Stadiums and teams attracting the highest attendance on opening day across Europe’s top 5 leagues

Written by Paul Kemp

Paul Kemp is an experienced sports writer covering Soccer, NBA and NHL. He also writes in depth reviews of sports betting sites based on his personal experience.

, | Updated: August 26, 2022

Some of the European leagues began a week earlier than others, but now they are all under way. There were some interesting results and new faces, but our latest study is about the fans in the stands. In order to conduct this SportingPedia report we collected data about the attendance on the opening day across the top 5 European leagues to see where fans were most eager to see how their favorite teams begin the new season. Some, like the Premier League, Ligue 1 and the Bundesliga kicked-off а week earlier than Serie A and La Liga, but now we have added up all the necessary numbers.

Key Takeaways

On the first day of the Premier League, only 1.5%, or 6,254 of all available seats across the 10 venues, remained empty
When compared to the other top 5 leagues in Europe, English fans were the most impatient, with a total of 421,273 flocking around the 10 grounds on opening weekend
On opening weekend, the average occupancy across the stadiums of Europe’s top five leagues was calculated to be 84.5%
The Premier League drew the most interest, selling 98.5% of all available seats; the Bundesliga came in second with 95%, and Ligue 1 rounded out the top three with 78.8%
Only 4 arenas were completely sold out, with all four located in Germany
Manchester United, Borussia Dortmund, Marseille, Milan, and Barcelona attracted the largest crowds in each league during the opening weekend
Serie A stadiums had the lowest occupancy rate, with just over 70% of their capacity filled
In total, 1,683,340 fans attended the first-round games in England, Spain, Germany, France, and Italy’s top divisions
Spezia was the only team unable to gather at least 10,000 fans in their debut game
Montpellier, Celta Vigo, and Verona were the only teams that did not sell out at least half of their stadiums’ capacity on opening day

Premier League

The Premier League was the hardest of Europe’s top five leagues in terms of finding available tickets for the opening matches. A total of 421,273 people attended the ten 1^st round games of the top English division. When West Ham hosted the defending champions Manchester City on August 7th in London, there were only 57 vacant seats, an indicator of how eager the Hammers’ supporters were to watch their team in action. The largest audience, 73,711, went to watch Manchester United in Eric Ten Hag’s debut game in charge of the Red Devils at Old Trafford. However they departed the stadium in shock after Cristiano Ronaldo and company were defeated 1:2. Newcastle, Tottenham, Everton, and Fulham were the teams that performed a commendable job at marketing and distributing tickets, as each of their venues was full to more than 99% of capacity. The Vitality Stadium in Bournemouth, which was 88.3% full, had the lowest occupancy rate in the opening round of the Premier League.

Host

Visitor

Stadium

Capacity

Attendance

Occupancy

West Ham

Manchester City

London Stadium

62,500

62,443

99.9%

Newcastle

Nottingham Forest

St. James' Park

52,338

52,245

99.8%

Tottenham

Southampton

Tottenham Hotspur Stadium

62,062

61,732

99.5%

Everton

Chelsea

Goodison Park

39,571

39,254

99.2%

Fulham

Liverpool

Craven Cottage

22,384

22,207

99.2%

Leicester

Brentford

King Power Stadium

32,273

31,794

98.5%

Manchester United

Brighton

Old Trafford

74,879

73,711

98.4%

Crystal Palace

Arsenal

Selhurst Park

26,047

25,286

97.1%

Leeds

Wolverhampton

Elland Road

37,890

36,347

95.9%

Bournemouth

Aston Villa

Vitality Stadium

11,329

10,000

88.3%

Bundesliga

According to our study, the German Bundesliga comes in 2^nd place, after drawing 377,971 spectators to the nine stadiums for its first matches. Augsburg registered the lowest level of fan interest, with their WWK ARENA filling only 82.6% of its capacity. Eintracht Frankfurt, Borussia Dortmund, FC Koln, and Union Berlin were the only teams not only in Germany, but across Europe’s top five leagues, to completely sell out their stadiums for the first round of games. BVB took full advantage of having the country’s largest venue and can be proud that the famous “Yellow Wall” at Signal Iduna Park drew 81,365 fans – the largest crowd in Europe.

Host

Visitor

Stadium

Capacity

Attendance

Occupancy

Borussia Dortmund

Bayer Leverkusen

Signal Iduna Park

81,365

100.0%

Eintracht Frankfurt

Bayern Munich

Deutsche Bank Park

51,500

100.0%

FC Koln

Schalke

RheinEnergieStadion

50,000

100.0%

Union Berlin

Hertha Berlin

Stadion An der Alten Forsterei

22,012

100.0%

Wolfsburg

Werder Bremen

Vokswagen Arena

30,000

28,015

93.4%

Borussia Monchengladbach

Hoffeheim

Borussia-Park

54,057

49,659

91.9%

Stuttgart

RB Leipzig

Mercedes-Benz Arena

50,571

46,000

91.0%

Bochum

Mainz

Vonovia Rurhstadion

27,599

24,110

87.4%

Augsburg

Freiburg

WWK ARENA

30,660

25,310

82.6%

Ligue 1

In terms of average occupancy, the French Ligue 1 rounds out our top three. The stadiums were visited by 290,870 people, which is 78.8% of their maximum capacity. Strasbourg was the only team to sell more than 95% of their arena’s 26,109 seats, while Marseille’s match against Reims drew the largest crowd, with 62,738 in attendance. After a disappointing last campaign, the fans of Montpellier showed their dissatisfaction and filled Stade de la Mosson to just 36.4% of its potential for the game against Troyes. This was the only match of Ligue 1’s opening weekend to see the venue not filled to at least 50% of its potential and recorded the lowest occupancy across all 49 sides featured in the report.

Host

Visitor

Stadium

Capacity

Attendance

Occupancy

Strasbourg

Monaco

Stade de la Meinau

26,109

25,359

97.1%

Lens

Brest

Stade Bollaert-Delelis

38,223

37,015

96.8%

Rennes

Lorient

Roazhon Park

29,788

28,177

94.6%

Clermont Foot

PSG

Stade Gabriel Montpied

13,000

12,203

93.9%

Marseille

Reims

Stade Velodrome

67,394

62,738

93.1%

Lyon

Ajaccio

Parc Olympique Lyonnais

59,186

48,516

82.0%

Lille

Auxerre

Stade Pierre-Mauroy

50,186

32,292

64.3%

Toulouse

Nice

Stade Municipal

33,150

20,567

62.0%

Angers

Nantes

Stade Raymond-Kopa

19,350

12,000

62.0%

Montpellier

Troyes

Stade de la Mosson

32,939

12,003

36.4%

La Liga

The next stop is down south in Spain, where we have the 4^th highest level of interest among football betting fans. The stadiums hosting the first round of La Liga games were filled to an average of 77.2% of their capacities. After a turbulent summer transfer window in which Barcelona landed the likes of Robert Lewandowski and Raphina among others, their fans were understandably eager to see how president Laporta’s new project will kick-off. 81,104 Culers gathered at Camp Nou, only to leave disappointed as Barca were held to a boring goalless draw by the visiting Rayo Vallecano. It was Celta Vigo who registered the lowest occupancy in Spain, with 47.8% of Estadio de Balaidos filled, or 13,859 in attendance. Almeria sold out 94.19% of their stadium for opening day, the highest of any La Liga team. Aside from their fans wanting to see the team in its return to the elite division, another factor was that the visiting team was none other than Real Madrid, the reigning Spanish and European Champions.

Host

Visitor

Stadium

Capacity

Attendance

Occupancy

Almeria

Real Madrid

Estadio de los Juegos Mediterraneos

15,274

14,386

94.19%

Betis

Elche

Estadio Benito Vilamarin

59,378

50,622

85.25%

Barcelona

Rayo Vallecano

Camp Nou

99,354

81,104

81.63%

Valencia

Girona

Estadio de Mestalla

48,600

39,359

80.99%

Osasuna

Sevilla

El Sadar

23,576

18,536

78.62%

Cadiz

Real Sociedad

Estadio Nuevo Mirandilla

21,094

16,570

78.55%

Athletic Bilbao

Mallorca

Estadio San Mames

53,289

39,747

74.59%

Getafe

Atletico Madrid

Coliseum Alfonso Perez

16,800

12,235

72.83%

Valladolid

Villarreal

Estadio Jose Zorrilla

27,618

17,543

63.52%

Celta Vigo

Espanyol

Estadio de Balaidos

29,000

13,859

47.79%

Serie A

The new Serie A season started just two weeks ago. According to the attendance ratings, the Italians were the least impressed with the new football campaign.The average occupancy registered across the ten stadiums on opening day was just under 73% – the lowest across all of Europe’s top five leagues. The largest crowd was found at Stadio Giuseppe Meazza, where 70,197 people gathered to watch Milan begin their title defense with an entertaining 4:2 victory over Udinese. It means that 92.46% of the capacity of Italy’s largest stadium was filled, but Juventus enjoyed the highest occupancy on the first day of Serie A, with 93.3% of their Allianz Stadium sold out. Verona recorded the lowest rating, with only 43.3% of the seats available at Stadio Marcantonio Bentegodi distributited for the match with Napoli. Spezia was the only team of Europe’s top five leagues that failed to draw at least 10,000 fans, with only 8,360 people in attendance for the slender 1:0 win over Empoli.

Host

Visitor

Stadium

Capacity

Attendance

Occupancy