BC Place's upper bowl seating open for Canada's World Cup qualifier

Vancouver is quickly becoming the soccer capital of Canada. Demand for the upcoming FIFA World Cup qualifier between the Canadian and Mexican men’s national teams is so high that organizers have decided to open additional seating – the entire upper bowl of B.C. Place.

The much-anticipated match, the third game in Canada’s campaign in the fourth round of qualifying for the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia, is scheduled to take place at 7 p.m. on Friday, March 25.

Lower bowl tickets for the Canada-Mexico match were first released on December 15, and within less than a month nearly all of the tickets have already been sold.

“We want to thank our fans for the terrific support and we are extremely pleased to be opening additional inventory to enable the Canadian soccer community and fans to attend the match and cheer for Canada,” said Canada Soccer President Victor Montagliani in a statement. “We continue to call on all Canadians to get their tickets today to ensure that we have a sea of red on match day.”

In November, over 20,000 people packed B.C. Place’s lower bowl when Canada defeated Honduras 1-0.

Starting at $25.00, tickets for the upper bowl seating area will be made available to only Canadians beginning at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, January 13. Including the upper bowl, the stadium’s seating capacity is approximately 54,000 and given the early strong interest there could be a sell-out by match time.

Following the next match at B.C. Place, Canada will play a return match in Mexico on Tuesday, March 29. Both matches will be televised live on TSN and RDS.

Canada is currently ranked second in Group A of the current qualifying round, which ends in September with a matchup against El Salvador. The two highest ranking nations within each group will move on to the final round in 2017, from which three nations qualify for Russia 2018 and the fourth team advances to an intercontinental playoff.