Attendances are down in the Catalan capital. Over the past three months, October to January, numbers of spectators watching the Blaugrana have plummeted by an average of 20,000.
Last weekend second placed Barcelona entertained sixth placed Villareal at Camp Nou, a game you would expect to be a sell out as Barca hunt down Real Madrid at the top of La Liga, but the turn out was one of the lowest of the season with only 60,005 fans inside the ground.
Only the Spanish Cup games have drawn smaller crowds at the Catalans' stadium. Early rounds of cup games tend to attract smaller crowds. Against Huesca 44,884 watched the game and Elche only attracted 27,099.
Camp Nou crowds have been falling gradually month to month, from 77,451 spectators in October to average attendance in January of 57,746. They only had a crowd of 62,225 at home against Atletico Madrid on 21st January.
Although it has been mightily cold lately there seems to be a lack of interest from Barca fans following their team at present. In Barcelona's Champions League away trip to Manchester City. The club had an allocation of 1,715 tickets for its fans, but there were only 784 applications to watch the game.
With stars to watch such as Neymar, Messi and Luis Suarez, you would expect a sell out every week. Manchester United is currently averaging 75,339 crowds this season despite their perceived lack of success.
Whilst the Premier League grounds are constantly packed, one of Spain’s big two are struggling to fill their stadium. Maybe the Barca fans have been spoilt over the years? Maybe they are just glory hunters and they are not interested unless their club are top of the league? The economic position of Spain may add to this drop in fans? Or the weather? But whatever is causing this exodus, Barca need to sort it out and soon. They can’t afford to lose more ground to their bitter rivals Real Madrid.
Source: DSG
