The sixth season in the Kontinental Hockey League has ended, with Metallurg Magnitogorsk becoming the winner. The richest club in the league, St. Petersburg SKA, became the champion in attendance. Fans of the "army" over and over again almost completely filled "Ice", returning the club to the championship in this indicator three years later.
Petersburg club thanks to the competent work of the marketing service and the signing of hockey stars, including Ilya Kovalchuk, managed to rise to third place among the most visited teams in the Old World, behind only Swiss Bern and German Eisberen. On average, 12,133 spectators came to the SKA games, which is 97% of the total capacity of the Ice.
Permanent leader of the latter three years- Minsk “Dynamo”, due to low sports results of the team, lost almost a third of its fans, but even so it retained its second place in the rating of average attendance, albeit with the worst home arena occupancy rate in the top 10 (70.5% ).
Remain loyal to their club, which is one of the poorest in Bratislava, fans. Slovan's matches attracted an average of 10,013 spectators, filling Slovnaft Arena by an impressive 99.6%.
We also note the presence in the top 10 of the league's newcomer - Croatian Medvescak. Thanks in large part to the frantic support of its fans, the Zagreb club managed to make its way to the playoffs in its debut season. Significantly increased attendance at home matches of Riga "Dynamo", which had one of the best seasons in (+1707 spectators at each match). The audience's interest also grew in Ufa and Novosibirsk, where Salavat Yulaev and Siberia regularly delighted fans with sports results.
As for the main outsider of the sixth season in terms of attendance, it was Metallurg Novokuznetsk. The indifference of its fans was added to all the existing problems of “Forge”. The home arena of Metallurg, built many decades ago, was only one third full! An average of 2,760 spectators could be seen at the team's home matches.
Ugra, not spoiled by the audience's attention, has dropped to second place from the end. This season, the Khanty-Mansiysk club has firmly established itself as an outsider in the league and the audience reacted immediately - on average, 500 fewer fans went to the team's matches. As a result, "Ugra" became the second team that did not manage to get over the mark of 3000 spectators at the match.
Traditionally, Moscow's CSKA and Spartak are on the list of the worst with their ancient arenas and low audience interest. This season, CSKA, despite the impressive spending on players, lost attendance (-313 people / match), but Spartak, which remained without money in the middle of the season and updated the anti-record (19 defeats in a row), on the contrary added (+335 people / match). match).
Vityaz, which replaced Chekhov in Podolsk in the summer, left the last line of the attendance rating, but
rose only three positions. In Podolsk, almost a thousand more spectators began to attend the team's games.
Again, one of the most successful clubs got into the anti-rating last season- "Barys". To contemplate the regular victories of the wards Ari-Pekki Selina, the team's home arena was 91.7% full. The problem is that the sports palace "Kazakhstan" can accommodate only 4070 spectators. For the same reason, another non-Russian club, Donbass, can be observed in the anti-rating. Despite the 94.1% occupancy rate, the Donetsk club took ninth place from the bottom in terms of the average number of spectators at the match.
Fans in the club were unpleasantly surprised Nizhny Novgorod, which, despite a rather successful season for Torpedo, filled the arena by only two-thirds. The drop in attendance compared to last season was over 1,500 spectators per match. As a result, the sixth place in the anti-rating of attendance in. Considering that a new, more spacious arena will soon appear in the city, the Torpedo leadership needs to seriously think about how to fill it in the future.
Another drop in attendance was recorded in Cherepovets, where after leaving Andrey Nazarov failed to create a competitive team. The Cherepovets club resigned too early to missing the playoffs, and it turned out to be unrealistic to solve this problem by the youth alone. Low athletic performance some of the spectators were also scared away (-682 people / match).
Well, the main disappointment of the rating is the two-time Gagarin Cup winner Ak Bars Kazan. The departure of long-term team leaders Alexey Morozov and Danisa Zaripova, as well as the extremely non-spectacular style of play deprived the leopards of almost a thousand more spectators. We can only hope that the return to the club Zinetuly Bilyaletdinova will be able to return the fans to the stands. In the meantime, Ak Bars has the second largest arena occupancy rate since the end - 42.6%.
Finally, let's compare the attendance with others European leagues... In terms of average attendance, the Kontinental Hockey League came in fourth in Europe with an average of 5812 spectators per match. The most visited championship was again the Swiss championship (6872), the second place was taken by the German DEL (6343), the third - the Swedish Hockey League (5978). The ten most visited clubs in Europe included only SKA and Dynamo Minsk. Note that a year earlier, Yaroslavl Lokomotiv was also in the top 10.
This season, the average attendance at the KHL regular championship matches according to the official league protocols was 6124 people. The decrease in comparison with the 2014/15 season was 298 people, or 4.6%. Last season, an average of 6,300 spectators attended each match. Let's analyze the audience interest in recent seasons: in which cities you can't get a ticket, and in which cities you can't find spectators on the arena.
Average attendance at KHL regular championship matches:
Season 2008/09 - 5117
Season 2009/10 - 5536
Season 2010/11 - 5793
Season 2011/12 - 5914
Season 2012/13 - 6105
Season 2013/14 - 6080
Season 2014/15 - 6423
Season 2015/16 - 6301
Season 2016/17 - 6124
Record two years ago: daring debutants, jump of "Ak Bars"
During the first seven seasons of the KHL, attendance has grown steadily, reaching its maximum two years ago. Why did it peak in the 2014/15 season? The newcomers of the league pleasantly surprised themselves that year - the Finnish “Jokerit” in the first season broke into the top three in the West in terms of attendance, gathering 10 thousand spectators at the “Hartwall-Arena”. Slightly more modest were the indicators of "Sochi" - an average of 7.5 thousand people went to the southerners. The return of Lada to the KHL did not go unnoticed for hockey fans from Togliatti. With the move of Zinetula Bilyaletdinov to Kazan, Ak Bars's performance also skyrocketed (from 4938 people in the 2013/14 season to 6796).
The league average hit an all-time high on interest in Western Conference teams. Avangard, being the leader in the East (8711), took only sixth place in the overall attendance table, behind Yaroslavl, Bratislava, Helsinki, St. Petersburg and Minsk.
The league average hit an all-time high on interest in Western Conference teams.
The problem of the East - small arenas
In the European part of Russia, football and hockey have been fighting for the title of "sport number one" for many years, and in the East, the winner has been known for a long time. The climate and conditions for training in many regions of our country do not allow more than four months a year to go in for sports on the street. In cities with a population of one million Novosibirsk, Chelyabinsk, Omsk there is no football teams the level of the Premier League, but there is hockey clubs, the fate of which worries thousands of fans. The ice arenas of Siberia, Traktor and Avangard are almost always full to capacity. However, only the stadiums in Omsk, Astana and Beijing accommodate more than 10 thousand spectators. The average capacity for arenas in the Eastern Conference is 7346 and the Western Conference is 9,400.
A real hockey boom reigns in Novosibirsk. The occupancy rate of LDS Sibir is 96% (the highest in the league). The need for a more spacious and new arena in this city is more acute than in other regions. Finally, on February 2, 2017, the Novosibirsk authorities signed an agreement on the construction of a new ice arena... The stadium for 10-12 thousand spectators should be built by 2022. And in 2023 Novosibirsk wants to accept youth championship hockey world.
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The Far East is crazy about hockey
Throughout recent years the occupancy rate of arenas in Khabarovsk and Vladivostok does not fall below 90%. The Amur stadium accommodates 7100 spectators, the Admiral stadium - 5500. The Khabarovsk club experienced a real take-off in the 2013/14 season, when there were sold out houses at every match of the regular season. Then the regression in attendance began (from 7023 it fell to 5872). In the 2015/16 season, it grew to 6972, and this was 6678 spectators. For a team that has played in the playoffs only once in its history, the indicators are more than decent.
The arena of the "Admiral" is significantly smaller than that of its closest competitor. The club began playing in the KHL in the 2013/14 season and since then, on rare days, fewer than five thousand people come to the stadium. The matches of the first round of the playoffs against Avangard in Vladivostok will undoubtedly be sold out.
The controversial "Kunlun"
Largely due to the Chinese newcomer, the attendance rate has dropped this season compared to the previous year. On average, 2,952 people went to Kunlun's home games - the fourth-most-in-the-league result. However, it is premature to declare that hockey in China is of no use to anyone. Incidentally, the first home match of the Chinese Red Star attracted 7832 spectators in Beijing. However, then the team throughout three months was forced to play home games in another city. And then the problems began.
On September 20, the club set an anti-record for attendance. Only 550 spectators came to the Feiyang stadium in Shanghai for the match against Neftekhimik. In total, Kunlun played 17 matches in Shanghai, with an average attendance of 1280 people. This is not surprising, because advertising for a new sport was completely absent in the metropolis.
If we discard all the data on “Kunlun” and imagine that the Chinese club did not appear in the KHL, then the average attendance of matches this season would be 6,237 people.
Now let's look at the number of spectators at the Beijing Le Sports Center arena: 7832, 8300, 8300, 4200, 8000, 2500, 4500, 2000, 4750, 7400, 4200, 2400, 2400. On average, 5137 people went to hockey in Beijing ... For a city in which they started talking seriously about hockey only a few years ago, the numbers are quite acceptable.
What did Kunlun give to the KHL? The Chinese returned to the playoff zone
After the first two months of the season, we find out what the exotic Kunlun Red Star gave the KHL and the fans.
Why has attendance dropped this season?
If we discard all the data on “Kunlun” and imagine that the Chinese club did not appear in the KHL, then the average attendance of matches this season would be 6,237 people. There is still a scanty decrease in comparison with the previous year. The reason is the decline in interest in European cities.
"Medvescak" appeared in the KHL three years ago and immediately pleasantly surprised. In the 2013/14 season, the club played five home matches at the Arena Zagreb, which accommodates more than 15 thousand spectators, the average for the season for the Zagreb team was 7828. And from the next season, the numbers slowly crept down: 5328, 5252, 4554 ...
Every year the attendance of the Riga "Dynamo" falls along with the results of the team. Arena Riga, where the team mainly plays, has a capacity of 10,300, but this season it was less than half full. Several matches were played by the people of Riga in Liepaja, where more than two thousand did not come to the game. But in two matches in Tallinn, the stadium was packed. A large number of Russians live in the Estonian capital, for whom hockey is their native sport, but they hardly need a team from Latvia on a permanent basis. And in any case, Dynamo Riga needs to change something.
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Sale of leaders, Russian money, parting with Dwyer and reduction of the league. Why does the KHL need to expel Medvescak without hesitation?
Moscow is not a hockey city
According to Rosstat, the population of the Russian capital in 2017 is 12 million people. This is two and a half times more than in St. Petersburg. Three KHL clubs are based in Moscow - CSKA, Spartak and Dynamo. The total average attendance of the capital's clubs this season was 16 688 people. The figure for one of the largest European cities is not very impressive. For example, in St. Petersburg with a population of five million people, the average attendance of SKA is 11,735 viewers.
It's a paradox, but the most popular Moscow club is a team that consistently does not make it to the playoffs. At least not every time Spartak's home games are sold out, the audience regularly goes to the games (an average of 7288 people). The name of the team speaks for the red and white great history and competent work of the club. On the other hand, the number of visitors to Dynamo Moscow this year began to decrease - attendance fell from 7179 to 6113.
CSKA: stable results, falling interest
Season 2014/15 - 4340
Season 2015/16 - 4206
Season 2016/17 - 3287
For three years in a row, the Moscow "army team" have skated over their rivals in the "regular season" and won the Continent Cup. However, the attention to the team is not growing. Every season the attendance of the home matches of the most titled club in the national history falls. Causes - Big city, old arena and not too effective work with the fans. The departure of Alexander Radulov to the NHL this year led to an outflow of fans from arenas, as a result of a 20% decrease in attendance compared to last season.
CSKA has never managed to take the Gagarin Cup. Perhaps the coveted trophy will return the viewer to Leningradsky Prospekt?
Every season the attendance of the home matches of the most titled club in the national history falls.
Minsk bypasses Petersburg
"Where can I get an extra ticket?" - this question is often asked in Minsk and St. Petersburg. These cities know how to attract fans to the arena and how to entertain them. A modern and spacious (15 thousand) stadium has been built in the capital of Belarus. On average, 13,230 spectators go to the local Dynamo. SKA lags slightly behind Minsk residents. The CSKA arena accommodates a little less - 12,300 people, and the average attendance at the matches of Oleg Znark's team is 11,735. Now the clubs are simply obliged to please their viewers with the results.
After a third of the regular season, average match attendance fell below 6,000. For the first time in the league's existence, the decline in viewership continues for more than a season, and stadium occupancy has dropped to 74 percent. "SE" understands the reasons for the incident.
WITHOUT FLUCTUATIONS
By October 22nd, average match attendance KHL is 5975 people, and the average stadium occupancy is 74.4 percent. At the same time, in the 2014/15 season, a record for the tournament, the indicators were significantly higher - 6423 spectators and 80.6 percent, respectively.
Would you say that there are an extra 500-1000 people, when the world's largest leagues operate with tens of thousands of spectators, and, albeit limited by the size of indoor arenas, is almost three times ahead of all European championships in terms of average attendance?
Yes, for some league the current drop (448 people compared to the 2014/15 season) would be just a fluctuation, but not for KHL, for which these viewers are more than 7 percent. Do not forget that in Russian hockey there are no typical factors that can greatly dampen the interest of fans and are characteristic of our football - the weather, the team getting into European cups or the riot of fans leading to the closure of sectors. The only reason that can cause a sharp and at the same time predictable change in attendance is the club's move to a new, often much more spacious arena.
What happened? Why attendance KHL stopped growing and started to fall? Indeed, before the 2014/15 season, it increased almost continuously, with the exception of one year, and in quite serious leaps - sometimes 200-300 people in one regular season.
There is one obvious reason that always affects numbers at the start of a tournament - the seasonal one. In September-October, they traditionally go to hockey a little worse than in November and winter, and no matter what happens, attendance grows during the season, reaching maximum numbers at the finish of the regular season. Unhappy August, which more than once or twice already "kicked" the compilers of the calendar (they say, who needs a winter sport in the summer), by the way, it has little effect here - the gap with September was not felt this year either, and last August the indicator in the last month of summer it was a record at all - almost 7000 people! World Cup as a distraction from KHL the argument, which is interesting, also does not work - within a week from the start of the tournament until the departure of the Russian national team in the semifinals, the attendance of our league was 6194 people.
SKA fans. Photo by Alexander FEDOROV, "SE"
KHL ATTENDANCE BY SEASON
"KUNLUN"
Other reasons for the fall are much more specific and tied to individual clubs. For example, . 1237, 1182, 834, 822, 550 - all these are weak indicators of attendance for VHL, and for KHL they cannot be called otherwise than nightmarish. In the history of the league there have been unpleasant incidents - for example, Moscow “Spartak” somehow didn’t even reach a thousand fans, for which it became the object of ridicule until the end of the season. But it’s one thing when the audience doesn’t come, it’s quite another when they don’t exist as a class. Moving "Kunlun", which scored an anti-KHL record of 550 people, from Beijing to Shanghai due to the busyness of the capital's palace, turned into a real disaster. And now guess until the team returns to the main arena - whether it is in Shanghai that hockey is so unpopular, or, on the contrary, the game in Beijing attracted almost 8,000 fans just because it was the first and historical one.
If you exclude "Kunlun" from calculations - the attendance of the KHL will grow to 6090 viewers, that is, more than 100 people! I repeat: it’s probably too early to shout “everything is gone, the Chinese do not need the league!” Before we move back to Beijing. And for example, the best-attended KHL club did not always perform at the posh “Minsk-Arena” and did not get sold out on its little old three-thousander. Huge progress can be made - but for this you need at least some kind of base. And here fears creep in: we do not yet know absolutely nothing about the real interest of the Chinese in hockey.
Spartak fans. Photo by Alexander FEDOROV, "SE"
EFFECT OF NOVELTY
Which KHL club has dropped the most in attendance in the last two seasons (since the 2014/15 regular season)? (-2604 people), (-1733), (-1653), (-1517). What unites all these clubs, with the exception of Dynamo, who, with their current game and results, scared away almost all Riga fans (for yesterday's match against "Sochi", however, gathered an impressive audience of almost 7 thousand viewers)? They all debuted (or returned in the event "Frets") v KHL in that record 2014/15 season. And they inevitably interested the public - with a new sport (Sochi), a new league (Helsinki) or a move to the top division (Togliatti). But some of these spectators, lured to the stands by the effect of novelty, having tasted the joy of going to hockey, rushed for new hobbies - but they no longer go to hockey.
A similar situation has developed with two large 12-thousanders opened last year. in the 2015/16 season, it hit the unbelievable mark of seven thousand spectators for Moscow - and this September it also lacked three thousand in the match with. I didn’t shine with full houses in the new arena a year ago, but now I’ve completely passed it - maybe there’s not enough on the ice?
ATTENDANCE OF KHL CLUBS
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Club |
Capacity |
Occupancy |
Difference* |
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Fans of the Moscow Dynamo. Photo by Alexey IVANOV, "SE" WHO NEEDS NEW STADIUMS? The most optimistic option for the next two or three years is to return the attendance to the level of two years ago, and then a natural limitation in the form of the capacity of arenas and the lack of serious interest in hockey in some regions will become an obstacle. Of course, it is necessary to fight the latter problem - but there have been and will be "outsiders" in this industry, nothing can be done about it. Therefore, another question is slightly more important - who is in KHL could "intensify" KHL a larger palace? Fair talk about the fact that there are fewer stars in the league (and that's why the audience began to walk worse) are logical, as it seems, only when applied to one team - CSKA... It was, and the army palace, which was outdated in every sense, took in an extra 500-600 people. Now Muscovites have returned to the usual "three thousand and a little" and are unlikely to move anywhere from this point in the near future - if the results do not fall. New arena need CSKA like air, but conversations "in Moscow and so many teams, one would be enough" are not relevant here. The fact that in a city in which at least 12-15 million people live, there is not even twenty thousand spectators to fill the arenas of all three clubs - this is the problem of the clubs themselves, but not a given that must be tolerated. Of the rest of the teams, I would single out three that hit the ceiling of their arenas capacity: SKA, "Torpedo" and "Siberia"... With the latter, everything is clear - for two seasons they remain the only club that collects sold out at every match, and if the MFM-2023 does reach Novosibirsk, which will make it necessary to build a new stadium, then "Siberia" will easily explode up to 10-12 thousand (well, or how much the arena will hold). Have "Torpedo" a similar case: a big city, an outdated small palace, while the team in Nizhny Novgorod is very fond of, and it plays great. The problem is that the arena project is being postponed to a farther box, although it has existed on paper for several years. And finally, the most visited club Of Russia - SKA... Which is already performing at one of the the best stadiums country, but since there is no limit to perfection in terms of the composition of the St. The NHL is currently unattainable for our league, but if you start with something, it’s from the arenas - and maybe in a different setting, and hockey players will think a hundred times whether they should go overseas. The material used data from the official website of the KHL and the website sport.business-gazeta.ru. |
SE "continues to sum up the statistical results of seven seasons of the KHL. Next in line is the league's attendance: comparison with the football championship, leaders and outsiders in viewer interest and forecasts for the next year.
RUSSIAN KIND OF SPORT No. 1
The eternal question - what should be called national Russian species sports? The game of millions of football, which receives the maximum attention of the domestic media, or is much more successful in international level hockey, where any place other than the first is considered at least a failure? And someone will also remember about biathlon, which is easy for perception, even by an average person who is far from sports, which has gained unprecedented popularity in our country in the last decade. But all this is lyrics. You can argue until blue in the face, but how to measure the required data? The evidence of one side will always run up against equally weighty arguments of the other.
However, it is realistic to answer another, no less essential question. What domestic championship can be called Russian sports tournament No. 1? Here all the necessary data is on the surface - you just need to count it. The league attendance will be the main tool for comparison. How can it seem from the outside, and what is there to compare? Football stadiums much more in capacity, and not a single hockey match can gather tens of thousands of spectators under any circumstances. Unless, of course, it is carried out on the same football arenas... But not everything is so simple.
At the end of the 2000s in Russian sports two things happened. One of them, the creation of the KHL, has become truly epoch-making - hardly anyone will argue with this, regardless of whether its consequences are positive or not. Another - let's just call it important - happened in November 2007: Sergei Pryadkin was elected president of the RFPL. The previous season, which ended with Zenit's first victory in the history of Russian championships, became a record in terms of average attendance (13,115 people per match) and a total indicator (3.147 million people) - more only in the transition tournament in 2011-2012, when the championship lasted a year and a half.
In hockey, the total figures were higher: 3.438 million people attended the matches of the first KHL regular championship of the 2008/09 season. However, then the only reason for the advantage, albeit a small one, was more than a twofold gap in the number of games themselves. The average attendance lost to football very seriously: 5117 people against 12 914. During these years, a lot of money appeared in Russian sports. There were a lot of them before that, but for the first time in football, domestic clubs were able to massively sign expensive legionnaires, and in hockey, inviting NHL players has ceased to be a pipe dream.
Photo photo. khl.ru
Seven years have passed. Cash flows in both football and hockey have been constantly increasing all this time, slightly chopped off only with the depreciation of the ruble. But the paths of the two leading Russian sports leagues parted ways. The 2014/15 season in terms of attendance was a record in the KHL. A total of 5.395 million people (including the playoffs, more than 6 million) attended the hockey regular season, with an average of 6,423 spectators per game. In football, it was also not without a record, but already with a minus sign: only 2.436 million in total and 10,151 people on average per match. From falling over the catastrophic ten thousandth mark Russian league saved the end of the championship - the indicator fell rapidly with each new spring round.
You can rightly notice that the football indicator is still higher, and the overall, as already noted, seems to be leveled out by the advantage of the hockey league in the number of teams and matches. But is it really so?
ATTENDANCE KHL AND RFPL (SEASONS 2008 - 2015)
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Season |
KHL |
KHL |
RFPL |
RFPL |
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2008/09(2008) |
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2009/10(2009) |
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2010/11(2010) |
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In the 2011/12 season, the Premier League held a one and a half year transitional championship, which changed the system of holding from "spring - autumn" to "autumn - spring". Among the KHL matches, only regular season games are taken into account.
IS THE NUMBER OF MATCHES IMPORTANT?
There are twice as many games in hockey - 60 versus 30. However, imagine what would have happened if RFPL matches would be held two or three times a week and regularly fall on weekdays? Even a couple of one-week home meetings, which is rare for a football calendar, ends up everywhere with a clear decline in interest in one of these games. At the same time, in football, at least a third of matches are played against box-office rivals, and one should not forget that the fate of the tournament is precisely in a smooth championship. Each game against a principled opponent has almost a cup value. In hockey, the regular season only affects the playoff grid, and even the surprising decision a year ago to award the title of champion based on the results of the regular season did not really increase the prestige of the first stage. But this does not interfere with the interest of the audience. But when comparing, we did not take into account the playoffs. In the 2014/15 season, the average attendance at the Gagarin Cup also reached a record high - 8388 per game. Not that far from football anymore, right?
At the same time, despite the much smaller number of matches, going to more significant tournament football battles in many cities, especially in the provinces, is much cheaper. For example, in Yekaterinburg, ticket prices for Ural meetings this season vary from 100 to 1000 rubles, but for the Avtomobilist club - from 450 to 1800 rubles! But also the high cost hockey fans does not bother.
Photo by Igor ZOLOTAREV
Finally, the most important thing. Football stadiums are banally larger in capacity, and almost three times - on average for the championship arenas accommodate 23 thousand spectators against eight hockey stadiums. At the same time, none of RFPL club the level of occupancy in the stands did not exceed at least 70 percent, and the average is close to a pitiful 40. In hockey, everything is different - 80 percent in the regular season and almost 94 in the Gagarin Cup! Even in the much-ridiculed Cup of Hope for the losers of a smooth championship held in the 2012/13 and 2013/14 seasons, occupancy rates were over 46 percent. In fact, only the lack of extra seats is holding back some of the clubs from a sharp increase in attendance.
Take St. Petersburg, for example. A few years ago, an exclusively football city, where there was only one team adored by everyone. The Sunday match between Zenit and Dynamo, one of the most principled rivals, was attended by 16,577 people - far from being sold out. Last season, Gagarin Cup winner SKA played 41 matches, including playoff games, with an average attendance of over 12 thousand people. Wouldn't CSKA have overtaken Zenit if their arena was almost twice as large as Petrovsky? I doubt that anyone would have prevented them from doing this.
Do not forget that the number of teams (28 in the KHL, including 22 Russian versus 16 in the Premier League) not only increases the number of matches, but also expands the middle peasants and outsiders in the league and inevitably leads to the emergence of unpopular clubs and non-hockey cities. It is inevitable that with almost three dozen teams, interest in the sport will not be equally high everywhere. One-time appearance in the Premier League "Ufa", "Mordovia" and "Torpedo" in terms of attendance led to sad consequences... And if you add a dozen more clubs from the first division?
WHY KHL OVERCOME RFPL?
All these features of the football and hockey industry make it the total number of spectators who attended championship matches to be considered a key indicator. And even if you forget for a second about the huge gap in favor of the KHL, one cannot help but wonder about the trend. Why has one league been growing and the other falling down over the past seven years?
Despite the similarity in many things in one aspect, football and hockey championships absolutely not close - in the sources of development. In football, the league has long been pushed forward by individual clubs: CSKA, which has become an exceptional example of a competent transfer policy, Krasnodar, quietly but steadily moving step by step towards the title of the new Russian grandee. In hockey, the league itself was at the forefront of progress from the very beginning, to the best of its ability, forcing its participants to move to a new level. It turned out, of course, not with every club. But everything is learned by comparison.
In the KHL, a situation is impossible when a team spends most of the league's home matches outside hometown or at the stadium, which is located at the training base - this club would simply not be allowed to participate in the tournament. Many complain about the closed nature of the league, prioritizing the sporting principle, but did everyone like Ufa's trips to Saransk and Perm?
Photo by Tatiana DOROGUTINA
In the KHL, fans do not stage fights in the stands or chant racist chants, although there are also black athletes in the league. There is no need to be afraid of every next game day, waiting for the next "Frimpong case". However, even if there were some kind of scandal, it is difficult to imagine that there would be a match in the KHL without spectators - such measures in the modern sports league have long been a thing of the past.
No matter how overly pretentious the words of the first leaders of the KHL sounded about rivalry with the NHL, they saw a specific goal - to improve club hockey in the country. And it's not just football that attendance has declined over the past decade - once-popular basketball and bandy performance has also fallen to unprecedented levels. In hockey, the opposite is true - it means that a lot was really done right. And now you cannot say unequivocally what should be called the number one sport in Russia.
PLAY-OFF ATTENDANCE AND ARENA CAPACITY
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Season |
Regular season (average per match) |
Occupancy(%) |
Playoffs (average per match) |
Occupancy(%) |
LEADERS - MINSK AND SAINT PETERSBURG
How did you manage to increase the average attendance by more than twenty-five percent in seven years? The occupancy rate of hockey palaces has risen quite a bit during this time. The secret is simple: new teams, new arenas. Foreign debutants helped especially here: Jokerit and Slovan are in the top four most visited clubs. Minsk “Dynamo” also stands apart, playing in one of the largest European arenas and topping the leaderboard in terms of attendance in the entire league. The newcomer of the last season from Olympic capital Sochi. Many wondered: who is interested in hockey in such a region? An excellent modern arena that is a pleasure to come to again and again can raise interest in winter sight sports even in the south of the country - "HC Sochi" surpassed the average for the KHL by more than a thousand people.
Photo by Vladimir BEZZUBOV, photo. khl.ru
There are also obvious outsiders, in recent seasons, unfortunately, constant - Severstal, Vityaz, Novokuznetsk Metallurg and Yugra. The Khanty-Mansiysk club finished the last regular season with a terrifyingly low average of 2,566 spectators per match, and the future looks even more pessimistic - even fewer people will probably gather for the “legionary” Ugra squad, which is unlikely to really claim the playoffs. ...
The leaders in terms of guest attendance last season were the top clubs of the Western Conference: SKA, CSKA, Dynamo Moscow and Jokerit. True, in addition to the attractiveness of the teams themselves, the calendar helped them - having more meetings on the road in large palaces in St. Petersburg and Helsinki, it is much easier to show the best numbers in this nomination.
HOME ATTENDANCE OF KHL CLUBS IN SEASON 2014/15
|
Club |
Viewers (average per match) |
|
Dynamo Minsk |
|
|
Locomotive |
|
|
Vanguard |
|
|
Metallurg Mg |
|
|
Salavat Yulaev |
|
|
Dynamo Moscow time |
|
|
Medvescak |
|
|
Motorist |
|
|
Neftekhimik |
|
|
Severstal |
|
|
Metallurg Nk |
|
GUEST VISITS TO KHL CLUBS IN SEASON 2014/15 (TOP-7)
5500 - TOO LITTLE
Could the average result be even higher? In the first KHL seasons the regulations introduced a strict requirement for the capacity of arenas - at least 5500 people, which provided for exceptions only for small towns. The limit required at first made the league closed from the majority of applicants for promotion from Major League and set a quality standard: if you want to play in the KHL, build a good palace. Left the elite Russian hockey for four years "Lada" returned not with an old "Volgar" that did not meet modern requirements at all, but with a new arena.
However, the notorious figure of 5500, which limits the capacity of several stadiums of the KHL clubs (CSKA, Torpedo, Neftekhimik, Vityaz, Avtomobilist, Yugra), has remained in the regulations to this day. Although there were constant talks about raising the bar and demanding at least large cities to acquire a more solid palace. The numbers of 9 thousand, 12 thousand flashed, which should have found their place in the official documents of the league in the near future, but this never happened.
Perhaps such a decision would be too harsh and somewhere premature, but it would spur the leaders of the clubs to more progressive measures. As a result of his absence, the newest Russian arenas that have appeared in the KHL in recent years, in Togliatti and Vladivostok, turned out to be smaller in capacity than originally announced, and at Lada Arena they decided to completely abandon the second tier of stands. And there were no problems: “Lada” and “Admiral” fit into the regulations, but their stadiums are not always able to physically accommodate everyone, and the train has already left - no one will build another, more spacious palace.
TIME TO OVERCOME THE SWISS
And how is the KHL in comparison with other presenters? hockey leagues the world? The NHL performance looks, of course, an incredible fairy tale, both in terms of the average number of viewers per match (17,505) and the occupancy of the stands (96%). In order to at least get as close as possible to an overseas competitor, a massive appearance in the league of new large ice rinks that have crossed at least the ten thousandth mark of ice palaces is necessary. In Europe, the KHL came out on top this year, slightly ahead of the German championship and so far lagging behind the Swiss one (6423 against 6762). Tell me, how can we claim the championship on the continent, not even being the most visited league?
This is strongly influenced by the huge number of clubs in the KHL. All 28 teams lack the maximum audience interest, just as there are not enough high-quality hockey players high level... The aforementioned outsiders in terms of attendance pull the average down a lot - for example, if you count only the twelve best clubs in the KHL, how many play in the Swiss championship, it would grow to almost 9,000 people.
Photo by Alexey IVANOV, SE
Are there any prospects for further growth in attendance? Unfortunately, the projects of new arenas in Novosibirsk and Nizhny Novgorod, which have been repeatedly mentioned in the press, have not even begun to be built yet. However, two newly built palaces of 12,000 are waiting for their visitors in the coming season: VTB Ice Palace will host the matches of Dynamo Moscow, and Barys Arena - the Astana team of the same name. Predicting the exact growth in traffic after they open is pretty tricky right now.
However, one can recall the sharp rise in popularity of the Minsk Dynamo after the construction of the 15,000-seat arena. And only partly this was due to the results. Create excellent conditions for going to the stadium, especially for family leisure, and all the talk about the fact that people are difficult to get interested in hockey or football will disappear immediately, as if they never existed. Now such conditions have appeared in Moscow and Astana. Will we overtake the Swiss next season?
The most visited team in the KHL this season is Dynamo Minsk. There has already been a full house in the capital of Belarus, and more than 13 thousand people regularly attend the matches. The audience interest, as always, is very high in St. Petersburg - over 11 thousand people attend SKA games. On average, each KHL match attracts almost 6 thousand fans, which means a stable audience interest in the league games. For the third time in the past four seasons, the total number of spectators in the stands by the November pause has exceeded the 2 million mark.
Traffic dynamics for all KHL seasons
Regular Championships *
| Seasons | 08/09 | 09/10 | 10/11 | 11/12 | 12/13 | 13/14 | 14/15 | 15/16 | 16/17 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Number of clubs | 24 | 24 | 23 | 23 | 26 | 28 | 28 | 28 | 29 |
| Number of matches | 672 | 672 | 621 | 621 | 676 | 756 | 840 | 840 | 382** |
| Total arenas involved | 29 | 28 | 28 | 26 | 30 | 33 | 28 | 31 | 31 |
| Average attendance at matches | 5117 | 5536 | 5793 | 5914 | 6105 | 6080 | 6423 | 6301 | 5920 |
All data are taken from the official match scores *
In absolute numbers, regular season attendance has grown steadily from the inception of the league to the 2012/2013 season. In the first regular season, on average KHL games 5303 people walked. A year later, the audience's interest increased - 5677 people. In the 2012/2013 season, an average of 6,105 people attended regular season matches. In the 2013/2014 championship, there was a slight decrease - 6080 people, but the occupancy rate of the ice rinks increased (from 78.5% to 79.1%). The real breakthrough happened two years ago: in the 2014/2015 season, an average of 6423 people went to matches.
In the seasons 2015/2016 and 2016/2017, you can see a slight decrease in attendance (6301 people per season, 6106 people as of November 2, 2015 and 5920 people as of November 2, 2016). The occupancy rate of arenas is 71.4% (last season 76%, as of November 2 - 75.4%). This year it is also worth paying attention to "Kunlun" - the team was forced to move from Beijing to Shanghai. In the capital of China, 7,832 people came to the first and only match of the new KHL club so far. In Shanghai, where the Stars will soon leave, an average of 1057 people came to the game. That is why the average traffic is lower, but the average in this case does not show the whole picture. If you do not take into account "Kunlun", then on average 6059 people attended the KHL matches.
West vs. East in the 2016/2017 season
Teams of the Western Conference this year overtake the East in average attendance - 6502 people against 5427 people. At the same time, the occupancy rate of arenas is better in the Eastern Conference - 73.9% versus 69.2% in the West. A similar situation was observed last season. In the West, on average, more people went to hockey games (6639 versus 5553 spectators), but the occupancy rate of palaces in the East was higher (79.7% versus 72.3%).
Attendance of KHL teams in the 2016/2017 season
| Clubs | Arena capacity | Matches | Total viewers | Average for 1 match | % occupancy | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dynamo (Minsk) | 15 086 | 10 | 131 533 | 13 153 | 87,2 |
| 2 | SKA | 12 300 | 17 | 193 383 | 11 375 | 92,5 |
| 3 | "Jokerit" | 13 349 | 10 | 91 996 | 9 200 | 68,9 |
| 4 | Slovan | 10 450 | 10 | 89 519 | 8 952 | 85,7 |
| 5 | "Avangard" | 10 318 | 14 | 122 920 | 8 780 | 85,1 |
| 6 | "Locomotive" | 9 070 | 12 | 98 900 | 8 242 | 90,9 |
| 7 | "Siberia" | 7 420 | 13 | 89 519 | 7 400 | 99,7 |
| 8 | "Spartacus" |
11 380* |
15 | 105 375 | 7 025 | 61,7 |
| 9 | "Salavat Yulaev" | 8 070 | 15 | 103 110 | 6 874 | 85,2 |
| 10 | "Amur" | 7 100 | 15 | 102 750 | 6 850 | 96,5 |
| 11 | Metallurg Mg | 7 704 | 14 | 94 740 | 6 767 | 87,8 |
| 12 | "Tractor" | 7 500 | 14 | 94 400 | 6 743 | 89,9 |
| 13 | "AK Bars" | 8 890 | 18 | 109 364 | 6 076 | 68,3 |
| 14 | "Admiral" | 5 500 | 14 | 74 874 | 5 348 | 97,2 |
| 15 | Dynamo (Moscow) | 12 100 | 12 | 64 127 | 5 344 | 44,2 |
| 16 | "Torpedo" | 5 500 | 12 | 62 931 | 5 244 | 95,4 |
| 17 | "Medvescak" | 6 700 | 10 | 51 355 | 5 136 | 76,6 |
| 18 | "Neftekhimik" | 6 000 | 13 | 63 800 | 4 908 | 81,8 |
| 19 | HC "Sochi" | 12 000 | 14 | 68 079 | 4 863 | 40,5 |
| 20 | "Barys" | 11 626 | 11 | 50 350 | 4 577 | 39,4 |
| 21 | "Motorist" | 5 545 | 14 | 61 330 | 4 381 | 79,0 |
| 22 | Dynamo (Riga) | 10 300 | 11 | 46 769 | 4 252 | 41,3 |
| 23 | "Lada" | 6 000 | 15 | 56 198 | 3 747 | 62,4 |
| 24 | "Knight" | 5 500 | 12 | 39 672 | 3 306 | 60,1 |
| 25 | CSKA | 5 600 | 16 | 52 300 | 3 269 | 58,4 |
| 26 | Metallurg Nk | 7 533 | 12 | 36 988 | 3 082 | 40,9 |
| 27 | Severstal | 6 064 | 14 | 41 896 | 2 993 | 49,3 |
| 28 | "Ugra" | 5 500 | 13 | 36 940 | 2 842 | 51,7 |
| 29 | "Kunlun" | 5 567* | 12 | 19 458 | 1 622 | 29,1 |
Kunlun played only 1 match in Beijing (capacity 14000), 7832 spectators came to it. The forced team played in Shanghai, where 11 matches were played - 1057 spectators on average per game with a capacity of 4800 *
Spartak played their matches in ISA Luzhniki and VTB Ice Palace". The table shows the average capacity of these two arenas *
Minsk "Dynamo" not only pleases its fans with a good game, but can boast of the best attendance. On average, 13153 people go to the matches of the "bison", while the capacity of the "Minsk-Arena" is 15086 spectators. In Russia, the HC SKA is traditionally the leader in average attendance. Hockey fans regularly fill the palace in St. Petersburg. On average, 11375 spectators go to SKA games with the arena's capacity of 12,300. Finnish Jokerit is in third place in the KHL in terms of the number of spectators on average per match. In Helsinki, 9,200 people go to matches with the Hartwall Arena's capacity of 13349. The worst attendance is shown by Kunlun, where an average of 1,662 people come to the games.
Fans of Novosibirsk "Siberia" fill the ice rink by 99.7% - this is best result in the KHL. Over 90% occupancy is also observed at the matches of Lokomotiv (90.9%), Admiral (97.2%), Amur (96.5%), SKA (92.5%), Torpedo ( 95.4%).
The largest relative increase (in percent) in terms of attendance compared to last season was at Barys (plus 17.8% or more by 691 people on average). They also started going to Vityaz's matches in Podolsk (plus 14.8%, or more by 425 people), Minsk (plus 14.1%, or more by 1626 people - the best increase in attendance in absolute terms). The worst dynamics in comparison with the previous season is shown by the Riga “Dynamo” (minus 29.6%, or less by 1,784 people).
Visiting teams attendance in the 2016/2017 season
| Away matches | Total viewers | On average for 1 match with the participation of the team away | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | CSKA | 12 | 85 646 | 7 137 |
| 2 | "Avangard" | 13 | 90 644 | 6 973 |
| 3 | HC "Sochi" | 13 | 86 508 | 6 654 |
| 4 | "Spartacus" | 10 | 65 529 | 6 553 |
| 5 | "Siberia" | 14 | 90 309 | 6 451 |
| 6 | SKA | 10 | 63 278 | 6 328 |
| 7 | "Torpedo" | 14 | 88 161 | 6 297 |
| 8 | Metallurg Nk | 15 | 94 223 | 6 282 |
| 9 | "Knight" | 14 | 87 852 | 6 275 |
| 10 | Dynamo (Moscow) | 14 | 87 693 | 6 264 |
| 11 | Slovan | 15 | 93 068 | 6 205 |
| 12 | "Kunlun" | 13 | 79 920 | 6 148 |
| 13 | "Jokerit" | 16 | 96 222 | 6 014 |
| 14 | Metallurg Mg | 12 | 71 642 | 5 970 |
| 15 | "Medvescak" | 16 | 95 127 | 5 945 |
| 16 | "Ugra" | 16 | 94 116 | 5 882 |
| 17 | Dynamo (Riga) | 15 | 88 009 | 5 867 |
| 18 | "Salavat Yulaev" | 12 | 69 606 | 5 801 |
| 19 | "Motorist" | 13 | 75 228 | 5 787 |
| 20 | "Barys" | 13 | 75 029 | 5 771 |
| 21 | "Locomotive" | 14 | 80 384 | 5 742 |
| 22 | "Admiral" | 12 | 68 462 | 5 705 |
| 23 | Dynamo (Minsk) | 15 | 80 295 | 5 353 |
| 24 | Severstal | 12 | 63 747 | 5 312 |
| 25 | "AK Bars" | 11 | 56 803 | 5 164 |
| 26 | "Amur" | 12 | 59 563 | 4 964 |
| 27 | "Lada" | 11 | 54 398 | 4 945 |
| 28 | "Tractor" | 12 | 58 731 | 4 894 |
| 29 | "Neftekhimik" | 13 | 61 064 | 4 697 |
The greatest interest in the league is caused by the arrival of CSKA Moscow. On average, 7173 people go to the matches of Dmitry Kvartalnov's team. The second most popular audience is Avangard Omsk (6973 people). HC Sochi is in third place in this rating - 6,654 people attend the matches of this team on average, which is very good for a club that has been playing in the league for only its third season. According to this indicator, St. Petersburg SKA is not yet one of the five most visited teams in the league (an average of 6328 people go to matches with their participation).
Least of all in the KHL go to the visiting "Neftekhimik". On average, 4697 people attend matches of Nizhnekamsk away. But with the arrival of the most "media" KHL coach perhaps the situation will change. Kazan "Ak Bars" is not very active either (5164 people - fifth from the bottom in terms of guest attendance).
Among foreign teams, Slovan is of the greatest interest. On average, 6205 people go to the games of Milos Riha's team. The newcomer Kunlun, who under the leadership of Vladimir Yurzinov Jr. has a very successful start for the debut season and enters the playoff zone, also boasts an impressive audience at their games outside of China (6148 people).
Top 10 most visited matches of the 2016/2017 season
| date | Day of week | Viewers | The hosts | Guests | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 08.10.2016 | Saturday | 15 086 | Dynamo (Minsk) | Dynamo (Moscow) |
| 2 | 04.10.2016 | Tuesday | 14 410 | Dynamo (Minsk) | "Locomotive" |
| 3 | 23.10.2016 | Sunday | 13 777 | Dynamo (Minsk) | HC "Sochi" |
| 4 | 21.10.2016 | Friday | 13 621 | Dynamo (Minsk) | "Torpedo" |
| 5 | 06.10.2016 | Thursday | 13 538 | Dynamo (Minsk) | "Knight" |
| 6 | 15.09.2016 | Thursday | 13 015 | Dynamo (Minsk) | Dynamo (Riga) |
| 7 | 17.09.2016 | Saturday | 12 691 | Dynamo (Minsk) | Metallurg (Novokuznetsk) |
| 8 | 06.10.2016 | Thursday | 12 350 | SKA | CSKA |
| 9 | 16.10.2016 | Sunday | 12 250 | SKA | "Knight" |
| 27.10.2016 | Thursday | 12 250 | SKA | "Medvescak" |
The most attended match of the current season was the confrontation between Minsk and Moscow Dynamo in the capital of Belarus. This game was attended by 15086 spectators. In general, Dinamo Minsk holds the lead in this rating. The most visited SKA game was the battle with CSKA. Then 12,350 fans came to the Ice Palace with an official capacity of 12,350 spectators. On November 21, the army derby in St. Petersburg will be repeated again.
10 worst matches by viewer interest in 2016/17 season *
The data are given without matches with the participation of HC "Kunlun" (the team played only 1 game on home arena in Pekin)*
| date | Day of week | Viewers | The hosts | Guests | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 30.08.2016 | Tuesday | 2 200 | CSKA | "Neftekhimik" |
| 2 | 29.09.2016 | Thursday | 2 210 | Severstal | "Admiral" |
| 3 | 11.10.2016 | Tuesday | 2 312 | Severstal | Dynamo (Riga) |
| 4 | 27.09.2016 | Tuesday | 2 317 | Severstal | "Amur" |
| 5 | 18.10.2016 | Tuesday | 2 388 | Metallurg (Novokuznetsk) | Severstal |
| 6 | 16.09.2016 | Friday | 2 390 | "Ugra" | Metallurg (Novokuznetsk) |
| 7 | 09.09.2016 | Friday | 2 395 | Metallurg (Novokuznetsk) | Slovan |
| 8 | 14.09.2016 | Wednesday | 2 400 | "Ugra" | Metallurg (Novokuznetsk) |
| 20.09.2016 | Tuesday | 2 400 | "Knight" | "Torpedo" | |
| 03.10.2016 | Monday | 2 400 | "Ugra" | "Lada" |
The worst match in terms of audience interest was the game between CSKA and Neftekhimik in Moscow. This meeting was attended by 2,200 people. Attendance hockey matches in the Russian capital is traditionally not the most impressive, the clubs still have to work with their fans. We deliberately do not indicate the games of Kunlun, since the real interest in this team can be assessed when the Stars will play again in Beijing.