Highest attendance for women’s club match

Spain surely has two of the highest from their monster attendances in league and cup in 2019

Atlético v Barcelona in league

🙌 ¡HISTORIA! 🙌
🙌 ¡HISTORIA! 🙌
🙌 ¡HISTORIA! 🙌

🏟 ¡ 60.739 espectadores en el Wanda @Metropolitano para ver el #AtletiBarça! 💥

🔝 ¡Récord mundial de asistencia a un partido femenino de clubes! 😍🤩#HablamosDeLoMismo#LigaIberdrola pic.twitter.com/TcUXqsfV6O

— LALIGA (@LaLiga) March 17, 2019

Athletic v Atlético in Copa de la Reina

Guardad este número en vuestra memoria porque esto es HISTÓRICO... ✨

🏟 ¡48.121 espectadores en San Mamés!

Récord absoluto en un partido femenino en la historia de España. 🔝

🙋‍♀️ #HablamosDeLoMismo 🙋‍♂️
🏆 #CopaDeLaReina 🏆 pic.twitter.com/WAmLPm3dCZ

— LALIGA (@LaLiga) January 30, 2019

 

Before women's football was banned domestically Dick Kerr Ladies had 54,562 and then 59,964 against West Brom on New Year's Day in 1920. That record lasted 99 years until broken by the above.

 

The top four I know of in recent memory include the two Spanish matches mentioned above, plus 51,211 for Tigres vs Monterrey (May 2018) and 45,423 for Chelsea vs Arsenal (also May 2018). I think there have been several 30k+ matches in England, Spain, Italy, and Mexico in the past four years as well, but not sure which ones those are.

Highest in the US was the inaugural WUSA match (April 2001, one of the few huge numbers that was NOT a double-header) when 34,148 packed into RFK for Washington Freedom vs Bay Area CyberRays. There have been four NWSL matches above Portland's previous cap of 21,144, though just one meeting and none yet above Portland's current cap of 25,218.

=edit=
I think Italy's top number is 39,027 (March 2019) for Juve vs Fiorentina.

 

*specification on my USA numbers above:
Those were for standalone matches only. Obviously we had a Seattle-Portland double-header this year with the respective MLS sides that had 27,278 fans in total. There was also a WUSA Washingtion-vs-Carolina match (June 2001) that had 30,217 in attendance.

 

The numbers in this thread are quite surprising to me. I did not think European attendance number had even a remote chance of beating US numbers. I am actually pleased that it is the case because I have always though that here, in the USA, we were paramount in women's club soccer and it is good to know, a: We are not as strong as I thought and 2: Europe supports women's soccer much better than I thought.

Now if we in the US can get more butts in the seats in the NWSL and raise our level of play in the clubs maybe we can retain our current spot on top f the women's game.

Good job Europe. I wonder what other countries or parts of the world have a truly effective women's league with good attendance.

 

These matches with +40K attendance are one-off games though, hardly representative for the leagues. Most teams in the big leagues in Europe play in front of crowds counted in the hundreds not thousands. The top teams may be 3-4000.

 

Yeah, taking about record attendances isn't representative of the average at all. As Bauser alluded to, league average is easily led by NWSL with around 5,000 per game, and I think LMXF has usually been second with roughly 2,000 to 3,000 per game. When you go to the week-in-week-out of European leagues, especially for the many clubs that don't have superclub status, attendance is absolutely woeful, making league averages hover around 1,000 (although I think the WSL at least is starting to buck that trend with a recent 3,000 average last season).

Also worth pointing out that many of those hugely-attended games outside of the USA are achieved with steeply discounted (or outright free) ticketing. I think one of Spain's top two and a few of Mexico's top games were free to attend, but I'm not 100% sure on those; I know for a fact that Italy's record was free for fans. So these numbers are all basically just for hype and not a direct benefit to the clubs hosting. (To be fair, hype does have value on its own in potentially bringing in more future fans and/or enticing sponsors - it's just much more nebulous than actual ticket money.)

Last note: a big reason that USA doesn't pull huge numbers is because our soccer stadiums aren't built to hold them. Remember that the Portland Thorns fairly regularly sell out their stadium, and Louisville has done well with filling out their stadium too. NWSL teams (and WUSA/WPS teams before them) literally can't pull huge numbers because they generally don't (can't) play in the stadiums that could hold them.

 

This. Juventus also recently had the record attendance for a UEFA Women's Champions' League match outside of the quarter-finals and above, with 16.781 for Juventus-Chelsea at Allianz Stadium in Turin. But, of course, it was a free-admission match.

 

Think many would go if it was only about 5 dollars?

 

Attendances 2021/22 season (home games only)

NWSL (US) - league average 4380 (full regular season)

Portland Thorns - 9158
OL Reign - 5240
NC Couraage - 4125

FA WSL (ENG) - league average 1976 (10 rounds in)

Arsenal - 3562
Chelsea - 3169
Everton - 2999

WE League (JPN) - league average 1715 (10 rounds in)

INAC Kobe - 2650
Urawa Reds - 2564
Omiya Ardija - 2333

Frauen Bundesliga (GER) - league average 682 (12 rounds in)

Eintracht Frankfurt - 1190
Turbine Potsdam - 1105
SGS Essen - 922

Division 1 Feminine (FRA) - league average 647 (11 rounds in)

Lyon - 2615
Paris - 1185
Dijion - 988

 

Think 2019 attendances was going up big. Chelsea especially was pretty packed.

 

Not sure. What I do know is that the choice of making it a free-admission event was aimed at different benefits than the immediate ticket money. There are benefits that are intangible (at least at the moment), but can be as important on the long run as the financial ones.

@SiberianThunderT mentioned the hype-value, especially for a new or growing team (or for a new or growing league). In the case of Juventus, the crowd at the home match was specifically there to support the performance of the team and to help them reaching the goal of qualifying to the quarter-finals of the Champions' League for the first time in the club's history (that indeed has happened, although that specific record-attendance match vs Chelsea was lost by 1-2; the kind of performance on that evening, though, made it clear that Juventus could compete and gave them confidence for the subsequent matches).

Advancing to the quarter-finals of the WCL was so huge for the club that the ticket money was just an afterthought there (the benefits are countless: prestige, sponsors-money, TV-rights-money, playing some more matches that can gather an even bigger crowd, attracting new top-players who could decide it's worth signing for the club, you name it!).

 

Lyon v Frankfurt Olympic Stadium, Munchen, Germany
Lyon v Chelsea, Groupama Stadium , Lyon, France

 

I think most of the WUSA attendances you listed are actually double-headers themselves... There are only three standalone WUSA matches above 20k
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Record_attendances_in_United_States_club_soccer#Women's_soccer
https://web.archive.org/web/20150906213759/http://www.kenn.com/soccer/results/leagues/wusa.html

 

Yes 53K+ and 99 years.

 

yes women's football used to draw big crowd in England before the long ban by the FA.

 

Pre WW2 FA was great at destroying opportunities. They cost England 3 WC (men) and clear dominance of the Women's game.

 

In addition to the list:

37th Empress Cup (Japan) - December 27th, 2015
Final match - Kawasaki Todoroki Stadium (Kawasaki)
Albirex Niigata 0 - 1 INAC Kobe Leonessa
Sawa 78'
Attendance 20 379

(It was Homare Sawa last match before retirement)

 

Bit off topic but some interesting data on top leagues developement (media):
(by RESULT Sports)

 

https://www.90min.com/posts/barcelo...u-tickets-womens-champions-league-real-madrid

Barcelona surpass 50,000 Camp Nou ticket sales for Women's Champions League tie

Tickets start from €9 and demand among eager fans keen to watch the Champions League holders, who are favourites to sweep to the trophy again in 2022, is clearly huge. There is every reason to believe that sales will continue to grow and grow ahead of the game on 30 March.

Think they should have charge 15 per ticket, they would still have reached 50k.

 

Most tickets are 16 euros. The cheaper ones are behind the net. That said, the average Spaniard is not as well off as in the North or many places in North America.

 

In addition to the list:
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2011 Nadeshiko League 1 (Japan), August 6th, 2011
Denka Big Swan Stadium (Niigata City)
Albirex Niigata 1 - 2 INAC Kobe Leonessa

Attendance 24 546

(Not 100% sure, but it's probably record attendance for women's league match in Japan)
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2012 Nadeshiko League 1 (Japan), July 31st, 2011
Kobe Universiade Memorial Stadium (Kobe)
INAC Kobe Leonessa 3 - 1 Okayama Yungo Belle

Attendance 21 236
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(Top 3 women's club attendances in Japan - again not 100% sure)