Post by QPR Report on Nov 30, 2008 7:38:02 GMT
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The Observer/Paul Wilson -
From top to bottom, England is the home of entertainment Even during these difficult times, the demand for English football's inimitable brand of escapism is still going strong.
Sometimes it takes a fresh pair of eyes to see properly what is staring you in the face, and Fernando Torres has just been extremely complimentary about top-level football in England.
'The Premier League is way ahead of the Spanish League,' the Liverpool striker said. 'You go to a team in the relegation zone and you find yourself playing on a perfect pitch, with the stands full to bursting and opponents who are there to play football. Even if they lose, the crowd are going to cheer them on until the death. You see this only in British football. It isn't easy to adapt, but once you have you would have trouble wanting to play anywhere else.'
So even if attendances have started to dip due to the economic climate, the number of empty seats ought to be put into perspective. Entertainment as a form of escapism usually does well during depressions and, though more expensive than it ought to be when compared with other leagues across Europe, the basic health of football in this country is still measurable at the turnstiles. Manchester City may be struggling to sell out today's derby, but Eastlands attendances are up on last season. Manchester United regularly falling a mere 1,000 short of Old Trafford's 76,180 capacity is hardly a calamity either and, though it has been claimed that Chelsea's game against Arsenal this afternoon has not sold out, the only seats available on the website on Thursday cost £650 each and involved dinner with Graeme Le Saux and Mark Ramprakash. That's as near to a sell-out as makes no difference.
There may be swathes of empty seats elsewhere, though Blackburn and Wigan are a hard sell at the best of times, and this is clearly not that. Newcastle and Sunderland are still getting respectable crowds despite their patchy form and, thanks to free beer and other occasional gimmicks, Bolton's gates have gone up. Rightly alarmed at failing to sell out against Liverpool and Manchester United, Everton were the first to do the square thing by their fans and immediately pass on the reduction in the VAT rate, yet there were only pockets of unoccupied seats for both of those games and had supporters realised tickets were still available more would have been snapped up.
The demand is still there, in other words, it is just a matter of clubs adjusting their prices downwards, which many seem prepared to do. Tickets are getting cheaper. Most clubs outside the Champions League bracket now have affordable deals on season tickets and many are actively targeting younger supporters with cheap deals for kids. Ironically, it is only the extremely well supported clubs, such as Liverpool and Manchester United, where non-season-ticket-holding parents find it almost impossible to obtain tickets on the open market to introduce their children to the experience of a live game.
That is the price of Champions League football, if you like, or, to put it another way, the cost of Torres's wages. The compensation is that outside the top four, indeed outside the Premier League, the big-match experience is still available a long way down the divisions. There was no need for Torres to stop at the Premier League relegation zone in his survey of enthusiasm for football in England. Last Tuesday night, a bitterly cold one as it happens, 27,111 watched Sheffield United v Wolves in the Championship, 25,534 saw Derby v Preston and 24,032 turned up for Norwich v Crystal Palace. Those attendances were greater than half a dozen Champions League gates last week (no, I am not including the empty stadium for Atlético Madrid v PSV), and Bramall Lane even topped the crowd for Villarreal v Manchester United. In League One on the same evening, that's the Third Division in old money, 16,961 watched Leicester beat Crewe and more than 10,000 saw Huddersfield lose at home to Orient.
This happens to be the Terriers' centenary season, and Huddersfield supporters have been taking advantage of season tickets at a special price of £100. Doubtless they were partly inspired by the success of the pioneering scheme a few miles down the road at Bradford, where season tickets were made available at rock-bottom prices once sufficient numbers of fans signed a pledge to buy them. Even now, the Tykes' crowds set them apart from the rest of League Two. There were only 1,182 spectators at Macclesfield on Tuesday, 2,416 at Darlington and 2,625 at Aldershot, yet 12,145 saw the five-goal thriller between Bradford and Chesterfield. This is the bottom tier of English League football, remember, three whole divisions below the level Torres inhabits - more if you go along with the idea that the top four are in a league of their own - and Bradford drew a bigger crowd than a couple of Thursday's Uefa Cup games.
This is not to suggest England is the cheapest place to watch football, or the country with the biggest attendances. Germany is still the place to be if you wish to see top-level football at a bargain price. Bayern Munich's 69,000 seat Allianz Arena sells out most weeks, hardly surprising for a state-of-the-art venue with a Champions League side where prices start at just €12 (£10) and even the most expensive seats are only €60. Most other German teams are even cheaper to watch, and most play to capacity crowds more often than not, although, with budgets constrained both by pricing policy and a ban on foreign investment, the Bundesliga lacks the star quality (and the staggering salaries) of the Premier League. German clubs may not be the international forces they once were but, within the country, football is affordable and demonstrably popular.
While, to some extent, England offers the best of both worlds, with its leading teams beginning to dominate the Champions League and even fourth-tier clubs pulling in five-figure gates, no one would pretend that trying to watch the top clubs is easy or affordable. A survey has just calculated that the average price of admission in England is €43, which does not sound too bad compared to €27 in Italy and €40 in Spain, but for that money you could only get to see an average team. The same survey also worked out, more pertinently, that it cost almost three times as much (€67) to watch Chelsea v Bordeaux as the €23 it cost to watch Bordeaux v Chelsea. On the other hand, Chelsea could be worth three times more than Bordeaux. They've got a decent chance of winning the League, for a start, and they have proved fairly handy in Europe. Even at €67 they could still be a bargain, though you will have to make up your own mind about £650 for Le Saux and Ramprakash.
www.guardian.co.uk/football/2008/nov/30/premier-league-championship-league-one-league-two
The Observer/Paul Wilson -
From top to bottom, England is the home of entertainment Even during these difficult times, the demand for English football's inimitable brand of escapism is still going strong.
Sometimes it takes a fresh pair of eyes to see properly what is staring you in the face, and Fernando Torres has just been extremely complimentary about top-level football in England.
'The Premier League is way ahead of the Spanish League,' the Liverpool striker said. 'You go to a team in the relegation zone and you find yourself playing on a perfect pitch, with the stands full to bursting and opponents who are there to play football. Even if they lose, the crowd are going to cheer them on until the death. You see this only in British football. It isn't easy to adapt, but once you have you would have trouble wanting to play anywhere else.'
So even if attendances have started to dip due to the economic climate, the number of empty seats ought to be put into perspective. Entertainment as a form of escapism usually does well during depressions and, though more expensive than it ought to be when compared with other leagues across Europe, the basic health of football in this country is still measurable at the turnstiles. Manchester City may be struggling to sell out today's derby, but Eastlands attendances are up on last season. Manchester United regularly falling a mere 1,000 short of Old Trafford's 76,180 capacity is hardly a calamity either and, though it has been claimed that Chelsea's game against Arsenal this afternoon has not sold out, the only seats available on the website on Thursday cost £650 each and involved dinner with Graeme Le Saux and Mark Ramprakash. That's as near to a sell-out as makes no difference.
There may be swathes of empty seats elsewhere, though Blackburn and Wigan are a hard sell at the best of times, and this is clearly not that. Newcastle and Sunderland are still getting respectable crowds despite their patchy form and, thanks to free beer and other occasional gimmicks, Bolton's gates have gone up. Rightly alarmed at failing to sell out against Liverpool and Manchester United, Everton were the first to do the square thing by their fans and immediately pass on the reduction in the VAT rate, yet there were only pockets of unoccupied seats for both of those games and had supporters realised tickets were still available more would have been snapped up.
The demand is still there, in other words, it is just a matter of clubs adjusting their prices downwards, which many seem prepared to do. Tickets are getting cheaper. Most clubs outside the Champions League bracket now have affordable deals on season tickets and many are actively targeting younger supporters with cheap deals for kids. Ironically, it is only the extremely well supported clubs, such as Liverpool and Manchester United, where non-season-ticket-holding parents find it almost impossible to obtain tickets on the open market to introduce their children to the experience of a live game.
That is the price of Champions League football, if you like, or, to put it another way, the cost of Torres's wages. The compensation is that outside the top four, indeed outside the Premier League, the big-match experience is still available a long way down the divisions. There was no need for Torres to stop at the Premier League relegation zone in his survey of enthusiasm for football in England. Last Tuesday night, a bitterly cold one as it happens, 27,111 watched Sheffield United v Wolves in the Championship, 25,534 saw Derby v Preston and 24,032 turned up for Norwich v Crystal Palace. Those attendances were greater than half a dozen Champions League gates last week (no, I am not including the empty stadium for Atlético Madrid v PSV), and Bramall Lane even topped the crowd for Villarreal v Manchester United. In League One on the same evening, that's the Third Division in old money, 16,961 watched Leicester beat Crewe and more than 10,000 saw Huddersfield lose at home to Orient.
This happens to be the Terriers' centenary season, and Huddersfield supporters have been taking advantage of season tickets at a special price of £100. Doubtless they were partly inspired by the success of the pioneering scheme a few miles down the road at Bradford, where season tickets were made available at rock-bottom prices once sufficient numbers of fans signed a pledge to buy them. Even now, the Tykes' crowds set them apart from the rest of League Two. There were only 1,182 spectators at Macclesfield on Tuesday, 2,416 at Darlington and 2,625 at Aldershot, yet 12,145 saw the five-goal thriller between Bradford and Chesterfield. This is the bottom tier of English League football, remember, three whole divisions below the level Torres inhabits - more if you go along with the idea that the top four are in a league of their own - and Bradford drew a bigger crowd than a couple of Thursday's Uefa Cup games.
This is not to suggest England is the cheapest place to watch football, or the country with the biggest attendances. Germany is still the place to be if you wish to see top-level football at a bargain price. Bayern Munich's 69,000 seat Allianz Arena sells out most weeks, hardly surprising for a state-of-the-art venue with a Champions League side where prices start at just €12 (£10) and even the most expensive seats are only €60. Most other German teams are even cheaper to watch, and most play to capacity crowds more often than not, although, with budgets constrained both by pricing policy and a ban on foreign investment, the Bundesliga lacks the star quality (and the staggering salaries) of the Premier League. German clubs may not be the international forces they once were but, within the country, football is affordable and demonstrably popular.
While, to some extent, England offers the best of both worlds, with its leading teams beginning to dominate the Champions League and even fourth-tier clubs pulling in five-figure gates, no one would pretend that trying to watch the top clubs is easy or affordable. A survey has just calculated that the average price of admission in England is €43, which does not sound too bad compared to €27 in Italy and €40 in Spain, but for that money you could only get to see an average team. The same survey also worked out, more pertinently, that it cost almost three times as much (€67) to watch Chelsea v Bordeaux as the €23 it cost to watch Bordeaux v Chelsea. On the other hand, Chelsea could be worth three times more than Bordeaux. They've got a decent chance of winning the League, for a start, and they have proved fairly handy in Europe. Even at €67 they could still be a bargain, though you will have to make up your own mind about £650 for Le Saux and Ramprakash.
www.guardian.co.uk/football/2008/nov/30/premier-league-championship-league-one-league-two