Johannesburg, June 7 : Four days before the World Cup, 38,000 premier tickets from hospitality packages that were returned unsold went back on sale in South Africa Monday.

Hundreds of people queued for hours outside a ticketing centre in Johannesburg's Sandton district for the tickets in a second such sell-off in recent weeks.

The tickets range in price from 1,400 rand ($200) to 2,100 rand (300 dollars) and include complimentary drinks.

Tickets are available for the group stage, round of 16 and quarter-finals, but not for the opening game, semi-finals and final.

The ruling body FIFA is also offering an additional 15,000 partially obscured tickets, which are on sale at the cheapest price of 140 rand ($20) a ticket.

FIFA's ticketing sub-committee chairman Horst Schmidt said in a statement it made "perfect sense" to create two new ticketing products, following high last-minute demand.

Some people camped through the chilly winter night in Johannesburg to position themselves for the tickets.

One man told Johannesburg's 702 radio station he had been queueing for 24 hours.

The tickets are only on sale at ticketing centres in South Africa's nine host cities.

Fans were hoping that FIFA's ticketing agency Match would be able to handle a new surge in demand after the ticketing system crashed during the last two big tickets sales in South Africa, causing near-riots at the sales outlets.

The availability of large number of premier tickets at this late stage shows how FIFA has struggled to sell hospitality packages to companies at a time of worldwide belt-tightening.

On the whole, however, the tickets sold well, particularly after FIFA made around half a million tickets cheaper in February to stimulate demand.

Around three million purchasable tickets were available for the tournament. FIFA said last week around 97 per cent had been sold.

South Africans have bought nearly 1.3 million.(DPA)