AFL =3rd biggest drawing football league in the world

[RussellEbertHandball]

Good research RussellEbertHandball. Makes the stats for Perth and Adelaide look even more impressive.

Ok. Now find me a stadium in Melbourne that can hold 160,000+ ...

Just close your eyes and dream of that double tiered, concrete grey, Waverley Park Grandstand, all the way around the ground that Kenneth Luke and the old boys of the VFL in the late 60's and early 70's had envisaged building.

Do you reckon you would get 160,000 on a nice cold, rainy, Arctic Park, July night for a game between the Bulldogs and the Kangaroos or say Geelong where the round trip home for the Cat fans would be a couple of hundred kms?

 

[West Coast 06]

Also Ticket Prices for AFL matches are about 3 times cheaper than than EPL

The Eagles struggled to sell out the Semi Final against the Western Bulldogs. Teh excuse fro mteh fans was because the tickets were an extra $10... Laughable.

The only thing laughable is that statement! There is no way West Coast struggled to sell out the semi final, confirmed by the attendence that night of 43,219.

The Dockers home final tickets sold a little slower than expected IIRC, but they still got 42,505 to their game.

And for your information tickets at Subiaco are more expensive than any comparable AFL game at another stadium, be it finals or home and away.

 

[RussellEbertHandball]

The only thing laughable is that statement! There is no way West Coast struggled to sell out the semi final, confirmed by the attendence that night of 43,219.

The Dockers home final tickets sold a little slower than expected IIRC, but they still got 42,505 to their game.

And for your information tickets at Subiaco are more expensive than any comparable AFL game at another stadium, be it finals or home and away.

Does it cost $29 for a walk up general admission like it does at the SCG or $33 at the Olympic Stadium? For some stupid reason it's $4 cheaper if you buy it over the net rather than at both venues. I think fans in Sydney may pay a little more than in Perth. What are the GA walk up ticket prices at Subi, if you can get one these days?

 

[fishmonger]

And yet soccer has other sports in England playing at the same time, so they do damn well huh?

yea, actually, you're right .... rugby union, rugby league and basketball don't actually exist in this country

god help the A-League if they had to play in the winter.

 

[akazie]

yea, actually, you're right .... rugby union, rugby league and basketball don't actually exist in this country

god help the A-League if they had to play in the winter.

The only place AFL NRL and RU go head to head is in NSW and QLD.

No team in Melbourne, no team in SA and the S14 is a summer sport more or less, it's over by the time the NRL and AFL get going properly, so that takes WA out of the picture aswell..

With the ACT having no AFL team.

 

[fishmonger]

The only place AFL NRL and RU go head to head is in NSW and QLD.

No team in Melbourne, no team in SA and the S14 is a summer sport more or less, it's over by the time the NRL and AFL get going properly, so that takes WA out of the picture aswell..

With the ACT having no AFL team.

Good point, but aren't you forgetting the Melbourne Storm ???

 

[akazie]

Good point, but aren't you forgetting the Melbourne Storm ???

No, there's only AFL and NRL down there, in NSW and QLD, we have RL RU and AFL.

 

[West Coast 06]

Does it cost $29 for a walk up general admission like it does at the SCG or $33 at the Olympic Stadium? For some stupid reason it's $4 cheaper if you buy it over the net rather than at both venues. I think fans in Sydney may pay a little more than in Perth. What are the GA walk up ticket prices at Subi, if you can get one these days?

There is no such thing as a walk up ticket for West Coast games!

If you are not on the net to ticket master at 9am monday two weeks before the game, you aren't going! (And sometimes, even if you are, you aren't going!)

Dockers supporters might know the walk up prices to games.

 

[Rob]

There is no general admission ticket to Subiaco, it's all reserved seating, and the price depends on how good your reserved seat is. The biggest difference with Subi is that half the ground is premium seating - you're paying the same for a crap seat in the pocket as you are for a great seat on the wing.
I'm not actually sure how much they are for a single game, but I know it costs me well over $400 for a premium seat membership.

 

[RussellEbertHandball]

There is no such thing as a walk up ticket for West Coast games!

If you are not on the net to ticket master at 9am monday two weeks before the game, you aren't going! (And sometimes, even if you are, you aren't going!)

Dockers supporters might know the walk up prices to games.

There is no general admission ticket to Subiaco, it's all reserved seating, and the price depends on how good your reserved seat is. The biggest difference with Subi is that half the ground is premium seating - you're paying the same for a crap seat in the pocket as you are for a great seat on the wing.
I'm not actually sure how much they are for a single game, but I know it costs me well over $400 for a premium seat membership.

So the question to both of you is how much does it cost a single adult season ticket, no concessions, for a) the cheapest reserved seats and b) the most expensive reserved seats for your respective clubs. Do your clubs package up a fair priced family ticket?

If you were to go to all the Swans game as a walk up and not book over the net it would cost $29 x 8 + $33 x 3 = $331. This however does include all public transport costs to both the SCG and Olympic Stadium. I'm about a 25 minute walk to the SCG so I don't use it there, but it's handy for the Olympic Stadium and eventhough I haven't bought a ticket before the game, I just walk onto the train and tell them I'm going to the Stadium as I will pay for my transport when I get there. I usually go to 4 or 5 games at the SCG and 2 or 3 at the Stadium.

 

[Rob]

So the question to both of you is how much does it cost a single adult season ticket, no concessions, for a) the cheapest reserved seats and b) the most expensive reserved seats for your respective clubs. Do your clubs package up a fair priced family ticket?

If you were to go to all the Swans game as a walk up and not book over the net it would cost $29 x 8 + $33 x 3 = $331. This however does include all public transport costs to both the SCG and Olympic Stadium. I'm about a 25 minute walk to the SCG so I don't use it there, but it's handy for the Olympic Stadium and eventhough I haven't bought a ticket before the game, I just walk onto the train and tell them I'm going to the Stadium as I will pay for my transport when I get there. I usually go to 4 or 5 games at the SCG and 2 or 3 at the Stadium.

I dunno, look it up. Probably about $170 or so for an adult budget seat, which will get you a crud seat behind the goals. But I don't really know for sure.
I know it's a heck of a lot more expensive than going to the footy in Melbourne though.

 

[ChrisFooty]

Do you think they will increase the staduim capacity of Subi ? I don't think they should because if Freo fall down the ladder (i would say they will be playing finals for the next 2-3 years at least) they won't get sell out crowds all the time.

If they should increase Subi, by how many seats ?

 

[mustapha]

yea, actually, you're right .... rugby union, rugby league and basketball don't actually exist in this country

god help the A-League if they had to play in the winter.

The league is two years old. It would not make sense to play it in winter at the moment. Victory drew 28,000 people to the last game while over 70,000 people were at the MCG watching the cricket. That's not bad.

The Asian Champions League games wil be happening during winter so it will interesting to see what they draw.

 

[Dan26]

The report is clearly not valid for Brisbane and Sydney. If you asked a Sydney person who they support in the AFL they will automatically say Sydney even if they could not name the colours of the team or any players. If the AFL started a team in China and you presented the population of China with a survey could you say that the new Chinese team has support of over 1 billion people?

If you asked the additional question "Have you watched an AFL game this year?" you would get a much more reliable result.

You are incorrect.

The survey ask who they respondents support, and if they don't support anyone they can choose this as an option.

The survey lists Sydney and Brisbane as the two most supported clubs in the country, which, taking into account the populations and "one team, one town" nature of the two clubs, is unquestionably true.

You are alluding to the fact that Aussie Rules is not the main sport in NSW and Qld, which means that most of the supporters of these two teams are not as passionate as those from traditional football states. That's true. There is no doubt that the Swams 1.5 million fans are not as passionate on average as the 800,000 odd Essendon fans or the 250,000-odd Western Bulldogs fans.

But the survey doesn't ask how passionate you are - it askes who (if anyone) do you support, and the facts, and results are that Brisbane and Sydney are the two most supported clubs in Australia. Not the two most passionately supported, but the two most supported nevertheless. In fact, if you look at the results of the annual survey back to 2001, there is a strong correlation between the success of Sydney and Brisbane and the recent survey results, showing that people ARE actually responding to the success of the clubs rather than just insintively answeing, "Oh, I support the Swans"

If they were just instinctively answering, "Oh I support the Swans" or "Oh, I support the Lions" when they don't really care, the results would be identical year to year, but the numbers have been going UP with the success of the two clubs. And, as I said, people are allowed to choose the option of not supporting anyone.

Sydney and Brisbane ARE the two most supported clubs in the AFL, make no mistake about it, and don't fall into the trap of thinking they aren't, simply because they're not the two most "passionately" supported. They are still the two most supported. You can't disagree with presented facts, just because you don't accept what you see.

 

[BuddyHawk]

Hate to tell you but last year about 80% of the West Coast Eagles and Adelaide Crows matches were sold out. Only the ones against really low drawing teams weren't. Both stadiums hold in excess of 40,000 fans. And don't forget that both these cities now support two major teams each ! At least in Perth, both teams are currently pushing capacity of the main venue. Geelong also sells out most Kardinia Park matches with a capacity of 23,000.

If there was only one Melbourne team, then the MCG would be full every week.

Now let's look at the urban populations:

Club City Population Big Stadium Capacity
*Arsenal FC Greater London 7,500,000 Emirates 60,432
*FC Barcelona Greater Barcelona 5,327,827 Camp Nou 98,787
*Multiple Greater Melbourne 3,689,700 MCG 99,000
*Man Utd Greater Manchester 2,240,230 Old Trafford 76,212
*WC Eagles Greater Perth 1,477,800 Subiaco Oval 42,000
*Adel Crows Greater Adelaide 1,124,315 Football Park 51,515
*Geelong Cats Greater Geelong 205,000 Kardinia Park 23,000

As you can see both Perth, Adelaide and Geelong have far smaller populations than Barcelona or Manchester, but regularly sell out and draw comparative crowds. That is a massive effort, especially since the average Australian wage is less, especially in the regional capitals than the average wages on offer in Europe.

Considering that Melbourne has 9 AFL teams, drawing 315,000 each week with a population only slightly bigger than Manchester is not too shabby. Can you imagine a stadium that holds 300,000 people ??

Perhaps this article from Time Magazine might interest you.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1040220,00.html

Australian rules football is 150 old and still growing.

Your population table is a bit misleading - Greater Manchester and Greater Barcelona (I'm assuming by that you mean Barcelona Provence) aren't cities at all, but rather regions that contain a whole host of cities, of which Manchester and Barcelona are the largest. The actual city of Manchester has less than 500,000 people, while Barcelona has a population of about 1.5 million.

In terms of soccer teams in the areas in question, as far as I know Barcelona and Espanyol (both based in Barcelona) are the only top division clubs in Barcelona Provence. But off the top of my head I know that premier league clubs Bolton and Wigan are situated in Greater Manchester, in addition to the two teams in Manchester itself - Manchester United and Manchester City - so it's not as though the entire region supports just the one club.

 

[TheSaviour]

If Arsenal or Chelsea both had stadiums that held 200 000 then they would still fill it every fortnight. Its not about attendances it abouts Money and Demand and the EPL along with almost all european soccer codes are lightyears in front of the AFL.

 

[frankc]

If Arsenal or Chelsea both had stadiums that held 200 000 then they would still fill it every fortnight. Its not about attendances it abouts Money and Demand and the EPL along with almost all european soccer codes are lightyears in front of the AFL.

Is that right? So if they could get 200,000 to every game don't you think they would have a stadium that would cater for that?

Why would Arsenal not build a bigger stadium if they were confident of pulling in that crowd every week? No doubt you will come up with hair brain reason why.

On a absolute basis, soccer is no doubt larger because of the number of countries it is played, no other sport will rival soccer as the truely global sport. Does this make AFL, or for that matter NFL inferior - of course it doesn't.

I enjoy soccer and AFL, however AFL will always be my number 1 sport and for mine has requires more all round skill than soccer, however if I was raised in Europe or the US, no doubt my opinion would be different.

 

[frankc]

The league is two years old. It would not make sense to play it in winter at the moment. Victory drew 28,000 people to the last game while over 70,000 people were at the MCG watching the cricket. That's not bad.

The Asian Champions League games wil be happening during winter so it will interesting to see what they draw.

Soccer would make a grave mistake playing in the winter. They have a much better chance competing against cricket which doesn't have the regularity of fixtures that AFL or NRL has.

If Soccer tried to go head to head with AFL, it would suffer significant drop off in crowds.

 

[fishmonger]

Your population table is a bit misleading - Greater Manchester and Greater Barcelona (I'm assuming by that you mean Barcelona Provence) aren't cities at all, but rather regions that contain a whole host of cities, of which Manchester and Barcelona are the largest. The actual city of Manchester has less than 500,000 people, while Barcelona has a population of about 1.5 million.

In terms of soccer teams in the areas in question, as far as I know Barcelona and Espanyol (both based in Barcelona) are the only top division clubs in Barcelona Provence. But off the top of my head I know that premier league clubs Bolton and Wigan are situated in Greater Manchester, in addition to the two teams in Manchester itself - Manchester United and Manchester City - so it's not as though the entire region supports just the one club.

It is all about the way you look at geography.

These are urban areas (comparative to the sprawl that we have here in our cities even if there is greater separation between towns). European counties are small compared to the area of Australia:

Greater Manchester area = 1,276 km²
Greater Melbourne area = 1,276 km²
Barcelona Province = 100 km²

Look it up if you don't believe me.

So Greater Manchester has 3 EPL clubs ?? Melbourne has 9 AFL clubs ... plus one in Geelong, which could be considered to be part of "Melbourne Province".

I am sure that a "Melbourne United" AFL club would easily be a greater supported club from a local perspective than Manchester United.

 

[mustapha]

You are incorrect.

The survey ask who they respondents support, and if they don't support anyone they can choose this as an option.

The survey lists Sydney and Brisbane as the two most supported clubs in the country, which, taking into account the populations and "one team, one town" nature of the two clubs, is unquestionably true.

You are alluding to the fact that Aussie Rules is not the main sport in NSW and Qld, which means that most of the supporters of these two teams are not as passionate as those from traditional football states. That's true. There is no doubt that the Swams 1.5 million fans are not as passionate on average as the 800,000 odd Essendon fans or the 250,000-odd Western Bulldogs fans.

But the survey doesn't ask how passionate you are - it askes who (if anyone) do you support, and the facts, and results are that Brisbane and Sydney are the two most supported clubs in Australia. Not the two most passionately supported, but the two most supported nevertheless. In fact, if you look at the results of the annual survey back to 2001, there is a strong correlation between the success of Sydney and Brisbane and the recent survey results, showing that people ARE actually responding to the success of the clubs rather than just insintively answeing, "Oh, I support the Swans"

If they were just instinctively answering, "Oh I support the Swans" or "Oh, I support the Lions" when they don't really care, the results would be identical year to year, but the numbers have been going UP with the success of the two clubs. And, as I said, people are allowed to choose the option of not supporting anyone.

Sydney and Brisbane ARE the two most supported clubs in the AFL, make no mistake about it, and don't fall into the trap of thinking they aren't, simply because they're not the two most "passionately" supported. They are still the two most supported. You can't disagree with presented facts, just because you don't accept what you see.

When presented with facts there is a need to understand why they are the way they are. If a Chinese team was started tomorrow and this survey was conducted in China, the team would instantly have over 1 billion supporters.

If most Melbournians were asked which team they support in the NRL they would say the Storm. Most would not follow the sport at all but they would like the Melbourne team to do well. These people should not be classed as supporters. A supporter and a person who wants their local team to perform well based only on its geographical location are different things.

I believe that this survey has always indicated that Sydney has a bigger supporter base than Brisbane (even during 01-04). Both teams are in a similar situation (one team towns, developing markets, recent success) but Sydney has always had more supporters. The obvious variable is the size of the populations. Sydney has a bigger population so Sydney has bigger support in this survey. If you started a new sport and gave each state a team, a survey would indicate that Sydney was the most popular with Tasmania or Darwin being the least popular.

 

[West Coast 06]

I dunno, look it up. Probably about $170 or so for an adult budget seat, which will get you a crud seat behind the goals. But I don't really know for sure.
I know it's a heck of a lot more expensive than going to the footy in Melbourne though.

From the Freo website it is $223 for a budget adult membership. $488 is the most expensive.

A West Coast Captains club membership is their most expensive at $538. The budget ones are $215 I think.

 

[frankc]

So Greater Manchester has 3 EPL clubs ?? Melbourne has 9 AFL clubs ... plus one in Geelong, which could be considered to be part of "Melbourne Province".

I am sure that a "Melbourne United" AFL club would easily be a greater supported club from a local perspective than Manchester United.

The combined membership of the 9 Victorian sides is around 300,000. What is the membership of the 3 clubs within Greater manchester?

 

[Shedmania]

A-League average attendance for this year (with one round to go) is 12, 907. That means it has jumped two spots from 17 to 15.

Melbourne Victory's average home attendance this year was 27, 728. With less games at Olympic Park next year and more at the Dome, that could rise beyond 30, 000.

 

[Le KooK]

Sydney and Brisbane ARE the two most supported clubs in the AFL, make no mistake about it, and don't fall into the trap of thinking they aren't, simply because they're not the two most "passionately" supported. They are still the two most supported. You can't disagree with presented facts, just because you don't accept what you see.

While you may be right, surveys can produce varying results. I once read a survey whereby the Brisbane Broncos were declared the most supported sporting team in Australia. I suppose I'll just maintain this result as 'fact' and rubbish whatever anyone else says then eh?

You can feel smug in throwing back to surveys all you like - but I will strongly argue that the West Coast Eagles are the best supported side in the AFL (you can throw in 'most' or 'greatest' or whatever descriptive you want). Seeing those scenes after the GF - with thousands upon thousands of WCE fans crammed into that oval (sorry I don't know the name of it), there's no doubt in my mind who gets the best support in the AFL. 3 GF victories for Brisbane and we NEVER got anywhere near that level of enthusiasm up here I'm afraid.

 

[defier]

Oops, missed the NFL.......which should really be called the NTL (National Throwing League!)

Maybe Murali could go there?