Football Fandom End of Season Awards
Whilst familiar teams have got their hands on the big trophies, Custom Gifts present the alternative end-of-season awards. We’ve survey 1375 football fans to find out which teams have the most die-hard fans, which fans watch the most games, and who’s the most popular.
View the data in full below, or follow the link to see the infographic.
Time Spent
For most of us, football is an obsession. But just how much of our lives does football take up, and which teams fans are the most football obsessed?
Minutes Watched Per Season
The typical football fan tends to watch 2205 minutes per season
19% of fans managed to watch double that amount, about 4410 minutes, or 72 hours. That’s longer than watching every episode of game of thrones back-to-back – bearing in mind Game of Thrones has been going 8 years.
Most Die Hard Fans
Chelsea and Liverpool have the most hardcore fans, with Newcastle and West Ham ranked the worst.
Chelsea fans are the most die hard, with 32% reporting they watched nearly every game. Liverpool fans are not that far behind, with 31.85% of their fans watching their title challenge this season. Whilst successful teams seem to have the highest proportion of die-hard fans, less successful clubs like West Ham (10.34%) and Newcastle United fans (12%) seem to have the least die hard fans.
Till the Bitter End
On average 48% of you will never switch off the tele or leave the game early, no matter how bad it is.
Again, it is mainly the big teams with the most die-hard fans.
Liverpool (4%), Man United (6%), Man City (7%) and Arsenal (7%) are the most likely to stay to the end of a game.
Whereas Leicester City (11%), Chelsea (10%) & Newcastle United (10%) are the most likely to leave early.
The phrase glory-supporter seems to be thrown at fans of big teams as an insult – however this data seems to suggest that supporting a team might just make you a more loyal fan.
Location
'Support your local team' is thrown around in football, but are local fans really more loyal? Do they watch as much football? Do they go to more games?
Distance From Stadium
The typical football fan is split between living within 15 miles of a stadium (45%) and living 50+ miles away (29%).
Does Location Affect How Often We Watch Games?
Interestingly, living 50+ miles from the stadium makes you more likely to watch games – either at the stadium or on the tele – with 29% of respondents living 50+ miles away watching almost every game, compared to just 16% of people within 15 miles of the stadium.
Does Location Affect How Often We Go to the Stadium?
As you would expect, living closer to the stadium, means you are more likely to attend games, however 5% of respondents still manage to attend a couple of games a season, despite living 50+ miles away. Are you one of the die-hard few?
Which Teams Have the Most Local Fans?
Leicester (44%), Newcastle United (42%), Man City (30%) & Leeds (40%) have the most fans from the area.
Which Teams Have the Most Out of Town Fans?
Conversely, Liverpool fans have the most out of town fans, with 57%. This is almost double Man United’s fanbase, which only has 39% of its fans from outside Manchester.
Given that so much is made about supporting your local team, it seems that out of town fans are much more likely to be loyal to their team. Whilst living locally means you are 4x more likely to watch games, a high proportion of out of town fans still make the trip.
Support
Every football fan has got into a heated debate about what makes a 'true fan' and who is a 'glory supporter'. What do you think is the main reason for supporting a club? We find out.
Why Do You Support Your Club?
Often a touchy subject, reasons for supporting a football team are often thrown around as insults. Reasons for supporting team is perfectly split between family (37%) and picking your team in your youth (38%).
Is It Because of Pushy Parents?
It seems like Arsenal (53%), West Ham (38%) and Leicester City (38%) have the highest proportion of pushy parents forcing their fandom on their children.
Is It Chosen Based on Childhood?
Supporting a team that impresses you in your childhood is the closest we could get someone to admit they were a glory supporter, without admitting it.
Liverpool (55%), Man United (51%) and sorry Leeds fans (50%) take this honour.
Interestingly Chelsea (44%) and Man City (42%) are middle of the pack, though are often talked about most as being glory supporters, when you are more likely to support Leeds or Spurs for that reason.
Big Spenders
Which teams fans love to splash the cash? Which group of fans is most likely to watch illegal streams? Find out below!
Which Fans Regulary Attend Matches?
Probably the biggest outlay for a fan is attending games. With the average price of a ticket being £30, West Ham fans have the biggest outlay by any team with £500+ being spent by 20% of fans. Man City, Tottenham and Newcastle all spend a lot here.
Which Fans Own Lots of Merch?
Another expense is the amount of merchandise bought by fans. Here Chelsea (50%), Liverpool (48%) and Man U (37%) love to show their support off with club merchandise.
Does Going to Games Affect How Much Merch We Own?
It also seems like living within 15 miles of the stadium makes you more likely to own merch, perhaps regularly visiting the club shop.
Who is Most Likely to Watch Illegal Streams?
Now that there are multiple subscriptions required if you want to see every game on the TV, more and more fans are opting to stream games illegally, saving hundreds of pounds in the process.
Chelsea fans take the crown here, with over 27% of respondents admitting to streaming games illegally. Liverpool (19%) and Man United (16%) are also guilty of this, whereas West Ham fans are the most ethical, with only 6% of respondents admitting to watching illegal streams.
Popularity
We use data from Facebook and Google to find out who is the most popular team, how that has changed over the years, and which leagues are the most supported.
Most Popular Teams
Here are the most popular football teams in England, according to the number of searches performed in Google.
Arsenal are by far the most popular team, followed by rivals Liverpool and Manchester United.
Leeds United are the most popular Championship, and more popular than all but three UK teams.
Rangers beat rivals Celtic by almost double the number of searches, despite Celtics dominance in the league.
Popularity by Season
Football Popularity is up 10% on last season, and up 33% on 5 years ago!
Popularity of Leagues
Unsurprisingly the premier league is the UKs top supported league by far – claiming 42% more searches than all the other leagues combined.
The championship is a strong second, getting twice as many searches as the Scottish Premiership.
League one is only 10% less popular than the Scottish Premiership.
Sources
We've also created an infographic on the above data! You can share this image on your site by copying the below code:
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