Premier League Average Attendances vs Stadium Capacity
Yesterday MOMS published an article on how Aston Villa’s average home attendance had increased last season, but was below the Premier League average. As some fans pointed out, due to the different sizes of Premier League club’s stadiums, it only tells half the story. How are teams actually filling their grounds in relation to the actual capacity of it?
Luckily MOMS reader Joel Haynes was on hand to knock up a swift spreadsheet of what the average attendance is as a percentage of the respective team’s stadium’s full capacity.
For those of you who think statistics that show Villa in a bad light are negative propaganda, you better look away now.
The overall Premier League average of all games being 95.60% of capacity is impressive, but as we all know Aston Villa only get full houses when the likes of Manchester United or Liverpool come to town. Yet despite poor performances on the pitch with an astonishing 19 league home defeats in the last two seasons, having an average attendance of over 36,000 last season was pretty good.
With a team that can entertain the Villa Park faithful and chalk up better results, the average attendance would be expected to rise a couple of thousand relatively easily.
It’s no surprise seeing two under-performing teams (Villa and Sunderland) with over 40,000 capacity stadiums being the only two teams whose average attendance is less than 90% of their capacity. The bigger the ground, the bigger the holes that will appear when under performing.
Interestingly it seems the David Moyes factor has seen Manchester United slip from what would have been an expected first place in the above table. It doesn’t matter how big a team’s fanbase is, if what’s happening on the pitch isn’t good enough, they’ll be empty seats m’lord.
I am surprise Liverpool and spurs is not closer to 100%, there never seems to be any empty seats or tickets on general sale, find it hard to believe average 600 people don’t turn up at spurs each week and 800 at Liverpool.
As this comment box wouldn’t take my long comment in one go I entered it in three comments, which are now backwards, so perhaps MOMS could sort that out. WordPress allows you to edit comments
I’ve had this problem when posting longer comments, will look into it. Also will see if I can edit order of your comments below. Thanks.
As has been mentioned by various people, The fact that we got 36k is pretty amazing considering the drivel we’ve been watching and the number of defeats at VP. And I believe it has gone up in the two season post-McLeish, when there was a dramatic fall.
It would be interesting to see the rise and fall of annual attendances by club over 10 years and relate that to performances somehow. Or related to other off field trouble.
There does seem to be a good number of fair weather supporters for Villa as under MON we had a few years of great attendances. These dropped off considerably as a protest against McLeish and have picked up, amazingly, under Lambo.
You coudl argue that the disgruntled, diehard fans have returned DESPITE the shit performances. That is the most interesting point about attendances, to me.
It is interesting to see how our attendances work out in comparison to other teams. There are so many confounds though, so it’s difficult for these snapshots to show anything meaningful.
Villa’s average attendance of 36k is actually higher than the capacity of 10 of the other teams in the PL, so it’s difficult to argue we’re the worst supported (I know you didn’t say this MOMS).
I used to say this very same thing to Bluenoses when they were in the PL and telling me how their fans were the best. Our average is bigger than your capacity, simples.
I’m glad you showed these data to compliment yesterdays table. You got a fair bit of stick, some fair some not. However, this doesn’t tell the whole story either, but it is an improved picture for sure.
We can criticise this approach because teams with large stadiums that have been doing relatively poorly for several years, Villa and Sunderland (as you point out), will have lost the ‘fair weather’ fans. Whereas teams that are on the up in smaller stadiums will have a higher ‘full up percentage’, in general terms.
Both this and yesterday’s report use rather crude measures. That’s not to say it’s not interesting, because it is. We just need to be careful to take it for what it is.
For a better picture we need to devise a formula that accounts for ground capacity, attendance as well as overall team performance this season and over the last few – to gauge relative poor/good performance. I’m not quite sure how you would manage that.
Although interesting this table doesn’t mean Villa have the shittest fans, worst attendances or most fickle fans, as Dolly once said.
It’s got nothing to do with suggesting the quality of Aston Villa’s support. There’s no agendas etc. It’s just numbers and statistics. The overall context is perhaps how Villa stand in the overall picture of the Premier League. Yes, performances and results make a big difference, that’s why a new owner has to come in and reverse the slump. There is still the opportunity to fill the stadium and maybe trigger the plans to revamp the North stand. If 36,000+ are watching crap, then a decent team will easily see an increase of two or three thousand to the average.
when was the last time there was a capacity crowd @ Villa ?
All I can say is 36000 every home game to watch that shit imagine how many would want to come and watch us if we were successful. VTID
pathetic the lengths some fans will go to paint the club in as poor a light as possible
Oh sorry, I suppose it’s a better policy just to censor the truth is it? Looks like we’re restricted to coverage of the 1982 European Cup final and other historical events. Get a grip Colin.
get a grip ? the reality is that under Lambert we’ve gone back to the drawing board & are building a squad from the ground upwards on a limited budget , yet it would seem some folk expect miracles . Of course there have been upsets as the Prem is a difficult place to attempt the impossible !
ps I’ve also been having problem with long posts not fitting the box