Football stadium attendance SPL/EPL/MLS/gridiron

[OC Richard]

For some unknown reason I was looking at the average attendance numbers for various football/soccer teams, and comparing them to baseball and NFL teams.

Sticking with football/soccer, I was noticing the average attendance of the best-attended teams in the SPL, EPL, and MLS.

Taking these three together, we have at "top ten" of

1 Man U 75,495
2 Arsenal 59, 957
3 Celtic 48,968
4 Man City 46,953
5 Newcastle 46,871
7 Rangers 45,305
8 Liverpool 44,945
9 Chelsea 41,649
10 Seattle 38,486

The SPL drops off dramatically after the top two: third place Hearts averages 14,185 fans per match.

In the MLS, second place Galaxy (with the best record in the league two years running) averages 23,335.

In Baseball, three teams (Philadelphia, Yankees, and San Francisco) average over 40,000 fans per game. But due to the long season, six teams average more than three million fans at home games per season.

The worst-attended Baseball team, Oakland, gets 18,232 fans per match but 1.5 million fans per season, more than Manchester United's 1.4 million.

The NFL has some bigger stadiums but teams only play 8 home matches per season. Top attendance is Dallas (83,075 per match) while 11 teams average more than 70,000 fans per match. (Only Manchester United in football is in that rarified air.)

Much larger than any of the above is College Football (Gridiron) in the US.

Five colleges average over 100,000 fans per match, four at 90,000+, five with 80,000+.

[David Thorpe]

Interesting. The Cowboys have the distinction of disappointing more fans than any other team.

[Tobus]

Five colleges average over 100,000 fans per match, four at 90,000+, five with 80,000+.

My alma mater falls in the latter category, with current average attendance at around 87,000 per game. It's actually kind of shocking when compared to some of the other attendance statistics you provided. More people go to Texas A&M home games than Manchester United matches?!

[Omar Zaragoza]

Interesting. The Cowboys have the distinction of disappointing more fans than any other team.

I know how it feels, I'm a Cowboy's fan since I was a kid.

[creagdhubh]

Interesting. Thanks for sharing, Richard.

[Chas]

Attendances at top flight venues in the UK used to be half as much again or twice as much. The reason was that apart from a small amount of expensive seating it was all standing on the terraces. And there was always room for an extra hundred or more.

But, the more people you pack in the less room there is for them to manoeuvre. There have been many, many cases of men having a fatal heart attack, but no one noticed till the final whistle and the crowd started to thin slightly. Giving just enough room for the body to fall to the ground. By then, of course, it was too late.

Coupled with numerous disasters across Europe and the regulations were changed. It was just too unsafe. Some clubs moved to bigger stadia, but most rebuilt round their own grounds. They are now all-seater family friendly venues.

Regards

Chas

[OC Richard]

Maybe I could explain why I did such a random-sounding bit of research: I meet people from all over the world every day, and they're often wearing their shirts/jerseys from their sports clubs back home (soccer or rugby usually) and we get to talking about sports, and often they'll ask "what is the most popular sport in the USA" and I'll reply that it's not an easy question to answer... that as far as attendance per match, College Football ("gridiron" to the rest of the world) is by far the most popular, with the largest stadiums, which always surprises them.

But if we're talking attendance per season, Baseball is by far the most popular due to the 162-game schedule.

If we're talking television ratings rather than attendance, it's the NFL by far.

Anyhow I got a bit interested in the topic and thought I'd compare some US attendance numbers to British ones.