Attendances - 2012-13 vs Seasons To Date

You're lucky in that I've just recently redone 1 - up to end of last season only. Saturdays vs Fridays suggest an extra 10% attendance (on Saturdays) over the seasonal average but this is not statistically significant and the significance has dropped over the last 4 seasons. However every hour the game is on later boosts attendance by an average of 3-4%.

Attached is a nice boxplot which shows the impact of Heineken Cup on attendances and the yuuuge improvement in the last 4 seasons.

Evil_g wrote: I'm a little underwhelmed by the increase in attendances this season. Am I imagining it, or were we told that every game was going to be a sell out? Shouldn't we at least be breaking 7k for an Ulster game?

I think we covered this before in another thread maybe but....

Capacity for end of season matches (Munster, Glasgow, Glasgow semi) was ~7800. This included 1900 extra (temporary) terrace places, so the "base" capacity was ~5900 which matches very closely to last season's Ulster game attendance of 5876.

This year we have the new seated stand which adds almost 300 seats which suggests a "base" capacity of ~6200. Connacht stated that Friday's Ulster game was a sellout at 6194.

We're adding temporary terracing again for Toulouse, if it's the usual 1900 extra that brings us to ~8100 "extended" capacity.

I've been critical of the branch lately on other matters but I think it's fair to say they're knocking it out of the park on tickets sales. Attendance is 1000 up on the comparable fixtures last year despite the available capacity for those matches being down by the 700 :- 24800 (6200 * 4) vs. 25500 (5900 * 3 + 7800).

I have to agree. People in the branch wring every last drop from the Sportsground in terms of ticket sales. Only way to increase would be to build the seated stand above the Clan that I believe they've gotten planning for. But given the current situation with mBord na gCon that would be the equivalent of looking for a mortgage to put an extension on a rented house you'll probably end up leaving in the not too distant future.

Just noticed that the Munster game had a record ("official") attendance for a pro 12 game in the Sportsground. (The semifinal last year was 7,800 wasn't it?)

Connacht v.	2016-17 [/b]		2015-16 [/b]		2014-15 [/b]	2013-14 [/b]	2012-13 [/b]	2011-12 [/b]	2010-11 [/b]	2009-10 [/b]
Glasgow Warriors	6,063		7,786		4,430	4,185	6,081	4,189	1,268	1,982
Ospreys	5,749		5,279		5,226	3,888	4,680	4,107	2,035	1,412
Edinburgh Rugby	5,771		3,834		5,267	4,038	4,930	4,324	1,586	1,460
Ulster Rugby	6,194		5,876		5,921	5,485	6,463	5,017	3,761	2,435
Cardiff Blues	6,190		3,274		5,247	5,168	3,869	3,996	1,856	1,425
Benetton Treviso	5,903		3,443		3,880	3,850	4,112	3,614	1,563
Munster Rugby	8,090		7,786		7,745	6,227	7,789	7,022	4,795	4,125
Newport Gwent Dragons			3,624		4,123	4,033	4,958	3,706	1,371	1,485
Leinster Rugby			7,300		5,917	7,210	5,813	6,582	4,582	3,250
Zebre			3,994		5,486	4,084	4,856
Scarlets			5,292		5,631	4,172	4,074	3,408	1,135	1,756
Average	6,280		5,226		5,352	4,758	5,239	4,597	2,395	2,148

That looks like an impressive upswing for the smaller games. The Munster match this year was definitely the most full I've ever personally seen the sportsground, the place was heaving.

So Saturday's (official) atendance smashed the previous record for a Leinster game at the Sportsground and with a game left we've broken the previous record for cumulative attendance over a regular season (62,331 so far this season vs. 58,873 over the entire 2014-15 season)

Connacht v.	2016-17 [/b]		2015-16 [/b]		2014-15 [/b]	2013-14 [/b]	2012-13 [/b]	2011-12 [/b]	2010-11 [/b]	2009-10 [/b]
Glasgow Warriors	6,063		7,786		4,430	4,185	6,081	4,189	1,268	1,982
Ospreys	5,749		5,279		5,226	3,888	4,680	4,107	2,035	1,412
Edinburgh Rugby	5,771		3,834		5,267	4,038	4,930	4,324	1,586	1,460
Ulster Rugby	6,194		5,876		5,921	5,485	6,463	5,017	3,761	2,435
Cardiff Blues	6,190		3,274		5,247	5,168	3,869	3,996	1,856	1,425
Benetton Treviso	5,903		3,443		3,880	3,850	4,112	3,614	1,563
Munster Rugby	8,090		7,786		7,745	6,227	7,789	7,022	4,795	4,125
Newport Gwent Dragons	6,190		3,624		4,123	4,033	4,958	3,706	1,371	1,485
Zebre	4,091		3,994		5,486	4,084	4,856
Leinster Rugby	8,090		7,300		5,917	7,210	5,813	6,582	4,582	3,250
Scarlets			5,292		5,631	4,172	4,074	3,408	1,135	1,756
Average	6,233		5,226		5,352	4,758	5,239	4,597	2,395	2,148

Including the not-HEC matches, we're at 84209 for the season, so we should finish about 90,000 for the year. If we sold out the extended (8094) rather than the standard (6194) capacity for the Scarlets match, and again for a play-off final (I realise I'm getting ahead of myself here) we could top 100K.