average attendance V local population

[truthteller]

I read this and found it fascinating
showing what teams in world rugby have the highest population as a percentage of their population

http://www.cardiffrfcfans.co.uk/analysis/attendance_vs_population.php

4 french teams on top, scarlets 5th , munster 6th Bath top english team etc

Gives a hint at what teams are ding some things better in their communities to cajole support

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

Pretty pointless stats though isn't it? How do they factor people who do TBF live in say Bath? Do they factor in the local towns or is it strictly the town/city the team isn't based?

 

[Leonormous Boozer]

Pretty pointless stats though isn't it? How do they factor people who do TBF live in say Bath? Do they factor in the local towns or is it strictly the town/city the team isn't based?

Aye, Dublin is down as ~500,000, that's literally saying that out of the entire province of Leinster (Population of 2.5m) only the half million people who actually dwell in the city should be considered, the city has a metropolitan population of 1.8m which shows how skewed it is. Most bizarrely though is how is doesn't discount filthy, base scum Lunsters like @Groundhog which is disgusting! I am working on this by petitioning the government to make a new category of 'sub-human' for them, we'll tax them more, count their votes as half, make them do a yearly GoT style 'shame' march etc...

 

[Groundhog]

I don't pay taxes you mouth breathing oaf. Like any self respecting Irish person I proudly promote tax evasion. Don't try remove my vote because I said I'd vote against your right to marry your anime waifu body pillow. And you know better than anyone I enjoy being nude.

 

[Reiser99]

Yeah bit misleading as local goes from a small city/town to capital cities the size of London and Tokyo.

 

[truthteller]

yes its a bit unscientific , i think theyre just taking in the biggest nearest population mass to the team....it has some value though id say and its an interesting take on how areas of smaller sometimes tighter communities with low populations do compared to the bigger city areas....nice to see david challenge goliath though

 

[smartcooky]

Meaningless statistics. They take no account of how popular rugby is compared with other sports in major cities that have teams in major competitions

Also, the Blues and Crusaders aren't listed, and Christchurch, with a population of only 380,000 and the Crusaders with an average attendance in 2016 of about 12,000 would come in at 3.2%...

 

[truthteller]

Meaningless statistics. They take no account of how popular rugby is compared with other sports in major cities that have teams in major competitions

Also, the Blues and Crusaders aren't listed, and Christchurch, with a population of only 380,000 and the Crusaders with an average attendance in 2016 of about 12,000 would come in at 3.2%...

they cant take everything into account where does it end ? other sports ? weather? climate? other forms of entertainment etc etc its simply taking the average crowds and the population of the nearest big city population.

 

[smartcooky]

they cant take everything into account where does it end ? other sports ? weather? climate? other forms of entertainment etc etc its simply taking the average crowds and the population of the nearest big city population.

If you can't take basic stuff like the level of popularity of a sport in a country then don't bother wasting your time doing the analysis because the results you get will not only be meaningless, and no use to anyone, they will actually be misleading.

 

[saulan]

If you can't take basic stuff like the level of popularity of a sport in a country then don't bother wasting your time doing the analysis because the results you get will not only be meaningless, and no use to anyone, they will actually be misleading.

Going to have to agree on this statistic being meaningless. Just looking at the Stormers stats, it made use of the population of the Cape Town city, but the stadium isn't even within the area of the city of Cape Town (Newlands is about a 20 minute drive from the city centre, on the other side of the mountain). It seems silly to try and focus on engagement without including the urban areas, because, again using the Cape Town example, the 3.8 million population of the area around Cape Town is what populates that city during the day, only so many can live there. Even more so support for the rugby matches don't come from the city bowl, I would say 80% of support comes from Southern Suburbs, Northern Suburbs and the Winelands regions of the Western Cape.

 

[unrated]

Yea this statistics does not mean much. For example in South Africa with a population close to 55 million, From that number about 5 million is Afrikaans and English speaking minorities (Which is the traditional supporter base of rugby and cricket in SA) and then only about half of that minority are interested in rugby. Our Rugby and Cricket supporting population is therefore comparable with that of New Zealand. These numbers are subject to change as more other communities becomes engaged with the sport though. Then at city level it is again very different. With Durban (Sharks home) its actually majority English, and a minority of Afrikaans and Indian supporters that follow rugby. In Pretoria (Bulls home) id say its majority Afrikaans supporters so if they can look at what the populations are of the traditional supporters base only then would it be more accurate. And it really wont be that hard to do as these census results are freely available.

 

[Which Tyler]

It's completely meaningless, but also completely not misleading. It does exactly what it say on the tin, badly, but that's what it does. A simple ratio of attendance to population size. That's only misleading to people who can't read. Of course, people can then use it to mislead, but that's on the people, not the stat, and is the case for literally 100% of statistics ever.
It's also fan collated, so of anyone wants more detailed stats, that includes things like weather, popularity of the sport nationally, competition from other sports locally etc etc, then feel free to collate that data. I don't see the point in criticising g someone else's stats for being the ones they were interested in, rather than the ones you wanted to see, and assumed they might have been by not reading what the stat was.

If someone posts up kicking stats for rugby players, then those will be kicking stats, no point in criticising them for not posting distance, or angle, or pressure, or tackle completion or try assists, or an analysis of how good the player is as an individual, or how good the team around him is. But none of that will make the kicking stats wrong or misleading; just your interpretation of them.


TL;DR "I don't understand statistics" =/= "the statistics are misleading"

 

[unrated]

A simple ratio of attendance to population size. That's only misleading to people who can't read. Of course, people can then use it to mislead, but that's on the people, not the stat, and is the case for literally 100% of statistics ever.

TL;DR "I don't understand statistics" =/= "the statistics are misleading"

Even the stats they gave is fake (For some teams that i know). Where did the guy get his population statistics from? Under what circumstances does Durban have 595,061 people? Its over 3 million. Yes you can make the case that he only took certain areas or maybe even took the city centre population but then again that would make the stats meaningless as why would you just randomly choose a district to attribute to the team and leave out the rest?

the whole thing Its a nice idea though, thats why so many people are interested in this. If it can be done in more detail and with more accuracy it would be awesome.

 

[saulan]

It's completely meaningless, but also completely not misleading. It does exactly what it say on the tin, badly, but that's what it does. A simple ratio of attendance to population size. That's only misleading to people who can't read.

My point was misread, so a TLDR for my points, the stats are misleading because the stats that are being used to calculate the figures are incorrect. The attendance is fine, the populations are not.

South African examples:
Joburg population: 4.4 million (stated 957k)
Cape Town Population: 3.8 million (stated 433k)
Durban Population: 3.4 million (stated 595k)
Bloemfontein population: 520,000 (stated 256k)
Port Elizabeth population: 1.3 million (stated 312k)
Pretoria population: ~700,000 based on 2011 census (stated 741,651 so this one seems about right, not taking into account population growth of 7 years)
Using wikipedia numbers to state the city sizes is problematic because its crowd sourced and not uniform, so we will have different definitions of what is included in that city population and what is not.

 

[Which Tyler]

"How is this data calculated? Averages are taken for all home games played by respective teams during the 2017-18 northern hemisphere season and 2017 Super Rugby season (these do not include friendlies or any knock-out fixtures). If no attendance figure was reported, then this game was ignored for the purpose of calculating home attendance averages. Population figures are taken from Wikipedia, as at 6th April 2018. City figures were used rather than greater urban areas. For Kings and Cheetahs, the average is calculated based on both Super Rugby and Pro14 fixtures.

According to Wiki today, Jo'sburg City population = 957,441, Urban population = 7,860,781, metropolitan population = 9,616,000
Equally, London comes in at 8,787,892; 9,787,426 & 14,040,163
To say that one of those is right, and the other 2 is wrong... is wrong. The stats from the OP were both explicit and (presumably - I can't be arsed to check) consistent, that you want to see different stats is on you, not the OP. Any misinterpretation is on you, not the OP.

Using any source for numbers to state the city sizes is problematic because local definitions and census data are not uniform, so we will have different definitions of what is included in that city population and what is not.
FTR, I don't know what your source is for Jo'sburg population of 4.4M (as opposed to the 1M, 7.9M or 9.6M) is, but the wiki article's source is the 2011 official census. Wiki is crowd sourced, but fully referenced, not just some local's estimate (though I fully agree that it often shows the bias of the author and cherry picking of data, that doesn't really appreciate!y to census information).

Again, if you have a better source than wiki, which is more accurate than official government data and census information from the nations involved, and consistent across different nations, then you can feel free to provide the stats you want. But to claim something is misleading when it isnt... is wrong.

What makes your figures right, and official government figures wrong? How would random fan #3,714 sitting Cardif know? Why would it be "wrong" to use the official figures instead of the ones you've provided?

 

[saulan]

Then you failed at reading the stats presented.

"How is this data calculated? Averages are taken for all home games played by respective teams during the 2017-18 northern hemisphere season and 2017 Super Rugby season (these do not include friendlies or any knock-out fixtures). If no attendance figure was reported, then this game was ignored for the purpose of calculating home attendance averages. Population figures are taken from Wikipedia, as at 6th April 2018. City figures were used rather than greater urban areas. For Kings and Cheetahs, the average is calculated based on both Super Rugby and Pro14 fixtures."

I read that box in the bottom right corner. The ***le for the page though is average attendance to local population, that ***le itself is misleading based on what is represented in the data. In addition:
1) Even if you call it the local population, the numbers being used aren't always correct, The Stormers Stadium isn't even within the city specified, so that isn't the local population
2) Some cities on Wikipedia are making use of the regions instead of just the cities. For example, Melbourne's stat of 4.8 million is for the region, not the immediate city, as is Tokyo's numbers.

So some of these stats are greater urban area, and are therefore incorrectly calculated and misleading.

 

[smartcooky]

Another reason why the stats are meaningless (at least for the NZ teams) is that the NZ teams are not city based teams, they are regionally based. Highlanders fans DO come up from Invercargill and down from Oamaru.... Chiefs fans do come into Hamilton from Tauranga and the Bay of Plenty. An appreciable part of their regular crowds come down SH1 from Counties and even from Auckland, yet the populations of those catchment areas are not included.

You just cant say "here is a team and this is the city where their fans come from". Its simply not true and it does not work that way.

The whole purpose of stats are so that you can make comparisons... but if the basis of the data is flawed, the stats will be flawed, and therefore meaningless, and therefore misleading.

 

[Which Tyler]

The you are much more deficits to this than I am.
Given that you've gone and looked at all the sources, why not correct then stats, stating your sources? Including your 4.4M for Jo'sburg which I did look up.

From my perspective the OP named his sources, I checked 3 of them, which were consistent and accurate as linked (as opposed to your 4.4M figure) and see no reason to double check the rest, if I was that interested I'd have out them together myself.

As for criticisms that a stadium isn't within such and such a city how's your local knowledge for other places?
Again, using Wiki as a perfectly acceptable place for this sort of basic information
"The Stormers are a South African professional rugby union team based in Cape Town"
"The Newlands Stadium, currently referred to as DHL Newlands for sponsorship reasons, is located in Cape Town, South Africa."
Google maps also calls it Cape Town. If you're being that pedantic, then few are in the city they're supposed to be. With that level ofmpedantry, then I would suspect Worcester tomcome top of the tree, as the stadium is just outside the city boundaries on an industrial estate, population of maybe half a dozen homeless people (who don't count as they don't have homes), average attendance of 7.8k for a reality breaking percentage that requires a "divide by zero"

Again, if you want wider urban combination, feel free; OP didn't, even if he made human error once or twice.

ETA, not human error, limitations of stats available for an easy search, wiki has 1 population stat for Melbourne, 2 for Tokyo (OP uses the smaller). OP doesn't claim to go beyond wiki for information.

 

[curtbob7]

Don't think you can read anything into these figures at all. So many different circumstances affect it.

Cant believe someone has wasted their time compiling it to be honest.

 

[Which Tyler]

Don't think you can read anything into these figures at all. So many different circumstances affect it.

Cant believe someone has wasted their time compiling it to be honest.

Yup, completely meaningless, though I can see why someone would be interested in doing it. We're all interested in different things after all.