Hammarby Attracting Largest Crowds In This Season’s UWCL Group Stage

In a season of dwindling attendances in European women's soccer, Hammarby of Sweden are set to host the largest crowd so far in the UEFA Women's Champions League group stage.

As of Friday, almost 18,000 tickets have been sold for the Swedish champion's match in Stockholm against Manchester City this week. It is expected that the final attendance may exceed 20,000 which would smash the Swedish record for a women's game in European competition.

That figure could be surpassed once more when Hammarby, who are highly unlikely to qualify for the knockout stages after two defeats in three games so far, host the European champions FC Barcelona at the Tele2 Arena on December 12.

However, these crowds are out of context in a women's Champions League season of disappointing attendances. Since a group stage for the UEFA Women's Champions League was introduced in 2021, total attendances in the competition have exceeded half a million every season. During the 2021/22 season, the average crowd in the competition was over 10,000 for the the first time and was over 9,000 in the year before and after.

Yet in this campaign, with half of the group stage already completed, the average has plummeted to a mere 3,140, a drop of 34% on the previous season. After 24 of the 48 group stage matches there has yet to a single five-figure attendance, the highest so far in an underwhelming season was at Hammarby when 7,562 saw them open their group stage against St. Pölten last month.

Earlier in the season, a Swedish record of 12,062 were at the Tele2 Arena for Hammarby's Qualifying Round 2 first leg against Benfica. It was a game they lost, ultimately coming through by winning 2-0 in the second leg in Lisbon, a match played in front of just 812 spectators.

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Although a bumper crowd will be in attendance when the defending champions FC Barcelona host Manchester City at the 55,926-capacity Estadi Olimpic next month, so-called showpiece matches in bigger stadiums have failed to attract eye-catching attendances this season.

Turkish champions Galatasaray have failed to draw a crowd over 3,000 to the 77,563-capacity Atatürk Olympic Stadium in spite of offering free entry to watch the country's first-ever group stage participants. Similarly Scottish newcomers Celtic will have hoped to have pulled in more than 7,390 to the 60,411-capacity Celtic Park for the visit of English champions Chelsea this week.

Chelsea themselves have capped attendances at 5,000 for group stage matches at the 40,173-capacity Stamford Bridge and Arsenal only pulled in less than one tenth of capacity, 5,613, for their first home game against Vålerenga last month.

Their home game next month against German champions FC Bayern would most certainly have attracted a five figure crowd to the Emirates Stadium but a quirk of the fixture calendar means that game will not now be possible with the game having to be shifted to another venue.

The downward trend in European women's soccer is replicated in the major domestic leagues. Almost a million people went to games in the English Women's Super League last season with average attendances hitting an all-time high of 7,363.

So far this season, the average has fallen 16% to 6,184. This number is inflated primarily by the fact that Arsenal have so far played all of their league matches at the Emirates Stadium, averaging 33,906 per game by themselves. Both champions Chelsea and FA Cup winners Manchester United have seen significant drops in average crowds despite each playing once so far at the club's main stadium.

Average crowds in this season's Frauen Bundesliga are down slightly from an all-time high of 2,876 per game to 2,611 so far in this campaign. In Spain, the average league attendance has dropped from 1,550 to 1,279. The rebranded French top flight is one that has bucked the trend with average crowds of 1,488 per game up significantly on those of last season (1,075).