Well even the top tier looked at least 1/2 full. Infact, the Hearts usually get around 7000 or so and when they play the top tier is completely empty. I was honestly expecting the crowd to be around 18-20k on Fri Night.,
Fair enough.
I did a little review -
last year, MVFC had 14 Melbourne home (regular season) matches - drew 290,000 at an average of around 20,700. That was surprisingly low, they dropped 4000 from the previous season, despite being defending champions and again contesting the Grand Final. It all looked a bit odd - but, with the Hearts building, and the new stadium around the corner - we heard stories of protests by people who hated Etihad, and those people who were never 'real' Victory fans who were building for Hearts this year.
And so, here we are, both Victory and Hearts have 9 'home' games under the belts each.
MVFC has dropped now to just a smidge over 14,000 average.
And Hearts, even with the 25,000 home blockbuster local derby - are only doing 8600ish.
the combined tally - is 18 matches, 204,000 attendees, avg under 11,400.
and, worringly, we also heard about those intending to take dual memberships!!!
Last year, MVFC drew 290,000 attendees to 14 matches.
The bottom has fallen out of the Melbourne soccer market it appears.
And this is in a WC year, and a WC bid year.
Things are looking very, very sick.
Even up in Sydney, the title defence has seen their home crowd drop from what was itself a miserable 13,000 in last years title winning season (2nd worse season avg to that point for SFC and massively boosted by last round 'blockbuster' hosting of MVFC), and this year, so far, as the defending champion, SFC are running sub 10,000.
These are very, very bad trends for the 2 biggest markets and the two MOST successful clubs in the A-League (2 championships each).
Seriously - there looks like a lot of hard graft going forward.
The 2 QLD expansion clubs are unsustainable as they are.
The Sydney Rovers, are they or aren't they ever going to happen?
And there's no, no 12 years of free ride promotion of the game on the back of potentially hosting a WC.
I don't want to be seen as death riding - - but, this is serious here. If clubs start falling over, suddenly the resemblance to the NSL is all too clear, but, without the long standing NSL ethnicity excuse.
(btw - I'm also nervous about seeing what Suns impact on Lions is, and Giants on Swans in the AFL. However, we HAVE seen in the past, that on field success DOES get reflected in attendance. The peaks occur where you'd expect them to. Not so the A-League thus far.)