As the old adage goes, there are lies, dammed lies and statistics. Any interpretation of  statistics is open to question. For a fuller explanation of the rationale behind my interpretation please refer to The Figures Explained. What I will say is that I have striven down the years to be consistent. That the figures, be they overall or for individual clubs, are based on like for like measurements from one season to the next.

There are two fundamental reasons for the overall fall in gates last season; The Rugby World Cup (RWC) and the relegation in 06/07 of the GP´s second best supported club, Northampton.

It is no coincidence that the last season we saw a drop in average gates, as illustrated by the graph above, was four years ago, 2003/4. That was the season of England´s remarkable RWC victory in Australia . Crowds grew sharply the following season and steadily the two after that. It remains to be seen if we see a repeat pattern after England´s good run in last years competition. My guess is that we will.

As one of those who spent a good part of last September and October in France it struck me that there were many supporters of all GP clubs, myself included, who were enjoying the biggest rugby party the world has to offer rather than attending their own clubs GP games. Add to these numbers those more casual supporters who were getting their rugby fix on TV rather than by going to games and the impact is substantial. This can perhaps best be illustrated by the round by round comparisons for the RWC period.  

 Each of these first six rounds had a lower attendance than the previous season. In the case of the opening round spectacularly so. As the graph below illustrates, the latter rounds were more balanced.

In the 2006/7 season Northampton were the second best supported club in the country with average gates in excess of 13.3k. Despite this it is the results on the field that actually counted and they were relegated. The team that replaced them, Leeds , averaged just over 7.2k per home game. Whilst this was excellent growth for Leeds , up 22.7% on their last season in the GP, it dragged down the overall attendances.

This difference, in home games alone, accounts for almost all the shortfall in last seasons numbers. If you take into account the lower number of travelling fans that Leeds brought in comparison to Northampton you could argue that their absence alone more than accounted for the drop.

My interpretation of the figures is that the underlying trend in crowd numbers is upwards. Given the ground expansion we are seeing at Gloucester and Leicester in particular growth in the 5-7% per annum range looks feasible for the foreseeable future.

As always there are winners and losers within the overall scheme of things. My next article in this series will look at how the clubs have compared. Both with each other and with their own previous seasons.

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