Many football fans did not have the chance to cheer for their favorite teams at this year’s Super Bowl Sunday; they were too busy being transferred from one area to another, desiring to see the field. Temporary seats that were supposed to have been installed and ready to go were not. As a result, many fans were without seating and were led endlessly throughout the stadium in search of proper seats.

            After much outrage, a class-action lawsuit had been issued Tuesday in Dallas, two days after the game, against the NFL, the Cowboys and Jerry Jones. The federal lawsuit alleges breach of contract, fraud and deceptive sales practices on behalf of people who ended up watching the game on TV at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, or had seats the lawsuit labeled "illegitimate."

            The NFL announced mere hours before the game was set to begin that 1,250 seats were deemed unsafe, and the league scrambled to find new seats to accommodate 850 people. The remaining 400, however, were without seating and were forced to watch the game on television from standing-room locations.

            Los Angeles-based attorney Michael J. Avenatti said he expects the suit to cover about 1,000 people.

"No one is attempting to get rich from this," he said. "People are merely interested in being compensated for what happened (at the stadium) and the cost that goes with that.”

Avenatti was disappointed. "People at the game were disgusted, but it doesn't take long to be disgusted with a situation like this," he averred.

            Mike Dolabi, the Cowboys season ticket holder in the lawsuit, is among a group called "Founders" who paid $100,000 per seat just for the right to buy tickets. Those so-called personal seat licenses resulted in more than $100 million in revenue for Jones, according to the lawsuit, which seeks $5 million in damages.

            "You were effectively in a bat cave," Avenatti said. "You don't take your 400 best customers and treat them like that."

            The lawsuit asserts that the NFL and Cowboys have failed to offer compensation for the troubles.

            The NFL has said the roughly 400 fans without seats have two options. The first is a ticket to next year's Super Bowl and a cash payment of $2,400, three times the face value of the ticket. The second is a ticket to any future Super Bowl, along with round-trip airfare and hotel accommodations.