Subject: Football shame !

the arguments and points are totally valid for what i was replying to.

German stadiums were poorer for their WC bid and more people watch football in England, totals and proportionately. Facts.

Last season the average attendance was 34,150 in Premier League and 41,802 in the Bundesliga according to Wikipedia. So much for your facts...

British stadiums were poorer before the EC in 1996... and so what? It doesn't mean a ****

and more people watch football in England
wrong:P

its not at all. Theres about 3 or 4 times as many clubs in Britain and 20m less people. Average attendances are going to be lower. Total attendances across all leagues up and down the country are higher + you'll have the half of a million or so that are playing/managing/actively involved in the games and the millions that watch it in the pubs. Proportionately, there wont be a country that's more involved in football in the entire world, not by a long shot

I would be careful with those statements as there are other football crazy countries as well.

If you take a small country, for example Uruguay with only 3.5 mio inhabitants, you might be wrong with this proportional thinking. Their strong national team already implies a huge football tradition throughout the whole nation.

all of their top division cities bar one are from the same city which has 1.3m people. In that city, maybe it could challenge England, as a country, no.

How can you conclude from that knowledge how many of the people there are involved in football?
Well, you can't. And that is the point here. You're claiming things that can't be properly quantified without a lot of work.

no, but from just looking at the broad facts, English football is probably the most watched in the world, despite the ridiculously high ticket prices compared to the rest of the world

The Bundesliga remains the cheapest league in Europe: an average price for a ticket last season was 20.79 euros compared to 43 euros in England's Premier League and 40 euros for a Spanish league match.

And German fans were holding protests because of those prices.

Bundesliga - the cheapest league in Europe? Hahaha... I'm quite sure the Danish league had a lower average prize than 20 euros. And I'd be surprised if the Moldovan or Estonian leagues were more expensive on average.

The size of the population, the ticket prize and any newer major international tournament in a country doesn't count. Fact. What counts is the average attendance. Fact. And last season the average attendance in Germany was higher than in England. Fact.

That wasnt anything i made up, that was a direct quote. You can get standing tickets for less than 10 euros in germany, in England you'll be lucky to get to a game for less than 25 quid which must be about 35 euros these days. Thats a big difference, we're in a recession and still having more people watch games over a season. The average attendance in germany was higher, FOR THE TOP LEAGUE. Look at the teams in England in the second and third tier. Our 3rd tier had the same attendance as the German second tier.

Newcastle, Leeds, Norwich, ipswich, southampton, charlton, sheffields, middlesborough, cardiff. Big teams getting big attendances, but down the pecking order. My local team had an average attendance of over 2k and this is in the 7th tier, same for FC united. Oxford in the 5th tier get 8k.

Across the country, England still has more people watching, despite all the things that should mean they shouldnt be (stupid kick off times, cost, recession, lack of tickets (ST holders), amount of games, tv, etc, etc). Deny any of that.

Germany has a higher average attendance in their best league compared to England. Deny that.

If in England there are more expensive tickets less people would come to watch WC

because that has any relevance to anything?

Yeah, the top league has bigger average attendances, so what? That hasnt been the argument at any point.

Yes, it blatently has, I'm going to weigh in now and say this, you're anti-FIFA/Russian/Qatari.

The Premier League does have higher ticket prices, but I'm sure the WC isn't the PL. :)

what football fan isnt anti-fifa? Or anti-qatari?

very true.

After all, Lloyd loves Qatar's football heritage, and the great job FIFA do...

oh, wait...