2006 attendances discussion

[pineapple stu]

One-third of the way through the season (one round of games in the Premier Division; just past one round in the First Division), so I said I'd post some stats on the attendances for if anyone wants to give their views on them. Obviously they're not official or 100% accurate, but they're good enough for the Genesis Report, so they can't be that far removed from reality. I've left out the 2003 figures as they were clearly way too high. There's figures for all the Premier games and all bar six First Division games.

AVERAGE ATTENDANCES
Club	       Overall    2006 	  2005	  2004
Athlone Town	   319 	   350 	   316 	   291 
Bohemians	 2,181 	 1,785 	 1,976 	 2,340 
Bray Wanderers	 1,323 	 1,600 	 1,550 	   818 
Cobh Ramblers	   356 	   424 	   403 	   240 
Cork City	 3,796 	 3,360 	 3,644 	 4,033 
Derry City	 2,230 	 2,285 	 2,698 	 1,672 
Drogheda United	 1,752 	 1,735 	 1,682 	 1,554 
Dublin City	   436 	   542 	   175 	   592 
Dundalk	           633 	   833 	   474 	   591 
Finn Harps	   994 	   530 	 1,347 	 1,106 
Galway United	   688 	   927 	   566 	   571 
Kildare County	   276 	   343 	   186 	   298 
Kilkenny City	   142 	   133 	   185 	   110 
Limerick FC	   434 	   445 	   669 	   188 
Longford Town	 1,163 	   930 	 1,004 	 1,131 
Monaghan United	   207 	   256 	   183 	   182 
Saint Pat's Ath	 2,027 	 1,656 	 1,599 	 1,882 
Shamrock Rovers	 1,572 	 1,363 	 1,539 	 1,349 
Shelbourne	 2,028 	 1,433 	 1,949 	 2,158 
Sligo Rovers	 1,537 	 2,034 	 1,794 	   781 
UCD	           574 	   555 	   653 	   306 
Waterford Utd	 1,667 	   882 	 1,513 	 1,753 
				
Premier Div	 1,859 	 1,495 	 1,759 	 1,853 
First Division	   529 	   555 	   520 	   512 

Overall average	 1,342 	 1,089 	 1,195 	 1,218

[pineapple stu]

And stats for percentage change... "Overall" is change from 2004 figures; 2006 is change this year compared to last year, etc. 2003 left out again.

Club	        Overall	   2006	   2005
Athlone Town	 20.48%	 10.82%	  8.72%
Bohemians	-32.03%	 -9.68%	-15.56%
Bray Wanderers	 95.68%	  3.23%	 89.57%
Cobh Ramblers	 76.35%	  5.34%	 67.40%
Cork City	-18.97%	 -7.80%	 -9.64%
Derry City	  0.87%	-15.32%	 61.33%
Drogheda United	-14.84%	  3.15%	  8.24%
Dublin City	 -8.47%	210.47%	-70.52%
Dundalk	         40.96%	 75.81%	-19.82%
Finn Harps	-52.09%	-60.64%	 21.73%
Galway United	 62.39%	 63.73%	 -0.82%
Kildare County	 15.32%	 84.26%	-37.41%
Kilkenny City	 20.59%	-28.20%	 67.96%
Limerick FC	135.95%	-33.53%	254.95%
Longford Town	-41.36%	 -7.36%	-11.18%
Monaghan United	 40.31%	 39.55%	  0.55%
Saint Pat's Ath	-44.25%	  3.59%	-15.06%
Shamrock Rovers	-33.13%	-11.44%	 14.05%
Shelbourne	-44.29%	-26.44%	 -9.72%
Sligo Rovers	160.35%	 13.36%	129.67%
UCD	        -29.19%	-15.07%	113.24%
Waterford Utd	-64.99%	-41.68%	-13.72%
			
Premier Div	-35.88%	-15.03%	 -5.04%
First Division	  8.36%	  6.72%	  1.54%

Overall average	-53.30%	 -8.88%	 -1.94%

Edit - just noticed the percentages are from 2003 for Premier Division clubs; too lazy to change that now... The increase/decrease for the Premier clubs is understated/overstated a fair bit respectively.

[pineapple stu]

Some fairly poor figures this season - Shels, Waterford and Longford stand out for going backwards continually. Harps' crowds have plummeted since relegation, while there's certainly nothing in the figures to indicated the Super-Duper league would increase attendances as mooted.

As far as UCD's concerned, I think our home support is up while the away Dublin support is down as Bohs, Rovers and Pat's have been struggling in recent seasons, which obviously will make a difference to us (and no mypost, I'm not interesting in starting discussions about how we'd be up if we didn't have to play a non-entity instead of the best supported team history's ever known; in part because we haven't played DC at home yet anyway). Any other reasons as to increases/decreases from various clubs?

[pete]

Would be interesting to see total annual attendances for the top sides in particular as i think the more cup & european games you have the more league attendances suffer who overall total may rise.

I know city would have had about 20,000 at 3 inter toto games in 2004 & about 15,000 at 3 Uefa Cup games in 2005.

[citybone]

One-third of the way through the season (one round of games in the Premier Division; just past one round in the First Division), so I said I'd post some stats on the attendances for if anyone wants to give their views on them. Obviously they're not official or 100% accurate, but they're good enough for the Genesis Report, so they can't be that far removed from reality. I've left out the 2003 figures as they were clearly way too high. There's figures for all the Premier games and all bar six First Division games.

AVERAGE ATTENDANCES
Club	       Overall    2006 	  2005	  2004
Athlone Town	   319 	   350 	   316 	   291 
Bohemians	 2,181 	 1,785 	 1,976 	 2,340 
Bray Wanderers	 1,323 	 1,600 	 1,550 	   818 
Cobh Ramblers	   356 	   424 	   403 	   240 
Cork City	 3,796 	 3,360 	 3,644 	 4,033 
Derry City	 2,230 	 2,285 	 2,698 	 1,672 
Drogheda United	 1,752 	 1,735 	 1,682 	 1,554 
Dublin City	   436 	   542 	   175 	   592 
Dundalk	           633 	   833 	   474 	   591 
Finn Harps	   994 	   530 	 1,347 	 1,106 
Galway United	   688 	   927 	   566 	   571 
Kildare County	   276 	   343 	   186 	   298 
Kilkenny City	   142 	   133 	   185 	   110 
Limerick FC	   434 	   445 	   669 	   188 
Longford Town	 1,163 	   930 	 1,004 	 1,131 
Monaghan United	   207 	   256 	   183 	   182 
Saint Pat's Ath	 2,027 	 1,656 	 1,599 	 1,882 
Shamrock Rovers	 1,572 	 1,363 	 1,539 	 1,349 
Shelbourne	 2,028 	 1,433 	 1,949 	 2,158 
Sligo Rovers	 1,537 	 2,034 	 1,794 	   781 
UCD	           574 	   555 	   653 	   306 
Waterford Utd	 1,667 	   882 	 1,513 	 1,753 
				
Premier Div	 1,859 	 1,495 	 1,759 	 1,853 
First Division	   529 	   555 	   520 	   512 

Overall average	 1,342 	 1,089 	 1,195 	 1,218

how can clubs survive like that? traveling costs would nearly equel gate receipts alone

[pineapple stu]

I'd imagine the players are paid a nominal amount. Monaghan's bar helps, as would their new astro. One of the papers gave a run-down of club turnover last season - Killkenny's was E80k. Remarkable they can put out a team on that little, but then the two teams' usual league placing reflects what you highlighted.

[red bellied]

attendaces are a fcukin joke until they increase in their thousands who cares not their ten or fifteens.

[Dr.Nightdub]

A few observations:
- The collapse in Shels' attendances over two years is astonishing
- I'm surprised at Cork and Derry being down on last year and Drogheda being only more or less level - maybe League attendances are suffering due to Setanta Cup overload, especially compared to 2004 when there was no Setanta?
- All of us in the Premier badly miss those green-and-white scamps coming in through the turnstiles

[dcfcsteve]

- I'm surprised at Cork and Derry being down on last year and Drogheda being only more or less level - maybe League attendances are suffering due to Setanta Cup overload, especially compared to 2004 when there was no Setanta?

Attendances at the teams that are doing well will increase as the season nears its end. Hence - if Cork and Derry are both at the top end of the table by season end, I'd expect their averages to rise accordingly - just like last year. Drogs should get a similar boost this year from being both more serious title contenders and current Cups holders

Cork had c. 9,000 at their last home game last season. If a team played 21 home games across a season with an average attendance of 3,500, having 9,000 at their 22nd and final game would increase their entire season average by 7%. That shows how it's just too early to be trying to draw significant conclusions when you're not comparing equal time-periods (let alone the fact that the data itself is collected in a variety of ways).

Unless we can compare '2006-to-date' with 'same period last year', we'll have to wait until the season is over to get a true picture.

I agree with you that the Dublin clubs in the Prem at least are likely to have seen some impact purely from Rovers being in the First.

[pete]

I agree that extra games are affecting average attendances. We have already had 11 home games (i'll include Setanta Cup final as almost home game due to numbers) whereas some teams have barely had 11 games in total this season.

When you have big Setanta Cup, League & European games its clear that UCD & Dublin City attendances will suffer. As long as we get 5000 for the bigger games the yearly average will not suffer.

[pineapple stu]

Unless we can compare '2006-to-date' with 'same period last year', we'll have to wait until the season is over to get a true picture.

True. The overall average is down 9% this year. I think it was July last year when the overall average became a decrease.

Cork's 9000 was a one-off figure not matched by anyone else in the league. I don't think any other club would actually have one figure skew their average by so much that the current year's figures wouldn't now be comparable to last year's overall average (bar Dublin City v Bohs this year).

[BohDiddley]

Great work PS.
Makes for sad reading though.

[dubman]

what ever did pats do with all the people , just a few years ago 5,000 was easy to get ... shame on them

[Dr.Nightdub]

Answer: Zimbru.

Stu, for future reference, all the official Pats attendances are here: http://www.stpatsfc.com/attendances.php , hadn't noticed that bit on the site before. Our guesstimates here aren't too far off the mark - you have us down for 1656 so far this season, the official average is 1541.

[Stato]

AVERAGE ATTENDANCES
Club	       Overall    2006 	  2005	  2004
Saint Pat's Ath	 2,027 	 1,656 	 1,599 	 1,882

Can I ask what the "overall" figure means, given that it's higher in the above case than any of the last three seasons? Is it an average that included the mystical 2003 figures?

[pineapple stu]

Can I ask what the "overall" figure means, given that it's higher in the above case than any of the last three seasons? Is it an average that included the mystical 2003 figures?

Good spot. Must do, yeah.

Will put the Pat's figures into the database from that link Nightdub - cheers.

[citybone]

A few observations:
- The collapse in Shels' attendances over two years is astonishing
- I'm surprised at Cork and Derry being down on last year and Drogheda being only more or less level - maybe League attendances are suffering due to Setanta Cup overload, especially compared to 2004 when there was no Setanta?
- All of us in the Premier badly miss those green-and-white scamps coming in through the turnstiles

well citys shed end is gone which means much less covered areas we have not had many big home league games this year yet bar $h£l$
we still have drogs and derry in the league to come

[Raheny Red]

I can't explain why we have had no good attendances over the past 2/3 seasons (cue: you lot have no fans). However, there are fans out there but not bothering themselves do actually go to the games! This might be down to the prices, the horrible toilets. But moving away to the problems off the pitch, these folk should be going to the games because of what is happening on the pitch. My estimation for Satuday's InterNoNo game will be no more 2,200 - sad and pathetic!