Furious sports fans complained about the "farcical" London 2012 ticketing system including Wiggins, one of Britain's most successful Olympians, who stated on Twitter: "No Olympic tickets for the wife and kids to watch Team Pursuit, oh well sorry kids going to have to watch dad on the telly!"

Johnson was another to miss out on Olympic tickets in the random ballet.

But, rather than being upset, he claimed that it showed the ticket system was fair and really was a lottery.

"Clearly it's been a massively popular thing and there's no surprise the event has attracted so much demand for tickets but I'm massively disappointed and cheesed off," Johnson told insidethegames.

"I fired up my computer this morning to see if I had got any Olympic tickets - and the computer said no.

"It made me proud to be British – surely there is nowhere else in the world where you could expect the Mayor of a host Olympic city to get rejected?

"But I want you to know I am going to keep going.

"And if I don't get them in June, I will try again in November."


In total, there were 20 million ticket applications from 1.8 million people for the 6.6 million tickets available to the public via the controversial ballot, but London 2012 has claimed that the quarter-of-a-million that have been left ticketless will be contacted by email and offered an 'exclusive window' later this month to buy tickets for events where demand was relatively low.

"Yes of course I understand that those people who didn't get tickets this morning are extremely disappointed," London 2012 chairman Sebastian Coe told insidethegames.

"But that's the nature of the application.

"They will have first claim if they get back into the system.

"There are still tickets to be had, and people will have a chance to apply for them.

"I don't accept that we could or should have made more information available beforehand, I don't think so.

"I think we put out as much information as we could have put down.

"The full process finishes on June 10.

"At that point we will have an understanding at that moment about the numbers of tickets still available.

"Those who didn't get tickets first time around will have the first opportunity when it comes to reapplying.

"Those who got some but not all of what they wanted will also have an opportunity, as will those who did get what they asked for.

"We will work through the whole process."

Jeremy Hunt, the Culture and Olympics Secretary, understood the disappointment fans would face but defended the ticketing process.

"Because there's such demand, there's going to be disappointment," he said.

"To be fair, the announcements on ticketing have been delayed for a very simple reason - LOCOG has to be able to get back to people whose Visa cards haven't worked for whatever reason and to give them another chance to pay for the tickets they have reserved.

"We know the first process will be complete by June 24, then everyone will know where they stand."

Sports where tickets will still be available include football, volleyball, handball, basketball and hockey, but sessions in smaller arenas, such as the 6,000-seat Velodrome, have virtually sold out.

Over the next week, organisers will also contact people who were successful in the ballot, but whose payment has been rejected.

More than 100 applicants had their purchases declined after a mistake by Barclaycard, in which the transactions were flagged as suspicious while many more failed because their card was subsequently lost or stolen.

Around eight per cent of the 8.8 million tickets have been set aside for sponsors but some events have a corporate allocation of 50 per cent.

Later this year, two million tickets to the Paralympics will go on sale between September 9 and 30 and only after that process has been completed will any unsold tickets to the Olympics go on general sale to the public in early December.

Meanwhile, it has emerged that the Government applied for 9,000 tickets, including 3,000 for civil servants and other officials involved in bidding and preparing for the Games with the other 6,000 set to be given to dignitaries and VIPs to showcase Britain as it hosts the event.

"Some of the tickets bid for will be made available to officials heavily involved in the London 2012 project, but these will be paid for by them, at face value, and are not freebies at the taxpayers' expense," said a spokesman for the Government.

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