How to organise a trip to a sports event

How hollow was that laugh? As Premier League footballers prepare to complete the season behind closed doors, and the world’s greatest sportsmen and women mourn the postponement of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, the very idea of travelling for the purpose of watching a great sports event seems absurd.

Yet as the deadly coronavirus crisis claims sporting victim after victim, many of us are dreaming of when we will once again be able to celebrate the winning combination of travel and top-level sport.

Uefa has just written to we ticket holders for the Euro 2020 football championships to remind us that we have just a few days to procure a cash refund. But everyone I know who was lucky enough to get match tickets is intent on accepting the postponed dates in June and July 2021.

As the Covid-19 pandemic has demonstrated, though, for a big-ticket event you should buy a package specifically tied to it.

One of the early sporting casualties of the outbreak was the Tokyo marathon, for which hundreds of British runners had booked flights and accommodation.

When the run shrank to elite contestants only, the enthusiasts were left with plane tickets that had cost many hundreds of pounds, plus premium-priced accommodation reservations. Many airlines and online travel agents stuck rigidly to their terms and conditions, presenting the non-runners with the choice of losing their cash or travelling to a city 6,000 miles away at the start of a global pandemic.

Many Olympics sports-travellers had made similar bookings for the 2020 Games – and are now hoping either that quarantine rules will be lifted by late July to allow them at least to enjoy the Japanese capital, or quietly praying their flights will be cancelled to allow them to claim the money back.

Champions League football matches, Formula One Grand Prix races and Wimbledon tennis: the cancellation of all of these events have cost would-be spectators fortunes.

The millions that have been lost present a reminder of how to prepare for a sport event: either invest in cancellable reservations (generally feasible and non-punitive for accommodation) or take a chance and book late – which is exactly what I was planning to do for my flight to visit St Petersburg for Euro 2020.

For a really big-ticket sporting festival you should buy a package specifically tied to the event. Specialist travel firms will sell you flights, accommodation and, crucially, tickets. Thanks to the Package Travel Regulations, since the event is a significant part of the holiday, if it gets called off you are guaranteed all your money back. Not everyone is a sporting loser this summer.