million savings, expenditure and revenue will once again be scrutinized.

The next budget revision is indeed scheduled for the end of 2022.

The executive has asked the organizers to seize its audit committee to review the budget by the summer.

Especially since the Cojo could see its forecasts hit by the inflationary context or by possible economic consequences linked to the war in Ukraine.

At the same time, the organizers manage other sensitive issues such as the torch relay.

More than ten departments have publicly refused the entry ticket to 150,000 euros excluding taxes for the passage of the flame, judging it prohibitive.

The Cojo insists on the fact that it does not earn any money from the operation and that it bears part of it.

Not all departments have responded yet.

Basketball not happy

Some test sites are also talked about.

After the shooting site at La Courneuve, on track to stay there, it is now the site of the basketball qualifying events, one of the halls of the Parc des Expos at Porte de Versailles, which is causing a lot of ink to flow, especially on Twitter.

"How can we accept to see basketball, the most popular Co sport at the Olympics, being sent to the expo park?" Evan Fournier, Olympic vice-champion with the French team in Tokyo, protested last week. .

"Certainly these are probably not the standards of an NBA room but it is also what we like at the Olympic Games, to have a + horizontality + between all the sports", replied the five-time Olympic biathlon champion, now a member of the IOC Athletes' Commission, Martin Fourcade.

For its part, the Cojo explains that meetings are underway with the international basketball federation to find "technical solutions" for the layout of the room.

But all this did not appease the basketball player who tried to train handball, who will play in Lille, in his fight: "Seriously, I am a handball player, I am told that I will live the @Paris2024 Olympic Games in Lille. I PETE UN PLOMB. It's a shame. Don't let it go. How many gold medals have you brought back to France? What a lack of respect".

© 2022 AFP