For any die hard football fan, there is nothing more appealing than going to watch your team play from the stands and terraces at your football ground. But with more televised matches, growing fuel prices and the economic recession squeezing everyone – Is going to watch a football game on a Saturday afternoon still popular and accessible for football fans?
Football Attendances
Last month, England played Sweden in a friendly match at Wembley stadium in front of 48,786 fans. Even though fans had flocked to watch England beat Spain at Wembley a week earlier, England’s national stadium was less than half full.
It’s no secret that football grounds, particularly lower down the football league pyramid struggle to attract large crowds to home games every week.
Non league football has always had a varied crowd response. FC United of Manchester is a success story with weekly high attendances, including 2075 at home to Chorley earlier this month. This has been mainly down to their co-operative business model in which all fans have a share in the running of their football club.
Other initiatives such as Non league Day have been encouraging football fans to support their local clubs instead of just supporting Premier league giants.
So are football attendances sliding or increasing? Have high ticket prices and working hours over the weekend caused viewing a football game to be an expensive luxury? Or are football fans doing everything they can to still shout for their team from the terraces?
I questioned football fans from Premier League all the way through to non league football on their experiences of visiting matches.
This report is purely based on public opinion to investigate attitudes towards visiting football matches.
I received responses from Arsenal and Manchester United fans right through to Lancaster City and Solihull Moors.
Ticket Prices
When asked if ticket prices were too high, over 66% of fans think that ticket prices are too high. The same amount of fans said they were willing to pay £11 – £20 for a ticket to see an individual football match.
A quarter of fans said they were prepared to pay between £21 and £30 for a football match ticket.
However, 45% of football fans also said that cheaper tickets would persuade them to go to more football matches.
It seems that ticket prices are a factor putting fans off attending more matches. Interestingly, ticket availability was a not an issue for the fans questioned as no one said they had any difficulties getting match tickets.
A Pie Chart showing the amount fans are willing to pay for an individual match ticket (£):
The increasing price of fuel is unsurprisingly a factor travelling to away games and also fans who live far away from the teams they support. One sixth said they don’t visit matches as they are too far away. Also, the majority of fans visit half the amount of away matches than the home games they watch. This shows that football fans do travel to football matches as much as possible but travelling is inevitably a factor that stops fans from seeing more matches.
Empty or Full stadiums?
When asked their opinion, only one sixth of fans said they felt their ground was busy on match days.
This suggests that there is possibly a problem with attendances at football matches, particularly in non-league football as their fans felt their stadiums were the emptiest.
A Pie Chart showing fan's opinions on whether their football teams' stadiums are empty or full?:
A Pie Chart showing fan's opinions on whether their football teams' stadiums are empty or full?:
Incentives to see more matches
Football fans said the main incentive for them to see more matches is cheaper tickets. Nearly half of those questioned said that this would be the main method that would encourage them to go to more of their team’s matches.
There was an equal share between other factors that would persuade fans to visit more matches. A number of fans said that cheaper fuel prices, better transport and better team performances would influence them to see more matches.
A Pie Chart showing incentives that would persuade football fans to visit more matches:
A Pie Chart showing incentives that would persuade football fans to visit more matches:
Positives of watching football matches
80% of fans say they visit football matches as a social event amongst friends and family.
Over 50% of those who answered my survey visit over 20 matches a season and all but one of my participants said they prefer to watch a match in the stadium rather than on television. This shows that the passion to go and watch football is still present.
Again, it was not surprising to discover that the non league football fans felt their grounds were half empty, quiet or empty rather than fans from the Premier League, Championship and Leagues One and Two.
Perhaps the answer is cheaper tickets, better transport services and initiatives to encourage fans to come to the stadium more. Perhaps the social side of visiting football should be exploited more. Clearly the passion to see football and visit matches is still present amongst football fans, but more initiatives should be used to harness support for local, non league and grass roots football.
The findings of my survey are not a surprise and have not uncovered anything unexpected, but it reaffirms that despite current attempts, more needs to be done to allow fans to enjoy the beautiful game from the terraces.
@amyscarisbrick
Thanks to everyone who took part in my survey, long may you keep supporting your local teams
Contact the author: ascarisbrick@uclan.ac.uk
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