Reuters Soccer Blog

Soccer City a white elephant? 90,000 say otherwise

Since July’s World Cup final, which attracted an official attendance of 84 490, the crowds at Johannesburg’s Soccer City have been getting bigger and bigger.

On Saturday the attendance record was beaten again when South Africa hosted its League Cup final at the venue.

Conveniently the match was between Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando Pirates, the two best supported teams in the country whose intense rivalry has been enhanced by several additional, and unexpected, cup meetings in the recent months.

Over 90,000 braved traffic problems to turn up and see the Chiefs triumph 3-0, trumping the 88,791 that watched the August rugby test when New Zealand’s All Blacks beat the Springbok in a Tri-Nations match at the gigantic stadium.

The fact rugby previously held the attendance record at Soccer City has motivated football officials to try to ensure they reclaim it as their own given the venue was extensively renovated for the World Cup and is long acknowledged as the cathedral of football in the country.

Tickets on Saturday cost R60 and R40, a snip in comparison to what was paid for the same seats at the World Cup in mid-year. (R10 = approx 1 Euro)

But South African fans have been moaning since the World Cup when the domestic league hiked up admission prices 100 percent from R20 to R40 per Premier League match.

Premier League not a sell-out

So now we know why the Premier League are so keen on taking matches on tour to Asia: the 39th game might be the only one that’s actually sold out.

According to a Daily Telegraph report, attendances at Premier League games are down by an average of almost a thousand fans per game this season. Even Manchester United have been affected, the report says, with the English and European champions having failed to sell out Old Trafford’s 76,180 seats for any game this season.

Most will see this as a sign that the recession is biting in England. Shelling out a hundred quid for a couple of tickets to a 90-minute show must feel more like a luxury than ever these days. And to quote from the Telegraph story:

It is the surest sign yet that the Premier League is not immune from the global financial downturn. The cost of entry, as well as the price of travel, is too much for fans already feeling the pinch to justify.

But can the Premier League be confident that the fans will all come back when (or perhaps if) the economy picks up? Might fans decide that the live TV menu is a more appetising one, either at home or in the pub? Outside the top four, are there that many games worth watching at sky-high prices?

I saw an interesting piece on Soccer Pie suggesting that influences from abroad are making matches in England more tactical and perhaps less exciting:

Coaches that prefer football with much more tactical tasks are more successful and all beauty of specific Island football is in doubt. Now, some matches are real chess games.