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It's not just football suffering from smaller crowds

24th April, 2011
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Expert
24th April, 2011
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Do small crowds mean Australians don’t care about the AFC Champions League? A couple of editorials in the Fairfax press last week hinted as much, but the truth is that for a variety of reasons, crowds across all of our sporting codes are dwindling.

Parramatta Stadium was half empty yesterday as the Eels beat Gold Coast Titans in an NRL thriller, despite Parramatta offering cheap family-day tickets to their supporters.

Just over 10,000 fans took up the offer, which wasn’t that many more than the 5,693 supporters who turned out in pouring rain to watch Melbourne Victory beat Chinese side Tianjin Teda last week.

Over in Adelaide, the lowest AFL crowd of the round to date – just 21,287 fans – turned out at AAMI Stadium to see Port Adelaide crash spectacularly to the Gold Coast Suns.

Like the Eels, Port suffered the indignity of running out into a half-empty arena. Interestingly, both they and the Eels were playing newly-minted Gold Coast expansion teams.

Critics will cite extenuating circumstances for the small crowds.

Both teams are out of form, the Eels game was broadcast on Channel Nine, AAMI Stadium is too far from the Adelaide city centre, it was a public holiday, and so on.

But the truth is probably more prosaic than that.

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Parramatta Eels only get big crowds when they play a Sydney-based rival such as Canterbury or the Wests Tigers.

Occasionally a winning run like those in 2005 or 2009 lures the would-be fans out of the woodwork, but despite being one of the most popular teams in the NRL, the Eels can generally only call upon a base of around 10,000 fans to attend games.

AFL crowds in Adelaide seem to be heading backwards, with the much-vaunted ‘showdown’ between Port and the Adelaide Crows failing to sell out a couple of weeks back.

And while many will point to today’s fixtures in the NRL and AFL as proof that Australians still turn out en masse to watch live sport, the fact is teams across all codes are pulling in fewer spectators than they might once have hoped.

The ANZAC Day fixtures hint at part of the problem.

No longer content to watch teams through thick and thin, increasingly Australian sports fans are only showing up for the big events.

More concerned with being entertained than barracking for one side, these fans turn up to A-League grand finals to sample the atmosphere and be part of an historic event.

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They’re the type of fans Sydney FC attracted in their inaugural season, pencilling in an A-League game as part of their cultural calendar before moving on to the next trend.

And while we should welcome all types of supporters through the turnstiles, the problem is how to maintain interest from non-diehard supporters in the face of so much competing entertainment.

This is where the cost of ticket prices plays a role.

A-League and Champions League tickets are not overly expensive, but factor in the cost of travel, the watered-down light beer, and the culinary disgrace Australian stadia call food, and suddenly the cost of attendance grows. At a time when many are struggling with current living costs, it’s no doubt a factor.

Why struggle with the traffic, the abominable food, and other inconveniences when chances are the match we’re interested will be broadcast on TV anyway?

It’s true Australians aren’t particularly interested in the AFC Champions League, but then neither are the Japanese or South Koreans or fans in the Middle-East.

And using crowd figures to gauge interest overlooks a broader problem: Australians are increasingly selective about the sporting games they attend, so unless it’s a big-match event or a run to the finals, smaller crowds could soon become the norm.

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