PARIS - France's World Cup organizers said on Thursday the final 1,000 tickets available by telephone order were sold during the day to European fans. A total of 170,000 tickets were sold through World Cup hotlines which were open for two weeks and manned by 90 operators, including 60 who spoke several languages. The tickets were made available to citizens of the 15-nation European Union (EU) as well as Norway, Ireland and Liechtenstein under European trade rules.

But the telephone sales scheme was plagued by an overwhelming number of callers and what proved to be an insufficient number of operators. The telephone sales were separate from regular sales of about two million tickets for the finals starting on June 10. (Reuter)