Lin Dan of China celebrates after beating Lee Chong Wei of Malaysia in their men's singles badminton final at the 16th Asian Games in Guangzhou on November 21, 2010. -Photo by AFP

GUANGZHOU: Scalpers are doing a brisk business at Asian Games venues, with tickets to see China’s superstar badminton player Lin Dan costing more than the price of entry to watch iconic hurdler Liu Xiang.

Black market tickets for Lin’s gold medal single’s victory Sunday went for as much as 5,000 yuan (750 dollars), far outstripping the 1,600 yuan touts were asking for Wednesday’s 110 metre hurdles final, the Yangtze Evening News said.

Lin, however. played in a much smaller venue, while the 5,000 yuan cost was for a ticket with a 600 yuan face value, the report said.

Scalpers were asking 1,600 yuan for tickets with a face value of 80 yuan to watch Liu run at the 80,000 seat Aoti Main Stadium.

Over 2.3 million tickets have been issued for the November 12-27 Asian Games, with about half of them given away to sponsors and other organisations linked to the event, Guangzhou’s Yangcheng Evening News reported.

In an effort to fill the stands, organisers have urged those with free tickets to pass them on to friends or Games volunteers if they decide they do not want to attend the matches, the paper said.

But apparently a lot of those tickets are falling into the hands of scalpers.

Last week, Guangzhou police arrested 196 scalpers who allegedly were trying to sell over 1,300 tickets, the paper said.

Despite repeated vows by Guangzhou police to crackdown on touts, they were appearing at most events where Chinese athletes were performing.

According to the web portal Netease, a 20 yuan ticket for a group basketball match between China and South Korea Sunday night sold for 1,500 yuan. -AFP