Interesting article on Beebs:

https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/45158878

It seems some clubs are over reporting attendances even though fans now the stadiums aren’t full. You may have noticed many empty seats at Arsenal, Man City and West Ham recently, so what are these figures? Those figures are actually tickets sold and can include members who don’t go to the game (who don’t sell, or pass on their ticket) and it currently doesn’t break the law in U.K. Also finances of ticket prices play a big part and the police who attend games issue a seperate attendance figure to the official figure dished out by clubs. For example, notice Manchester City have actually been getting 7,500 less fans than reported over the club microphone 14% less than capacity. Pretty shocking clubs would do this but the fans are no fools.

@Ledley Yeah but how many seasons ticket are there sold at once? Could it be around 10 000? And if so, does that mean that team who sold those alway add 10 000 to their attendance numbers? Because if they do, its suck.

This i have no idea and depends on the club.

If you subtract the sponsors, general admission and the away allocation i would say roughly 80-85%. That is just a rough guess. For example, I remember being at The Hawthorns as my uncle is a West Brom season ticket holder and i asked him if I could get a ticket to see Man United. He said there was a group of them going about 3,500 or something going to Manchester and it varies from club to club. Buying a resold ticket i think to aston villa(LOL) i think i purchased it for $220 pounds not including transport and stuff you buy for matchday..

A club can also factor in UCL nights on their season ticket. So imagine that for a scalper he's in dreamland and the fan is held to ransome basically. That was a few years back and at the game, the guy who sold us the seats came and offered us tickets to Manchester United v Bayern (Van Persie years).

So to answer your question a club like Manchester United might sell 65,000 season tickets lets say. More than one person can buy a ticket and some include UCL packages which make the pass more expensive. This adds to what the club announces as their official attendance even if the stadium aint full. I am not sure whether the loudspeaker guy gameday attendance or pre-sold tickets. There is only ammount of General admission for the day and they are sold weeks if not months in advance. For lesser teams like a QPR or something when they were around their stadium is tiny like 18,500 or something and I still could not get in general admission only through people not going on the day.

And if so, does that mean that team who sold those alway add 10 000 to their attendance numbers?

Yes. Its currently not against the law to over-report and they use to advantage. Greed ay

Anyone see the Man City game. 53, 300 my blue moon!