LONDON - New QPR Stadium (45,000)

[michał_]

Originally Posted by alwn

When you fill with 99% you have to extend the capacities for sure..

Now, when you sell, not fill. They're never that full

[alwn]

Originally Posted by michał_

Now, when you sell, not fill. They're never that full

ok, sell. But is the same. In case of "sold out" it is normal that some season ticket owners to not be able to attend the game.

[alwn]

Originally Posted by jts1882

Not necessarily. While the stadium is full, prices can be kept high. People who want to see the big games have to buy season tickets.

If you dont think to extend when you sell 99,...% then when?

Why do I have the impression that Arsenal could fill /sell an 80.000 capacity without any problem and prices decreasing? They did a mistake by chosing to build only 60.000. If we take an average of 50 £/ ticket could result 1 mil £/game in addition to the current capacity.
Same in Germany with Bayern but at least it is not their stadium.

Big mistake also in case of Newcastle and Liverpool with the new expansionproject (only 60.000? Liverpool? ).

Probably it is also a problem of space avalaibility and building costs..

Man City (until recently) and Sunderland found that with excess capacity people could just buy tickets for the games they wanted

It is not so bad and uncommon to a have a little excess of capacity. This happens everywhere, including Barcelona. Only 75% filled last season but at the big games they attract 100.000 people. That's why exist big games to attract big crowds exceeding average attendance

[jts1882]

Yes, but the prices in Spain are a fraction of the prices in England. They don't rely on the gate as much for the revenues.

I agree Arsenal could probably fill a larger stadium (70k if not 80k), but I think you've named the main problems; space and cost. 60k seems a fairly standard size and the few bigger stadia have been very expensive (e.g. Wembley). The extra cost only makes sense if you can fill the seats at high prices or the cost per seat decreases. I also think that maximising the corporate entertaining - at least a third of the Arsenal matchday - is a more important consideration than extra seats for the plebs.

Space certainly is a consideration. It definitely is for Spurs and we've dropped down to 56k in our plans. Arsenal may have had the extra room, though. Liverpool have space on their new site and when Hicks & Gillett took over Liverpool they commissioned designs for a larger stadium (73k?), but cost wasn't an issue for them as they didn't have the money to build anything anyway.

Another big issue is transport. The extra people require new transport infrastructure and local councils won't/can't pay for it so won't give permission without a transport plan. This was certainly an issue for Arsenal and is for Spurs and Liverpool. A jump from 38k to 80k instead of 80k is a lot more challenging and expensive.

[C F Looprevil]

Can only make an informed guess about spurs, however jts1882 is certainly correct about Liverpool, we could maybe fill 80k for 10 games per season (60-70 for the rest), however the transport links that would need to be paid for by the club would not make financial sense. and thats in Liverpool, never mind London.

[alwn]

I was not sure about Spurs so I didnt argue for only 56.000 capacity. I thought Hotspur could fill 60-65.000 easiliy.

I didnt think about the transport issues. So i understand that the municipality would not aprove a certain capacity without a transport plan. I just thought that municipality is in charge for the upgradation of the local transport when needed. If 80.000 want to go to the stadium on saturday afternoon municipality has to upgrade the links. However sounds more convenient to bound the clubs to build larger stadiums or to charge the club for transport upgradation.

Corporate seats are very important however football began with the plebs and will finish when loosing the support of the plebs. And at least in england plebs pay a lot ( expensive tickets, t shirts, TV subscription etc)

@C F Looprevil
80.000 for 10 games per season it is not so bad. Is more then 50% of PL. However with the transport issues it looks that we are going to expect a stadium with 60.000 capacity only.

[jts1882]

Originally Posted by alwn

I was not sure about Spurs so I didnt argue for only 56.000 capacity. I thought Hotspur could fill 60-65.000 easiliy.

I didnt think about the transport issues. So i understand that the municipality would not aprove a certain capacity without a transport plan. I just thought that municipality is in charge for the upgradation of the local transport when needed. If 80.000 want to go to the stadium on saturday afternoon municipality has to upgrade the links. However sounds more convenient to bound the clubs to build larger stadiums or to charge the club for transport upgradation.

I suspect we could fill 60-65k for all league games, so probably would sell out season tickets and be able to keep prices high (I not saying this is good, just an inevitable commercial reality). But there is a risk we couldn't especially if we have a few bad season (or bad to normal as many rival fans call it.

It doesn't work that way on transport. The local authority and the builder have to come to agreement on an S106 agreement, which includes things like upgrading roads around the development. The council can make planning approval conditional on a lot of things if they want to be difficult. I've been following our stadium plans closely and have looked at the planning documents on the Spurs website. The transport assessment has dozens of documents and hundreds of pages.

It further complcated by the fact that Haringey - the local authority - only has responsibility for the roads, with a London-wide body dealing with public transport. With the needed transport developments for the Olympics, nothing was coming the way of Tottenham ... until the rather convenient riots, which has caused some funds from the Mayor's office to be made available.

[RMB2007]

QPR chairman Tony Fernandes is planning a new 45,000-seater stadium for the club, as the owner feels they are outgrowing their current home ground, Loftus Road.

Rangers' current home ground holds 18,500 and has the smallest capacity of all the grounds in the Premier League.

Fernandes has revealed his plans to build a new stadium for the club, increasing the capacity to around "35,000 to 45,000", with the owner believing that QPR have the capacity to play to crowds of twice that amount.

"I've always felt anything from 35,000 to 45,000 is possible," the chairman told QPR's London Call-In radio show. "If we're playing good football and have a good stadium, offering a good product, people will come. And London's a great city. The message to our architects was to keep what's good at Loftus Road but try to make it a bit bigger."

A site for a new home has not yet been finalised but Fernandes is adamant that talk of a new ground is not a pipe dream and serious discussion is taking place regarding the concept.

http://www.espn.co.uk/football/sport/story/177359.html

[bewilder2]

Originally Posted by alwn

Premiere League; last season 2011/2012
home averange attendance of the London clubs by percent capacity:
1. Chelsea 41,478 99,6%
2. Tottenham 36,071 99,6%
3. Arsenal 59,960 99,3%
4. Fulham 25,316 98,8%
5. QPR 17,295 94,1%

When you fill with 99% you have to extend the capacities for sure..

It kinda amazes me that almost all UK football stadiums are so much smaller than American Football stadiums, even Arsenal and Chelsea. The smallest NFL stadium is 61k (Soldier Field in Chicago, limited by the original building which is designated historic.)

On a side note, how long before all of the PL is based in London? (apart from 2x Liverpool & 2x Manchester)

[JimB]

Originally Posted by bewilder2

It kinda amazes me that almost all UK football stadiums are so much smaller than American Football stadiums, even Arsenal and Chelsea. The smallest NFL stadium is 61k (Soldier Field in Chicago, limited by the original building which is designated historic.)

On a side note, how long before all of the PL is based in London? (apart from 2x Liverpool & 2x Manchester)

Couple of things.

Firstly, you have to remember that USA has a population that is six times bigger than England's.

Yet there are 92 Premier League and Football League clubs by comparison to 32 teams in the NFL.

And in addition to there being more teams competing for football (soccer) supporters in England than there are teams competing for NFL fans, there is also more competition in terms of different sports - rugby league, rugby union etc.

Lastly, it's simply a question of money. The big American sports have long been well financed by massive TV and sponsorship deals and by wealthy owners, while many stadiums have been built by cities keen to lure franchises.

By contrast, English football was in the dark ages, both in terms of stadiums and commercial savvy, until the early 1990's. We're playing catch up and we don't have a tradition of local or national government paying for club stadiums. So it's inevitably a long process.

[eMKay]

Also the EPL season has a lot more games (39 is it?) plus a bewildering amount of tournaments that I can't keep track of as a casual EPL fan, and 3 teams each year that spent the previous year in a lower league (teams that may or may not have a decent stadium)

[MS20]

Lol. If The NFL was consigned to markets from just California, you'd have something similar to the EPL. Use a bit of logic.

Still, all the stadiums in the NFL couldn't change it's irrelevance outside the US. For that, we can all be thankful.

[Gavrosh]

Originally Posted by bewilder2

On a side note, how long before all of the PL is based in London? (apart from 2x Liverpool & 2x Manchester)

? The football league has been going for over a century now, and the maximum number of London teams in any one season was 8, in 1989-1990. I doubt you'll ever see much more than that.

[jts1882]

Originally Posted by Gavrosh

? The football league has been going for over a century now, and the maximum number of London teams in any one season was 8, in 1989-1990. I doubt you'll ever see much more than that.

There has been remarkable stability. Last season seven of the twelve founding members (from 1888) were in the PL: Everton, Villa, Stoke, West Brom, Blackburn, Bolton and Wolves. Obviously a bad year with three of them relegated, but it is a sign of the stability.

That said the clubs outside the urban areas are finding it harder. London, Merseyside and the West Midlands dominate, but we still have some of the smaller provincial teams making short visits (Southampton, Reading, Norwich, Swansea currently). Although if ever the clubs in urban Yorkshire get their acts together they might squeeze out the small town teams.

[JimB]

Originally Posted by Gavrosh

? The football league has been going for over a century now, and the maximum number of London teams in any one season was 8, in 1989-1990. I doubt you'll ever see much more than that.

Nevertheless, it's amazing that as many as 11 London clubs have been in England's top flight within living memory:

Arsenal, Tottenham, Chelsea, West Ham, Fulham, QPR, Crystal Palace, Charlton, Wimbledon (now MK), Millwall and Watford (to all intents and purposes, a London club).

Is there any other city in Europe that can make such a claim? Moscow, perhaps?

[JimB]

Originally Posted by MS20

Lol. If The NFL was consigned to markets from just California, you'd have something similar to the EPL. Use a bit of logic.

Still, all the stadiums in the NFL couldn't change it's irrelevance outside the US. For that, we can all be thankful.

The NFL doesn't need to be relevant outside of the US. It is already a fantastically wealthy league. Nevertheless, it isn't irrelevant outside of the US at all. One glance at the Superbowl viewing figures would quickly correct you that matter.

[EJG]

Originally Posted by JimB

The NFL doesn't need to be relevant outside of the US. It is already a fantastically wealthy league. Nevertheless, it isn't irrelevant outside of the US at all. One glance at the Superbowl viewing figures would quickly correct you that matter.

The Superbowl attracting a huge worldwide audience is a myth though, isn't it? The huge figures quoted are the potential audience, not the actual audience.

It's mentioned in Wikipedia (I know, I know ) that the audience for the 2005 Superbowl was 91 million North American viewers, 2 million for the rest of the world.

I couldn't find any later figures, so the international audience could have gone up since then (which wouldn't be surprising with events like NFL games in London taking place)*

Oh, and on topic, good luck to QPR with getting a new stadium

* I found a 2012 estimate that put the viewing figures at 175 million world wide, with 111 from the US. Pretty spectacular international growth if both they and the 2005 figures are accurate!

[bewilder2]

Originally Posted by JimB

Nevertheless, it's amazing that as many as 11 London clubs have been in England's top flight within living memory:

Arsenal, Tottenham, Chelsea, West Ham, Fulham, QPR, Crystal Palace, Charlton, Wimbledon (now MK), Millwall and Watford (to all intents and purposes, a London club).

Is there any other city in Europe that can make such a claim? Moscow, perhaps?

I guess I kinda consider Reading part of London in a way since it is so close, even though I doubt anyone really treks from London to cheer for Reading.

With all the worldwide support the EPL has, it certainly makes a bigger splash than attendance shows. Heck, you look at payroll, and the top football clubs hand out way more than the NFL teams. Then again, the revenue sharing just isn't there to support the salary cap either.

[rantanamo]

Originally Posted by JimB

Couple of things.

Firstly, you have to remember that USA has a population that is six times bigger than England's.

Yet there are 92 Premier League and Football League clubs by comparison to 32 teams in the NFL.

And in addition to there being more teams competing for football (soccer) supporters in England than there are teams competing for NFL fans, there is also more competition in terms of different sports - rugby league, rugby union etc.

Lastly, it's simply a question of money. The big American sports have long been well financed by massive TV and sponsorship deals and by wealthy owners, while many stadiums have been built by cities keen to lure franchises.

By contrast, English football was in the dark ages, both in terms of stadiums and commercial savvy, until the early 1990's. We're playing catch up and we don't have a tradition of local or national government paying for club stadiums. So it's inevitably a long process.

You left out the 118 Div-I college football teams, not to mention more in D-II and D-III. And there is baseball now the MLS competing for fans as well.

[JimB]

Originally Posted by rantanamo

You left out the 118 Div-I college football teams, not to mention more in D-II and D-III. And there is baseball now the MLS competing for fans as well.

Not the same thing at all.

None of those college teams will ever play (at least, in a meaningful game) against an NFL team. So there is nothing to stop anyone supporting a college team AND an NFL team. The two are not competing for supporters.

Not so in English football, where any team can be promoted through the divisions, all the way to the Premier League, and any team can be drawn against any other team From any other division in the FA Cup. Consequently, most people only support one team. As it happens, I neglected to mention hundreds of non league teams that could equally, one day, rise through the divisions all the way to the top.