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Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 15:49 - May 17 by WeWereZombies
It's not a Premiership contrived statistic, it comes from a UEFA report and applies to all Scottish football, league and non-league, not just the top tier. There's always something of interest when you go to a new Scottish ground.
No it doesn’t.
‘For the third year in a row, football fans across Scotland have recorded significantly higher top-flight attendances per capita than any other league in Europe.’
‘The SPFL’s William Hill Premiership welcomed 18.5 attendees per 1,000 people at matches in season 2024/25.’
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Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 00:02 - May 18 with 647 views
Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 22:04 - May 17 by Danny_G
No it doesn’t.
‘For the third year in a row, football fans across Scotland have recorded significantly higher top-flight attendances per capita than any other league in Europe.’
‘The SPFL’s William Hill Premiership welcomed 18.5 attendees per 1,000 people at matches in season 2024/25.’
'Stats last year showed that Scotland had 21.3 attendees per 1000 people at matches across its top four divisions – the highest figure across Europe. 👏👏 This attendance per capita was over 65 per cent higher than second placed country Netherlands, which has 12.9 attendees per 1,000 people.'
Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 15:49 - May 17 by WeWereZombies
It's not a Premiership contrived statistic, it comes from a UEFA report and applies to all Scottish football, league and non-league, not just the top tier. There's always something of interest when you go to a new Scottish ground.
The "per capita" bit is not written anywhere in the UEFA reports published since 2023. It is cited as a source by the SPFL (because it does contain total attendance figures) and then the SPFL calculations are published online which are what you and the BBC are reporting. The "per capita" is not UEFA, it's the SPFL painting a good picture of their league. Nothing wrong with that per se, it's good marketing material.
Not just me saying this BTW. Key phrases in this being "According to the SPFL", "the Scottish leagues claim", etc...:
"While the Scottish Premiership and the wider SPFL couldn’t lay claim to the highest total number of fans last season, Scottish football was once again the highest attended among Europe’s top nations on a per capita basis. According to the SPFL, Scotland recorded significantly higher top-flight attendances per capita than any other European league. Using the data from UEFA’s report, the Scottish leagues claim that the Scottish Premiership’s support represented 18.36 of every 1,000 people in Scotland. Which was apparently twice that of the second best nation by the same metric - which was Portugal’s Primera Liga, which had 10.23 fans for every 1,000 people in Portugal. The Dutch Eredivisie (9.16) was third, followed by the Premier League, which had 6.77 fans per every 1,000 people in England attend games last season."
Should also say that they aren't special in this regard. The EFL do the same thing by just changing the measure to something good for them. The EFL is the "Highest Attended League Body in Europe". They've picked the stat that puts them top and uses that for their press releases.
I'm working in Ballymote today, home of Brother Wilfred who founded Celtic. Not a Celtic flag to be seen, was hoping the streets would be knee deep in empty beer cans but not a sausage
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Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 11:13 - May 18 with 472 views
Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 10:39 - May 18 by leitrimblue
I'm working in Ballymote today, home of Brother Wilfred who founded Celtic. Not a Celtic flag to be seen, was hoping the streets would be knee deep in empty beer cans but not a sausage
I tend to think Irish Catholics are more likely to support an English team, with Celtic as maybe their second team.
In contrast, primary support for Rangers appears much stronger amongst Northern Irish Protestants but that strikes me to a large degree as evidence of Loyalism translating to Glasgow.
Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 11:13 - May 18 by DJR
I tend to think Irish Catholics are more likely to support an English team, with Celtic as maybe their second team.
In contrast, primary support for Rangers appears much stronger amongst Northern Irish Protestants but that strikes me to a large degree as evidence of Loyalism translating to Glasgow.
There are apparently 60 Rangers supporters clubs in Northern Ireland, and only a fraction of that number when it comes to Celtic.
[Post edited 18 May 11:14]
Yep, yer not far off. Up along the border here there a hell if a lot of Celtic supporters. But it's common enough for many of um to support an English team as well. There also loads of people who have minimal interest in Celtic and just support English teams. Mainly Liverpool, Man U, Spurs or Arsenal in my experience (argh, and a small pocket of Town fans around Enniskillen)
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Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 15:28 - May 18 with 358 views
Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 03:07 - May 18 by Kievthegreat
The "per capita" bit is not written anywhere in the UEFA reports published since 2023. It is cited as a source by the SPFL (because it does contain total attendance figures) and then the SPFL calculations are published online which are what you and the BBC are reporting. The "per capita" is not UEFA, it's the SPFL painting a good picture of their league. Nothing wrong with that per se, it's good marketing material.
Not just me saying this BTW. Key phrases in this being "According to the SPFL", "the Scottish leagues claim", etc...:
"While the Scottish Premiership and the wider SPFL couldn’t lay claim to the highest total number of fans last season, Scottish football was once again the highest attended among Europe’s top nations on a per capita basis. According to the SPFL, Scotland recorded significantly higher top-flight attendances per capita than any other European league. Using the data from UEFA’s report, the Scottish leagues claim that the Scottish Premiership’s support represented 18.36 of every 1,000 people in Scotland. Which was apparently twice that of the second best nation by the same metric - which was Portugal’s Primera Liga, which had 10.23 fans for every 1,000 people in Portugal. The Dutch Eredivisie (9.16) was third, followed by the Premier League, which had 6.77 fans per every 1,000 people in England attend games last season."
Should also say that they aren't special in this regard. The EFL do the same thing by just changing the measure to something good for them. The EFL is the "Highest Attended League Body in Europe". They've picked the stat that puts them top and uses that for their press releases.
Not quite sure what point you are making here. It seems that many English people like watching football, an even greater percentage of people in Portugal and the Netherlands like watching football but not as great a percentage as the percentage of the population in Scotland ?
I don't necessarily think that is a good thing if too much money is spent in the pursuit and families suffer as a result (see Steve Clarke's plea to fans not to bankrupt themselves this summer) or that football can be allied to destructive behaviour regarding alcohol and violence cough***Celtic***cough, or this current trend for ultras who are almost paramilitary (section numbers and all wearing black for example.) However the exuberance is quite special.
Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 15:28 - May 18 by WeWereZombies
Not quite sure what point you are making here. It seems that many English people like watching football, an even greater percentage of people in Portugal and the Netherlands like watching football but not as great a percentage as the percentage of the population in Scotland ?
I don't necessarily think that is a good thing if too much money is spent in the pursuit and families suffer as a result (see Steve Clarke's plea to fans not to bankrupt themselves this summer) or that football can be allied to destructive behaviour regarding alcohol and violence cough***Celtic***cough, or this current trend for ultras who are almost paramilitary (section numbers and all wearing black for example.) However the exuberance is quite special.
[Post edited 18 May 15:34]
My main point was it is contrived to find the best stat possible for the league as marketing. Hence I also gave the equally tedious EFL example. It's not a statistic that anybody other than the SPFL have ever used before. You then claimed it was a UEFA stat and supplied by them, which was not true. So I pointed out that too. Doesn't mean the stat is wrong or untrue. Just that it's cherry picked to look good.
Admittedly, it does looks impressive on paper, although not really that surprising to know that a football mad country goes to watch a lot of football. However the data also shows the huge structural problem in Scottish football. IF you delve in, Rangers and Celtic account for 43% of all football attendees in Scotland*. And that is with the reports generous definition of professional lower league which includes all 3 lower tiers in Scotland when the majority of those clubs are not fully professional.
Meanwhile in England, the entire PL is only 36% of the national total, which is measured in a more restricted way as it ignores leagues equivalent in professionalism to the lower Scottish tiers such as the national league (which gets more than double all Scotland's lower tiers combined). The difference between England and Scotland is depth. Scotland has virtually none outside of an oversized top 2 and then 3 clubs who are equivalent in support levels to Brentford. Beyond that, there is nothing of real note. Ipswich get more fans through the turnstiles that the entirety of the Scottish lower leagues combined. It might look good having Rangers and Celtic big up the total, but they are the problem as well.
*Doesn't account for away fans, so likely an underestimate as I'd assume they take bigger followings than most other clubs, but not numbers for this.
PS. I decided to do some maths for fun. By my calcs, Scotland are lightweights. Taking the equivalent data for Suffolk (Ipswich Town, Needham Market, Lowestoft, Leiston and AFC Sudbury) , we get 39.7 fans per 1000 residents at every single game. Far more than Scotland's paltry figures. Amazing what stats can prove!
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Hail Hail The Celts are here. on 11:17 - May 19 with 268 views
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