Tickets to World Cup games in Massachusetts are going for hundreds and even thousands of dollars, but some lucky kids will get to go for free.
Governor Maura Healey’s office announced Monday that more than 1,000 free tickets will be distributed through youth-serving organizations in Massachusetts, including the Boys and Girls Club.
Ruth Provost is executive director of the Boys and Girls Club of Cape Cod. She said her organization tries to create opportunities for children with busy, working families to have new experiences.
“Many of our parents work two jobs and so the kids don’t get out much,” she said. “This is just going to play into our whole philosophy of getting our kids off Cape and out to see the world that so many of our visitors take for granted.”
Provost said she does not yet know exactly how many tickets her chapter of the Boys and Girls Club will get. The Massachusetts Alliance of Boys and Girls Clubs is in charge of distributing more than 700 of the free tickets to its 41 member organizations.
“But we’re very excited about the opportunity to send any of our kids to go to the World Cup,” Provost said. “The kind of diversity that comes to the World Cup, the excitement of it, just the chance to go to Gillette and see the stadium—all these things are hugely exciting to kids.”
The rest of the tickets will be distributed through other youth-serving organizations in the state, including the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families and nonprofits like the Brazilian American Center and the Immigrant Families Services Institute.
Massachusetts is hosting seven World Cup matches. The first is Haiti versus Scotland this Saturday, June 13.
