NAPLES, Italy, July 14 (Xinhua) -- The president of International University Sports Federation (FISU) Oleg Matytsin told the press at the news briefing here on Sunday that FISU would try to bring more spectators to the stadiums while insisting the Universiade should maintain its non-commercial feature.
Being informed that only a few audiences were shown in some venues, Matytsin said that FISU would like to discuss how to bring more audiences to the games. "We should think about how to create the proper conditions for both athletes and spectators."
"We've started as early as possible and think about the level of the competitions, explaining what the event means," said Matytsin. "We sold 300,000 tickets in total and we're proud to have many spectators. But in some venues, maybe not."
In tennis court and football pitch, the spectators are not as much as expected. "Football is a commercial sport. Our mission is to bring students to the sport. Now we will organize World Cup for the University students. It's more focusing on the university sports, not in a commercial concept."
Matytsin insisted that FISU is not a commercial organization and wouldn't turn some of the games to market operation.
"We organized competition for students to promote the sport values. The sport is to educate people, to educate the future leaders. I believe the young players will learn the fair competition during the games," said the president.
The local organizing committee of Campania Region had invested in venues reconstruction for the Universiade. Matytsin believed some of the venues, such as diving pool, are ready to hold international events.
"I met many families in the venue. They thanked me for the event because the kids are now dreaming how to be good students, how to play sports, how to be proud of Italy. This is the impact and legacy of Universiade," said Matytsin.
Responding to some of the negative comments about the organization, Matytsin said: "the organizing committee members are proud to wear the unified T-shirts of Universiade. They have great responsibilities. Of course they will meet many challenges and problems."
"It has become more and more difficult to organize the event like this. We are together to solve the problems and it wasn't easy. The game was demonstrated to the people all around world and I'm sure people would have good memories here in Napoli," said Matytsin.
