^there's definitely loads of passion for football in Portugal, sure. Same for Italy, when I went there everybody around was talking about football - even the armed guards at the Vatican's Pinacoteca.
How that translates into a sports attendance culture (which was our starting point) is however a different and more problematic issue. Notice I said *sports attendance culture* like you initially put it, so not just men's football but all sports, and not just loving these sports but also attending. There are loads of factors (between which attendance culture, while still a factor, is not a prominent one IMO) for which in men's football France doesn't stand out more like it could (lack of a string of large inner cities to support more major clubs, lack of institutional and economical development at club level to the extent that many clubs/cities that should be major are nowhere to be seen, lack of stadium infrastructure until recently etc), however where France loses a bit in what men's football is concerned to countries like the Netherlands (I'm really not having Portugal but I think I'm giving you there a better example), they are also gaining a lot in what other sports are concerned.
For example, even if I come from a country where the *passion for football* is much stronger than in France (when the national team plays in a tournament and they get a good result, we make up spontaneous marches throughout most of the country's cities), I can still admit that in sports attendance culture we are nowhere near France. I had recently stumbled upon a stream of a third division (i.e. amateur) promotion play-off match in French rugby, and looking over the size of the crowd and the wonderful sense of occasion (you can sense it a bit in
this video), I can easily say that it would be hard for me to find many examples like that in my country's *top flight football*, never mind the "basement" level of a secondary sport. There are 40 teams (split in conferences) in this level ("Federale 1"), there must be quite a few more such nice clubs like that of Nevers, which is only a town of 35k people. And above this level there's professional rugby with it's 30 clubs from towns and small to medium-sized provincial cities (save for the two Parisian clubs) who, like I said, on their own make an attendance figure that would put them comfortably somewhere in Europe's top ten *football* attendances.
Another good example is basketball,
here's a snap of what winning the title means for Limoges, a small city of 136k people. How about second division though, here's a couple of videos:
first shows the away support of Saint-Quentin,
the second shows the away support of Le Portel. Saint-Quentin is a 56k people town and Le Portel is 10k, if they get that *away* and in *second* division basketball, they REALLY do love basketball there.
Such videos give, IMO, a much better of French sports culture overall, and I can't blame anyone for not knowing much about it beyond top flight men's football, as these things will, of course, never get broadcasted and covered internationally.
Had you asked me to define French sports attendance culture (you didn't but here goes), I'd say that it lends itself to attendances that range from relatively mediocre (Ligue 1) to excellent (rugby) in terms of domestic competitions, that the fans have a special appreciation for anything that elevates itself from that day-to-day level to special event level: tournament sport, play-offs and finals, international club games, yearly events, glamour one-offs, etc. Which is what makes France a good host for tournaments, and that's where we started at initially. Sorry indeed for the offtopic!