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All Stars for Hope Charity match won’t include Red Bulls

One of the most anticipated soccer events of the summer in the New York area is the All Stars for Hope Charity Match, an event to raise money for schools in impoverished parts of the world. For months now, the match was to feature a team of European-based superstars vs. the New York Red Bulls, at least that is what had been rumored.

As it turns out, the New York Red Bulls will not be taking part in the event after the club failed reach an agreement with organizers the event, scheduled for June 14th at Giants Stadium.

The all-star match, which is set to include such world stars as Cristiano Ronaldo, Thierry Henry, Didier Drogba and Frank Lampard is rumored to now include an unidentified South American club. No other details yet are available on the new opponent for the all-star team.

The Red Bulls released this statement from managing director Erik Stover on Tuesday:

You may or may not have heard about an All Stars for Hope (ASFH) match being played at Giants Stadium and I want to confirm that the Red Bulls will not be playing the ASFH team on June 14.   This is a wonderful charity that we hope you will support, but we simply could not work out all of the details for our participation.  We were happy to contribute to the cause, but we could not agree with some of the conditions for our participation.  Most importantly, we were not granted permission for our Red Bulls Members to receive match tickets as part of our season package.  We respect the business model of the ASFH organizers, but we simply could not break our promise to you, our most valued customers.

We remain committed to assisting Mikael Silvestre and ASFH as we believe this charity is really making a difference for underprivileged youth throughout the world.  You can do the same by making a donation or purchasing tickets for All Stars for Hope.

Proceeds from the charity event will go toward Mikael Silvestre's School for Hope, an organization that helps build, maintain and staff schools in impoverished parts of the world.

For more information on the match, you can go to the All Stars for Hope website.

Comments

  1. How utterly bush-league, why should I ever expect anything different from this franchise? This is a charity endeavor…why should the charity lose out on funds just because they need to mollify their season ticket holders? Simply ridic

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  2. “THE Nick” – Surely you jest. I find it hard to believe that RBNY fans are so morally repugnant that they would have crucified someone for requiring that they donate to a charity as a condition for attending a charitable event.

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  3. Lame, RBNY, lame…A charity event of this sort is for the benefit of the charity, not the benefit of the RBNY or it’s fans. Think of a better reason to back out next time.

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  4. Will be sweet when the team has its own stadium and has total flexibility to schedule events like this 😀
    Not saying it would have made a difference but it couldn’t have hurt

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  5. “as in including the tickets in season ticket packages so they wouldn’t have to donate to a charitable cause like everyone else in attendance.”

    Keeping in mind that there are something like 5500 season ticket holders, and the seats would all be lower bowl than thusly in the $ 80 to $ 250 range, the “donation” you’re talking about would be close to three quarters of a million dollars. That’s quite a donation for a charity to “require”, for the right to have the RBs host the game and do all of the work too, just to play against Theirry Henry for 30 minutes running at half speed.

    Kudos to the charity for putting Mikael Silvestre and “all star” in the same sentence though.

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  6. As a RBNY fan, it doesn’t make sense that a charitable event would be included for free for season ticket holders. I would prefer to pay for that event, especially since it is for charity. Something seems fishy to me.

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  7. The guy is in a lose lose situation…if he agreed to play the match and didn’t include it with season tix, then he would have been crucified….and now that the red bulls arent in the game, people are disapointed….what I would have done is allow season ticket holders the choice of paying a little donation extra for these tickets and have them included, or not….maybe a little less than whatthe seats are going for….but whatever…it is what it is

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  8. By saying $20 bucks, I could have said $40 bucks. My point was that I very well may pay the $40 bucks anyway, so the notion that it isn’t fair to season tickets holders is a little wierd. Many season ticket holders will go anyway, and they would prefer to see NY play.

    There is probably another very good reason, I just don’t buy Stover’s logic on this.

    I do like his update emails though. Makes me feel wanted.

    -Mike

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  9. You shouldn’t trust everything Stover does. He’s told half truths to ESC before. I suppose you can’t expect the managing director to be fully truthful about everything, but, just saying. And I mean this in general, not specifically with regards to this charity match.

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  10. For those too feeble to RTFA:

    VIP ($275-$850)
    CAT 1 (Side line lower level, $85-$250)
    CAT 2 (Side line mid-level, and corners, $55-75)
    CAT 3 (Behind the goalies, $35-55)
    CAT 4 (Upper Level, $15-25)

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  11. “We respect the business model of the ASFH organizers, but we simply could not break our promise to you, our most valued customers.”

    What specifically was this promise, anyway?

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  12. I would have paid extra to see this game as long as the season tickets holders had first dibs on the tickets

    I don’t know if any season tickets holders was asked what they thought (or was willing to spend) but they should have been

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  13. The charity web site says the all stars sre to play a team of “celebs” from the entertainment & sports industries. As I see it thats the all stars VS. steve Nash, Ethan Zohn, one of the Baldwins, and that Mohammed kid from you tube. At least if it was the Red Bulls the friendly would have been more of a match than an exhibition

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  14. [The all-star match, which is set to include such world stars as Cristiano Ronaldo, Thierry Henry, Didier Drogba and Frank Lampard]

    You actually think that Giants Stadium seats will be in the 40-50 dollar range despite it being a charity event. They know people will pay to see these players

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  15. For the “benefit of their fans” – as in including the tickets in season ticket packages so they wouldn’t have to donate to a charitable cause like everyone else in attendance?

    Or am I misunderstanding?

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  16. i highly doubt it’ll be just 20 bucks. even if they fill the nosebleeds, those seats will probably be in the 40-50 dollar range.

    who’s gonna play the team now, or are they gonna split into 2 and play all stars #1 v all stars #2?

    just remember everyone, don’t buy your tickets on ebay. a $100 ticket could go for well over $300, and that extra will go to the seller’s pocket, not the charity.

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  17. At the risk of being ‘controversial’, I trust every move Stover has made so far.

    So, its unfortunate, but I’m going to take him at his word (as far as reasoning).

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