Athletes for the Beijing Olympic Games are likely to play to packed houses, as enthusiastic fans snapped up Olympic tickets in the final round of sale. By Saturday evening, 16 of the 19 ticket booths, which started the fourth, or the final, phase of Olympic ticket sale to individuals on Friday, hung out signs "sold out".

Tickets for "hot sports" like tennis and archery were sold out within hours on Friday, said Wu Xiaonan, an official with a ticket booth near the Beijing Olympic Green Hockey Stadium.

But, tickets for hockey, boxing and handball are still available, Wu said, adding most tickets for hockey are probably sold out by late Sunday.

A female official surnamed Yu at a booth of the Olympic Sports Center said tickets for the handball match are expected to be sold out by Monday.

A total of 820,000 tickets, covering 28 sports events, were put on sale on Friday at 19 ticket booths around the city.

By Friday noon, tickets for gymnastics, diving and football were sold out.

The sales created long queues in the city. More than 30,000 people lined up overnight at a ticket booth near the Bird's Nest on Friday, forcing local police to take temporary measures to prevent chaos. All the Olympic tickets at the booth were sold out at 3 a.m. on Saturday.

In all, 6.8 million Olympic tickets were available for domestic and foreign sales.

(Xinhua News Agency July 27, 2008)