World Cup organisers are prepared to take legal action against secondary ticketing sites, with some tickets being priced at over £12,000.
Tickets for the England v Australia game at Lord’s are being sold on Viagogo for 104 times their face value.
“We are working closely with lawyers to identify secondary ticket sites which infringe our terms and conditions,” said a World Cup spokesperson.
“We are taking appropriate enforcement action against them as required.”
The World Cup takes place in England and Wales from 30 May to 14 July.
It is not illegal in the UK to resell tickets to international cricket matches, although the Cricket World Cup’s own ticketing website states that no ticket should be offered for public sale.
A Viagogo statement read: “Viagogo does not set ticket prices, sellers set their own prices, which may be above or below the original face value. Where demand is high and tickets are limited, prices increase.”
Tickets for all World Cup matches are banded into four categories - bronze, silver, gold and platinum.
For the sold-out England-Australia match on 25 June, a vendor on Viagogo is marketing two silver tickets, with a face value of £115, for £12,029 each.
There are a number of other matches involving England and also India where prices of £12,029 per ticket are being asked on Viagogo.
The Viagogo statement continued: “Viagogo is a marketplace and doesn’t buy or sell tickets. Viagogo provides a platform for third party sellers to sell tickets to event goers.
“Event organisers sometimes make claims that they will deny entry to people who have purchased resold tickets. These types of entry restrictions are highly unfair and in our view, unenforceable and illegal.”
Separately, it has been alleged that Viagogo has previously approached supporters’ group the Barmy Army with a request to sell some of its allocation for England matches outside of the World Cup, a claim Viagogo has not denied.
When asked about the claim the company replied: “All tickets on Viagogo are valid and it is perfectly legal to resell a ticket or give it to someone else if you want to.”
A total of 48 World Cup matches will take place in England and Wales, with 36 listed as being sod out of all non-hospitality tickets on the tournament’s ticketing website.
The same site does have an official resale section, but no tickets are currently listed.
As well as Viagogo, Stubhub is selling tickets well over their face value. Two gold tickets for the India v Pakistan match at Old Trafford on 16 June, originally priced at £150 per ticket, are being marketed at £3,280 each.
When asked for a comment by BBC Sport, Stubhub said: “As a ticketing marketplace, StubHub does not set the price of tickets that appear on our site, the fans do. Importantly, the prices for the tickets mentioned are the ones listed, but as it is often the case, those are not necessarily the prices for which tickets sell.
“StubHub believes that fans should have the flexibility to use, transfer, donate or resell their tickets on the marketplace of their choice that provides them with the best user experience and consumer protections.”
Rakesh Patel, founder of India supporters’ group the Bharat Army, said: “Through ballots, tickets have got into the hands of people who trying to make a quick buck.”
Although Patel conceded that it is difficult for the International Cricket Council to stop tickets falling into the hands of those who want to resell them, he called on the game’s governing body to do more to reward the loyalty of fans who regularly attend international matches.
“There has to be measures taken to stop these tickets getting into the wrong hands,” he added. “Surely the ICC can track genuine fans who turn up to matches and prioritise matches. It’s something that football clubs do.
“If they are serious about dealing with tickets that get onto secondary sites, they have to do something about it, otherwise it will never stop.”
In November, Cricket World Cup organisers were forced to apologise to thousands of fans who were mistakenly told they had got tickets for the tournament through a ballot.
The World Cup begins on 30 May, when hosts England meet South Africa at The Oval. – BBC
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