Midweek Attendance Thread (6/18) [R]

I believe that capacity for this game was around 12-13,000.

 

LA - 13,867.

All in all not bad I guess though I'd prefer 27,000.

 

We had full capacity, it was not a sellout.

Rain from about midday and threats of rain for the night, as well as lightening. Things were ok throughout the game, and a lot of people showed up at around the half.

 

MLS' site says 11,728 for CHI/DAL.

Personally I think that's excellent for midweek. Almost a sell out. Hell it's a season high.

 

How significant is the rivalry factor? Is anyone, apart from the few thousand who go to every match, even aware there is much of a rivalry? Are there "casual fans" who don't go to matches often but would go to see the Galaxy play San Jose (or the reverse in San Jose) because of the rivalry? I've always thought of MLS rivalries as things supporters groups get excited over but no one else. But I could be wrong.

 

I got a feeling you're right. All this stuff bounces around a thousand times among us fanatics here on BS, but noone else picks it up. It's just another part of being a young league. In 20 years or so, everyone will be able to recognise a rivalry. (Just like everyone knows the Raiders and Broncos suck).

 

Historically midweek games have had awful attendance numbers, so I must say I was pleasantly surprised. Two games and both over 11K - that's not bad at this point. Saturdays are the bread and butter.

 

I think you're right.
The only rivalry that I think there might be any kind of increase for is SJ-LA in SJ (though this year hasn't done any favors to that theory)

 

Chicago was at full strength, seating-wise, and should remain so. Considering the weather, that wasn't a bad crowd at all.

Los Angeles' historic midweek average (non-July 4):9,785

San Jose at midweek in LA:

THU..7/04/02..San Jose at Los Angeles..55,234
WED..8/30/00..San Jose at Los Angeles..11,974
WED..9/01/99..San Jose at Los Angeles...8,662

 

Fanaddict just pointed out that the stands below the main permanent stands were not up. So it was something less than 15k, but it wasn't a sellout.

I hate being wrong...it was a very long offseason.

 

Oh, you're right. My bad. The stands on the track, the ones where if you're sitting in the front row you can't see jack, those weren't in yet.

Still a good crowd.

 

Good showing...

I agree with the posters here who said that the attendance figures where "not bad" or "good for midweek".

How many of you, when you first scrolled down the mlsnet pages to find the attendance squinted your eyes a bit or cringed before looking hoping NOT to see a 7k or 8k number after the word "Attendance:"? I for one was thinking just that, please don't let either game be that low. (a pretty pathetic thought i know)....

...but 11,728 and 13,867 for MID-WEEK games...I think that for the season of 2003, MLS can live with that and feel rather pleased. not happy, but pleased....

 

The weather was the only wildcard in Naperville as far as I was concerned. The Fire has come close to capacity, whatever that capacity has been, every game since late last season. And it would have taken quite a while for somebody to make it from downtown Chicago out here in the rain last night. Kudos to those who did.

And I figured LA would do better than its historical midweek average, just on the basis of the HDC.

Now, if last night's games had been in Southlake and San Jose rather than here and LA, I'd have been more reluctant to take a peek at the numbers.

 

Gotta give credit to Phire fans - good crowd last night, though it got quiet in the 2nd half. If you want to know why- check out the Fire boards.

Somehow Chicago has been able to do in Naperville what it looks Dallas will never do in Southlake. Fill the stands.

Was the LA v SJ game on the shootout package last night? I could not find it and was stuck watching the 2nd half of France v Colombia.

 

I brought 4 last night -- delayed Father's Day. At 5:30 at dinner in Lombard, it was raining, and we were considering cancelling, but the rain dried up just long enough for the game and then it began drizzling again 20 minutes later. As if Peter had asked for and been granted a window just big enough to fit overtime, if needed.

I'm surprised the crowd was that big. For that matter, my ticket guy assured me Tuesday afternoon that I'd be able to cash in vouchers at game time, so they weren't expecting a sell-out last night even with better weather. Great crowd for a rainy Wednesday. With all Saturdays to go, I'd expect all sell-outs the rest of the way. There should be a catch-em-before-they-leave factor now.

 

There's one Wednesday left, isn't there? 8/20 vs. LA?

The schedule has changed so much, I don't know if the version I have is still accurate.

 

Well, it's still a Wednesday on the Fire site.

We also have a couple sets of consecutive home weekends that may depress attendance a bit...seems to me that it used to downtown. "Lets go to a soccer game" ... "nah, we just went last week".

We shall see, I suppose.

 

Back-to-back-to-back 7/12, 7/19, 7/26 and 8/9-8/16-8/24.


Back-to-backs last year did okay:

SAT...6/15/02..Dallas........13,117
SAT...6/22/02..MetroStars....12,721


And then

SAT...7/20/02..D.C. United...14,432
SAT...7/27/02..MetroStars....14,576


And right after that

WED...7/31/02..D.C. United...10,444

 

Game was on that HDTV network not MLS shootout.

 

To be honest, I don't think the HDC attendance was that bad. I was actually expecting fewer. For starters, attendance is not going to be 27k very often because AEG have priced a good chuck of would be fans out. Second, getting to Carson for a midweek match from many parts of LA is a pain. The two Saturday games took me about half an hour to get there from Pasadena. Took an hour last night. Thank God for Car Pool lanes. Surprisingly, the upper deck was probably 2/3rds full.

 

I don't think we're disappointed at all (except that MLS scheduled this game on a Wednesday), a pretty solid showing for the game. Next time SJ comes to L.A. at the end of the year (final regular season home game), the numbers will be very strong and has a chance of selling out, and the 5 and 10 games packages didn't have this game.

 

I saw the HDnet broadcast and it looked like quite a bit fewer than 13,000. We saw a number of wide angle shots that included the opposite field stands and there was literally no one. I think empty seats outnumber those occupied at least 10:1. Now maybe the other side of the field was full, but I must say the 13,000 number from the HDnet broadcast looked about 5,000+ too high for those who were in attendence (based on the 3 sides of the stands we could see).

No doubt midweek games are bad for attendence, but I think in this case thousands of people who paid for tickets just weren't at the game (that is only explanation I can think of.)

 

Is this another way of saying, "Looked like more on TV?"