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Euroleague attendance figures mostly dismal through four weeks

November 14, 2009

The numbers are in and if one thing can be said about Euroleague 2009-10 this early on, it’s that this association is hardly free of the specter of economic woes. After Partizan and Alba Berlin set attendance records in 2008-09, this season has heretofore seen a most remarkable downturn in paying fandom with Lottomatica Roma and possibly Efes Pilsen appearing to be the only teams with a chance to record decent growth for the season.

Attendance rates for week four games were reported as the following, though perhaps slight adjustment is needed in some cases with regard to actual *people showing up at the arena* (more on this in a moment).


Lietuvos Rytas vs. Partizan: 8500 reported in attendance
Olympiacos vs. Efes Pilsen: 7200
Roma vs. Maccabi: 5745
Orleans vs. Unicaja: 5000
Oldenburg vs. Real: 4104
Prokom vs. Panathinaikos: 4100
Barcelona vs. Asvel: 4021
Cibona vs. Zalgiris: 2500
CSKA vs. Olimpija: 2500
AJ Milano vs. Khimki: 2059
Maroussi – Caja Laboral: 2050
Fenerbahce vs. Siena: 1000

While most of these numbers seem legit, empirical evidence questions some of the figures reported this season. BC Maroussi reported attendance of 1,650 and 1,700 for its games against CSKA Moscow and Roma (representing capacity of 8.73% and 9% in its venue seating 18,900), though many observers have stated fewer than 1,000 went to these games. For just a small taste of this debate, the argument at Interbasket’s forums may be visited (and/or fueled) here.

With the actual basis for counting “attendance” not set in stone, though, one does have to wonder. Having watched week four’s Cibona-Zalgiris, wellllllllllllllll, i suppose you could imagine 2,500 people were there, or that lots (lots!) of folks showed up to catch the first half of the third quarter.

And even if the Roma-Maccabi game sold 5,700-plus tickets while the venue has been a relative success in Euroleague in drawing fans, the depressing 42% average capacity would seem to dwarf the home-crowd impact in such a massive venue.

In terms of sheer capacity rates, the numbers are as follows. Number in parentheses indicates average attendance; an asterisk denotes just one game played at the given home stadium.

1. Maccabi Tel Aviv, 100% (11,000)
2. Baskonia, 96.97% (9,600)*
3. Zalgiris Kaunas, 95% (4,750)
4. Asvel Basket, 94.93% (5,357)
5. Olimpija, 87.5% (5,250)
6. Partizan Belgrade, 80.08% (5,605)
7. Unicaja, 80% (8,400)
8. Khimki Moscow, 75.10% (3,950)
9. Entente Orleanaise, 73.38% (5,064)
10. Lietuvos Rytas, 70.45% (7,750)
11. EWE Baskets Oldenburg, 69.09% (3,489)
12. Montepaschi Siena, 69.64% (4,892)*
13. Asseco Prokom, 64.87% (3,567)
14. Efes Pilsen, 64% (8,000)*
15. Cibona Zagreb, 62.04% (3,350)
16. Real Madrid, 61% (9,150)
17. Panathinaikos, 52.91% (10,000)*
18. FC Barcelona, 51.88% (4,280)
19. CSKA Moscow, 45.45% (2,500)
20. Lottomatica Roma, 42.05% (4,710)
21. Olympiacos, 41.75% (6,200)
22. AJ Milano, 14.83% (1,780)
23. Maroussi BC, 9.52% (1,800)
24. Fenerbahce Ülker, 8% (1,000)

Of the repeat Euroleague contenders, the percentage change in attendance looks like the following:

1. Efes Pilsen +73.91%
2. Lottomatica Roma +24.36%
3. Olimpija +20.97%
4. Asseco Prokom +16.97%
5. Real Madrid +8.45%
6. Baskonia +6.84%
7. Montepaschi Siena +3.32%
8. Maccabi Tel Aviv +0.58%

9. Panathinaikos -2.08%
10. Zalgiris Kaunas -2.7%
11. Unicaja -5.54%
12. FC Barcelona -17.31%
13. Olympiacos -19.90%
14. Cibona Zagreb -32.66%
15. CSKA Moscow -34.64%
16. Partizan Belgrade -34.95%
17. AJ Milano -41.66%
18. Fenerbahce Ulker -76.94%

Perhaps when considered in this light, the overall attendance dropoff – currently at 6.28% — isn’t quite so generally disastrous and a few reasons might be attributed to problems at the bottom 10 listed above. Poor play might be keeping the relatively cash-strapped at home (looking in the direction of Milano and Zagreb here) in some cases, whilst surely some juggernauts (Barcelona, Olympiacos) will see better numbers as Euroleague play heads down the stretch.

There may even be a positive spin on this in the short term: After all, when the Asvels and Orleanaises are drawing twice as many as, say, CSKA Moscow, won’t the playing field be leveled somewhat in favor of the smaller-market teams? And won’t the Italian teams dreading next year’s cutback in non-European players have their woes eased in the knowledge that fellow suffering Euroleague teams (and even Serie A squads) might be less willing to plunk down euros for top-drawer American talent?

In the immediate-term future, however, certainly much hand-wringing is going on in front offices all over Europe right about now. We fans can settle back to ponder a couple of philosophical questions: 1. Does this mean Euroleague tickets might actually drop in price? and 2. If a team competes for the Euroleague championship and no one is there to see it, does it make a sound?

Nov 14, 2009ballineurope
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This post was published on November 14, 2009
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Comments: 4
  1. Morzikei
    13 years ago

    that 8500 against Partizan seems quite right, even with warning of swine flu the only empty sectors were at the back of the court (roughly 2000-3000 empty seats)… I think, thanks to some really cheap tickets, Linas Kleiza, and perhaps (should he join Rytas) the chance of seeing Macijauskas settle things with the greeks, there should be a capacity crowd against Olympiakos

    as for the CIbona-Žalgiris match – everyone probably thought the croats would get it handed to them… everything seemed good at half-time, so the fans probably came to the conclusion that them being there would help Cibona grab the vital win

    ReplyCancel
  2. kinski
    13 years ago

    outside of big soccer cities, basketball is clearly no 1: siena, malaga, vitoria, lithuania, belgrade, tel aviv…most of the times venues in these cities are sold out. unfortunately, bologna and solonica seem to be lost for euroleague, as well as berlin (what a shame, they should have been given a wild card by some means). alba berlin sells out 02 even in eurocup (10.000+ in this competition). very pleasant surprise are good numbers in france and big rise in popularity over there.
    but, high attendance figures in france and spain are no surprise. they play very fast and pretty basketball, with lots of fastbreaks, dunks, alley oops etc. who wants to see destructive cska or panathinaikos style of basketball, perfected by obradovic? i love tough defense and tough it should stay, but EL promptly needs to change the rules to allow more flow, ball movement, faster pace and most importantly, more points scored on average. who wants to see a 62:59 result, except us, basketball freaks?
    the play should be pushed towards and favour the style of play of barcelona, olympiacos, caja laboral, maccabi…allow contact (I hate NBA these days for not allowing contact like in the 90s), but….euroleague desperately needs REAL STARS, like gallis, sabonis used to be and let’s admit, THE ONLY REAL STARS OF EUROLEAGUE ARE ITS COACHES, Obradovic, Messina and alike..people dont want to come and see Obradovic’s tactical and preparatory mastery, they wanna see spectacular moves by spectacular and athletic players…euroleague is full of them these days, finally…allow these players to showcase their true potential!

    ReplyCancel
    • zakis
      13 years ago

      kinski hi – excellent post. I’m involved with a team in the greek A2 and I have been arguing for some time now that the sport has become a masonic occupation ie it is not accessible to the average fan. Coaches now dominate the game with the connivance of owners, who are only interested in their own teams and the administrators of the sport, who are not interested in anything at all to do with basketball other than as a political expression.

      the sport needs new rules, so that the likes of Obradovic can be marginalised and stop infecting the game with their negativity and new administrators, who are committed to growing the popularity of the game.

      why don’t we start a chat on how to improve the woeful condition of the sport in Europe? How about starting with the validity of current european competitions?

      ReplyCancel
  3. Данило
    13 years ago

    Hi all, I am a Partizan fan and would only comment on the attendance figures for it. Pionir arena has a capacity of 7000 seats, but Partizan played a few Top16/Top8 games in Belgrade Arena hall seating 22000 last year. So, if you take those games out of the equation, I am sure you wouldn’t be seeing a drop in attendance in Pionir this year (and especially not a drop of 34% with 80% of full capacity used anyway :).

    I am sure Partizan could fill the Arena again, but I think that was the main reason for lucklustre performance against CSKA last year in quarter finals so I’d rather if they kept the home advantage by using the familiar court.

    And woohoo, we are through to Top16 again! 🙂

    ReplyCancel
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ballineurope
13 years ago 7 Comments EuroLeague, MoreAJ Milano, Asseco Prokom, Asvel Basket, Baskonia, Caja Laboral Baskonia, Cibona Zagreb, CSKA Moscow, Efes Pilsen, Entente Orleanaise Loiret, EuroLeague, Euroleague 2009-10, Euroleague attendance, EWE Baskets Oldenburg, FC Barcelona, Fenerbahce Ülker, Khimki Moscow region, Lietuvos Rytas, Lottomatica Roma, Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv, Maroussi BC, Montepaschi Siena, Olympiacos, Panathinaikos, Partizan Belgrade, Real Madrid, Unicaja, Union Olimpija Ljubljana, Zalgiris Kaunas
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