Hapoel Tel Aviv's basketball club has torn up its old subscription rulebook, unveiling a new season-ticket framework for 2026/27 that scraps the pricing gap between fans renewing their seats and those signing up for the first time.
Under the previous system, new subscribers typically paid more than returning ones. The club says that distinction is gone: everyone will be charged the same rate, on the principle, as the club put it, that there are no new or old fans — "all are Hapoel supporters coming home."
The Euroleague component of the package has also been softened. Fans previously had to commit to a mandatory advance payment, worth 20 percent of the Euroleague subscription price, to lock in that price and secure priority access to league tickets. That advance is now optional rather than compulsory, and supporters who already paid it can request a refund if they prefer to opt out.
The club is also introducing discounted rates for youth, soldiers and children across every stand and seating section of the arena, rather than in select areas only. Fans who already signed up as new subscribers at the old, higher rate will be refunded the difference directly to their bank account.
The overhaul is one of the first substantive moves by Stav Shaham since he was named Hapoel Tel Aviv's chairman, a voluntary post he took on only weeks after his predecessor's brief tenure ended. "We want to reconnect the public and the community to the club, starting with simple things," Shaham said. "We simplified the complexity, we listened, and we made the subscription plan clearer and more accessible."
The timing is pointed. Mako reported this summer that fewer than 1,000 season-ticket holders had signed up for Hapoel Tel Aviv's basketball section amid strained relations between the club's ownership and its fan base, a backdrop that has clearly shaped the new management's pitch for a reset.
Hapoel Tel Aviv are set to play in the Euroleague again in 2026/27, giving the ticketing shake-up added weight: a mandatory advance payment tied to Europe's top competition had been one of the more contentious pieces of the old system. Whether the simplified, cheaper terms are enough to draw fans back through the turnstiles will become clear once the new campaign gets under way.
