NFL London ticket chaos: Ticketmaster blames exceptionally high demand

The opening of ticket sales for the NFL's 2025 London Games on Thursday quickly descended into chaos, leaving countless genuine fans frustrated and locked out. The league's U.K. and Ireland Twitter account confirmed that Ticketmaster had "temporarily paused sales" due to "exceptionally high demand," citing efforts to monitor the queue and ensure legitimate purchases.

However, anecdotal evidence flooding social media suggested that the system was being overwhelmed not just by legitimate interest, but by an influx of resellers and their automated bots. Many fans believed these "bad actors" were still acquiring tickets, even as the official queue for human purchasers ground to a halt, subsequently listing them for resale at inflated prices.

Attempts to join the online queue revealed staggering wait times, with hundreds of thousands of users already in line and an estimated wait of "more than an hour." A message from Ticketmaster acknowledged the issue, stating, "Our tech teams spotted bad actors and we are working to keep them out."

This scenario has become an unfortunate staple for high-profile events globally. Automated bots often swarm online ticketing platforms, rapidly purchasing face-value tickets before real fans have a chance.

This forces desperate supporters to resort to buying access through secondary markets, often at significantly higher prices, from the very resellers who exploited the system. The recurring nature of these issues continues to fuel fan dissatisfaction and calls for more robust anti-bot measures in the ticketing industry.