Also the national team aspect. A lot of USMNT fans aren't really fans of U.S. soccer as a whole, they're fans of American men who play in Europe and Jesse Marsch. I remember a poster over in USA Men openly admitted that during the course of a national team game he roots for the MLS players to fail.
I mean, that's like looking at a tree and rooting for the apples to fall while the birds fly away...they're built for 2 different purposes.... Whereas, most of the eurosnobs I know root for having coach who is smart enough to realize that just because they're both found in trees, you want the birds if you're trying to compete with other birds....
That's just big soccer. The most popular non-Mexican teams in the US are Barcelona, Real Madrid, Liverpool, Manchester United and Chelsea. That survey was carried out in 2016, before Dest and Pulisic signed for Barca and the Pensioners.
There's also a sort of inferiority complex among American soccer fans, especially those who haven't been following the sport for very long. The people I've encountered who compare MLS to European U-12 teams or call MLS a retirement league are mostly Americans without strong connections to any other country. I've even encountered Americans who root against the USMNT every game "because Americans suck at soccer."
D1 college football attendances in 2019 (pre-Covid) The average Texas High School attendance was 21,227.
TBF, TX HS att is like the EPL end of the discussion I went to a HS that had 499 kids in it, and we had roughly 5-6k at home and would have 1-2.5K on the road
American Football Attendance needs to be put into perspective. There's a scarcity of supply. Most High School Football seasons are 8 games (4 home, 4 away). College Football is usually between 11-13 games, with 6-7 Home games (9-10 if you're Notre Dame). Same with NFL, who have 8 home games. As soon as Covid subsides, that 17th game will likely be played in other parts of the world too. The attendances in the EPL, and Bundesliga are much more impressive IMO, given that those teams play 17-19 Home Games a season, plus more for continental and cup competitions. Not to mention the fact that the cost to attend a High School football game is considerably less than a Professional Game. Same with College Football (most stadiums are bench seating.....) where most tickets are very affordable.
High school football is the dominant religion in Texas. It's more important to Texans than pro football.
Agree with the overall point, but will say that the soccer season is much more spread out and availability to attend is much higher than the more condensed football season, American type.
That was the average for the state championship games across the various divisions based on school size. No way that is an average for regular games. Texas high school football is obviously a big deal, but even the fancy expensive stadiums that people always mention are under 20K capacity, and there are hundreds of school with more modest facilities.
Thank you for pointing this out. I didn’t think that number could possibly pass the sniff test but have, admittedly, never been to a Texas high school football game. However, given that the largest high school stadium in Texas holds 19.5k (which, admittedly, seems unreal), the average is certainly a small percentage of that.
An actual avg would be hard to pin down but I'd bet it is higher than most would think. My school is a perfect example. There's a smaller classification school about 35 minutes away that regularly gets 4-5k What's really awesome though is that TXHS football was getting over 40k as far back as the 1940s and there have been a few games over 50k The 50th largest SEATS 11k
When TX finally secedes and introduces pro/rel in pointyball the NFL billionaires are going to soil themselves no longer being " world" champions...
Similarly... my high school's best season in the four years I was there was 2-8. They still filled a 12,000 seat stadium to 80-90% capacity every game. This was in the 90s. Ironically, every single team except football was a state semifinalist at least once in those four years, and several won state titles. None drew more than a couple hundred people a game.
well opinion is when american watches serie a or other leagues and see pro/rel and how teams fight to not be relegated they take that underdog side that is why in america along with main club they have relegation battle club they have investment it. just mls i bet most fans of clubs pay also attention who will get the champions league sport i8n concaf champions league as well euro teams to champions league uefa. pro/rel is needed concaf champions league needs to get bigger because since gabriel hainze to me mls is just sunday league i do not watch it at all. lose 4 games in row coach ask for practice and you deside it is not worth it more then your free day. lol in pro /rel battle team in europe fans would breathe their team and their fight