Thinking of the fact that we compete with rugby in the same town/city.... a good comparison is Northampton Town.
The Cobblers are located in a town with a population that is somewhere near 50% higher than that of Newport. They are in the same division as Newport, though having nowhere near as good a start to the season.

Northampton's attendances so far, for the number of HOME fans, at home games:
Lincoln City....................4789
Cambridge.....................4395
Tranmere R....................4225
Cheltenham T.................4385

AVERAGE......................4448

Newport's attendances so far, for the number of HOME fans, at home games:
Crewe Alexandra...........2990
Notts County..................2750
Grimsby Town................3046
Yeovil Town....................3737

AVERAGE.....................3131

In relation to the population in Northampton & Newport respectfully,( 226,000 & 153,000) each club seems to have a home following of roughly, within a fraction of a percentage point, 2% of their population turning up at football matches.
* both in same division
* both compete with rugby
* both have similar home followings as a percentage of population

So are Newport any worse supported than any other COMPARABLE club?....

Interesting stats, well done for compiling. If you fancy a further statistical challenge (and I think we both know you do!), it'd be interesting to know what represents Northampton's highest average season attendance in the last decade, and at what level of football, versus their lowest - and the same for Newport.

The reason for asking is to gauge what would represent a decent ambition for boosting our own attendances at our current league level, and also to gauge how far we've come so far in comparison to a club of a similar situation.

Kairdiff Exile wrote:Interesting stats, well done for compiling. If you fancy a further statistical challenge (and I think we both know you do!), it'd be interesting to know what represents Northampton's highest average season attendance in the last decade, and at what level of football, versus their lowest - and the same for Newport.

The reason for asking is to gauge what would represent a decent ambition for boosting our own attendances at our current league level, and also to gauge how far we've come so far in comparison to a club of a similar situation.

Oooh, not sure I'd even know where to obtain those numbers. The number of away fans is only a relatively recent phenomena, so these days it's easier to see exactly how many HOME fans are in attendance (or at least listed as such) but I'm not sure going back ten years, whether the number of home fans would be highlighted, or whether it'd just be the total attendance.
I never count away fans because there's too much variance - you could have 7,500 Sunderland fans at an away game which would queer the figures.
What we need to do, is simply turn 2% into 3%........but how do we do that?

newgroundrodney wrote: What we need to do, is simply turn 2% into 3%........but how do we do that?

Indeed, and that was really the genesis of my question - of course attendance is largely linked to success (hence our home crowd basically trebling since Conference South days, which itself is a success). However, it'd be interesting to get a sense of whether 3% of the Newport population is a realistic target based on fourth-division football or not, given that we're unlikely with our current infrastructure to rise much higher any time soon.

Kairdiff Exile wrote:

newgroundrodney wrote: What we need to do, is simply turn 2% into 3%........but how do we do that?

Indeed, and that was really the genesis of my question - of course attendance is largely linked to success (hence our home crowd basically trebling since Conference South days, which itself is a success). However, it'd be interesting to get a sense of whether 3% of the Newport population is a realistic target based on fourth-division football or not, given that we're unlikely with our current infrastructure to rise much higher any time soon.

I could probably list teams in our division, with their average attendances / populations...... but it's the issue of having a senior rugby team in the same town, competing for the same leisure incomes....how many teams in our division face the same opposition for their fans' money?

True. But all clubs will face some competition. We're lucky that we have a relatively low number of other football clubs nearby against whom to compete - certainly if you compared us to, say, Bury or Accrington or Rochdale or Oldham or any other club in Greater Manchester! There's also less to do on a Saturday afternoon in Newport than might be the case in London. And public transport is probably better for most of our fans to get to a home game than might be the case for clubs out in the sticks like Carlisle or Lincoln.

My point is: all clubs can find excuses for why it's hard to get more fans through the door. We're not as bad off as we might like to think we are.

Some years ago, I did some research into attendances, which suggested that for a team climbing the divisions, the home attendance would approximately double (ground capacity permitting) for each division climbed. That being the case, ours would / should look something like this:

Premier League................24864
Championship...................12432
League One....................... 6216
League Two........................3108
Conference.........................1554
Tier 6.....................................777 (This was our actual average in the Dr.Martens Premier)

So we probably need a 15,000 capacity stadium to meet our realistic aspirations in the foreseeable future.

newgroundrodney wrote:Some years ago, I did some research into attendances, which suggested that for a team climbing the divisions, the home attendance would approximately double (ground capacity permitting) for each division climbed. That being the case, ours would / should look something like this:

Premier League................24864
Championship...................12432
League One....................... 6216
League Two........................3108
Conference.........................1554
Tier 6.....................................777 (This was our actual average in the Dr.Martens Premier)

So we probably need a 15,000 capacity stadium to meet our realistic aspirations in the foreseeable future.

Useful stats, although I would seriously question whether Division Two football is a realistic ambition when we've only played at that level for a couple of years of our history! Most of our time has been spent in Division 4, and even that feels like a struggle given the level of support in the city. Div 4 / Conference is probably our 'natural' level, and I'd far rather we worked to be sustainable at that level than over-stretched ourselves or kidded ourselves that we could play in the second tier.

Kairdiff Exile wrote:

newgroundrodney wrote:Some years ago, I did some research into attendances, which suggested that for a team climbing the divisions, the home attendance would approximately double (ground capacity permitting) for each division climbed. That being the case, ours would / should look something like this:

Premier League................24864
Championship...................12432
League One....................... 6216
League Two........................3108
Conference.........................1554
Tier 6.....................................777 (This was our actual average in the Dr.Martens Premier)

So we probably need a 15,000 capacity stadium to meet our realistic aspirations in the foreseeable future.

Useful stats, although I would seriously question whether Division Two football is a realistic ambition when we've only played at that level for a couple of years of our history! Most of our time has been spent in Division 4, and even that feels like a struggle given the level of support in the city. Div 4 / Conference is probably our 'natural' level, and I'd far rather we worked to be sustainable at that level than over-stretched ourselves or kidded ourselves that we could play in the second tier.

.... Bournemouth?

Depends whether you see Bournemouth as a side who will play at the top table of domestic football for decades to come, or whether you see their current (impressive) position as a blip for a club with an otherwise unremarkable history in the lower leagues. For me, I'd say it's the latter - and if they're sensible, they'll invest their current riches in the sustainable stuff (the ground, the training facilities, the academy) rather than 'doing a Leeds' and gambling on pushing themselves to even greater things.

There are quite a few clubs that have gone on to play in division 2 ( Championship ) and above who were regular opponents of ours when I first starting watching County in the old division 4.
Barnsley
Bradford City
Swansea City
Reading
Bournemouth
Carlisle
Swindon
Peterborough
Burton
Wimbledon
Plymouth
Bristol Rovers
Watford
Crewe
and there are probably more if all of these clubs can do it there is no reason why we cant.

Sometimes I do see County in the Championship and holding their own, in a half decent stadium. Sometimes I think there's no reason we can't be a Rotherham, Peterborough, Gillingham or Barnsley...
The potential support in South Wales is certainly there if we climb the divisions.

Goddard & woods wrote:There are quite a few clubs that have gone on to play in division 2 ( Championship ) and above who were regular opponents of ours when I first starting watching County in the old division 4.
Barnsley
Bradford City
Swansea City
Reading
Bournemouth
Carlisle
Swindon
Peterborough
Burton
Wimbledon
Plymouth
Bristol Rovers
Watford
Crewe
and there are probably more if all of these clubs can do it there is no reason why we cant.

....that's the makings of a bloody hard division in its own right!

Goddard & Woods - I'm not arguing that it's impossible for a club of our size to play at a higher level. What I am saying is that doing so is (more often than not) a brief high point in that club's history. What we don't tend to consider as part of that equation is that there are low points as well, which also need to be prepared for. Having a 20,000-capacity stadium for your provincial club is great when you're having a brief spell in the top tier - but when the winds are against you and you're in the Conference, you look a bit daft (ask Darlington fans).

My point is that the wisest clubs make themselves sustainable (which we currently aren't, I would argue), invest in infrastructure (which we currently can't) and then start to plot an upwards trajectory.

We seem to have gone off-topic, so to return us to the issue of attendances, I'd simply say that the answer to our modest crowds currently is around marketing. I don't think Newport County have ever (in the 15-odd years I've been going) marketed themselves effectively to the people of the Gwent and Cardiff region. That takes skilled personnel and money, and it's not a quick fix. But - to use the word again - it's the sustainable approach.

newgroundrodney wrote:

Kairdiff Exile wrote:Interesting stats, well done for compiling. If you fancy a further statistical challenge (and I think we both know you do!), it'd be interesting to know what represents Northampton's highest average season attendance in the last decade, and at what level of football, versus their lowest - and the same for Newport.

The reason for asking is to gauge what would represent a decent ambition for boosting our own attendances at our current league level, and also to gauge how far we've come so far in comparison to a club of a similar situation.

Oooh, not sure I'd even know where to obtain those numbers. The number of away fans is only a relatively recent phenomena, so these days it's easier to see exactly how many HOME fans are in attendance (or at least listed as such) but I'm not sure going back ten years, whether the number of home fans would be highlighted, or whether it'd just be the total attendance.
I never count away fans because there's too much variance - you could have 7,500 Sunderland fans at an away game which would queer the figures.
What we need to do, is simply turn 2% into 3%........but how do we do that?

By not losing 6-0 at home when we get an extra 700 or so would help !!!