Why were these Newcastle United Champions League attendances so low? | OneFootball

I am still only 27 but if there is one thing that makes me feel old, it’s telling people that when I was little, I used to watch Newcastle United play in the Champions League.

Some of my favourite football memories growing up, were watching us play in Europe competition.

Whether it is the very obvious of watching us play against some of the biggest teams in the world like Juventus, Inter Milan and Barcelona, or the little games like Zulte-Waregem in the UEFA Cup where there were no buses on a Thursday night (for whatever reason) and so me and my cousin walked back to Blaydon via the Metrocentre on a bitterly cold night. I could go on…

However, one thing that has always bugged me, is why were our attendances in Europe so bad in the early to mid 2000s?

Now I don’t just mean UEFA Cup Group Stages or Intertoto Cup qualifiers, but massive Champions League games, that you would have thought we dreamt about. I vividly remember us playing Feyenoord at SJP in the Champions League and it felt like half the stadium was empty?

My Dad will tell you that if your answer to ‘what is the best NUFC atmosphere of all time?’ isn’t the 3-2 Asprilla / Barcelona game in 1997, where SJP was packed to the rafters, then you just weren’t at the game. That was under Dalglish and capacity was capped at around 36,000. I think looking back, having watched the highlights a million times, UEFA also took away a couple of thousand seats in the front rows for advertising purposes.

A few years later in the UEFA Cup, we also had close to sold out ties for CSKA Sofia, FC Zurich and Roma in the UEFA Cup. Then by the time I was watching us play regularly in Europe, we had expanded SJP to 52,000 and were event attracting attendances in the mid 30,000s for pretty much pre-season games in the Intertoto Cup, against the likes of 1860 Munich and Troyes.

So just one year later, having qualified for the Champions League again, what happened? Not what you’d expect:

Zeljeznicar (qualifier) – 34,067

Feyenoord – 40,540

Juventus – 48,370

Dynamo Kiev – 40,185

Inter Milan – 50,108 (most of the ground were 10 minutes delayed thanks to a Craig David concert)

Leverkusen – 40,508

Barcelona – 51,883

Partizan – 37,293

Quite staggering that the stadium was had so many empty seats for big games against the likes of Feyenoord and Leverkusen, we failed to sell out for games against Juventus and Inter Milan… meanwhile, the one game we did sell out, Barcelona, was a somewhat meaningless game in which we had already been knocked out of second group phase.

Strange too that either side of the Feyenoord game, at home to Sunderland and then West Brom, a sold out 52,000 turned up to SJP.

So, what’s the context? Can the club learn anything this time round if we are to be so lucky and qualify for the Champions League again?

You could be forgiven for thinking that particular season was a one off, likely to do with the games being on television and the prices of the tickets being relatively high (30 quid is a lot of money now, never mind twenty years ago). This is all the more the case, when you consider that the following season, we would hit the 50,000+ capacity for games in the UEFA Cup against PSV and Marseille.

However, the season after, another long UEFA Cup campaign run saw some somewhat dismal crowds of:

30,221 – Bnei Sakhnin

27,218 – Dinamo Tiblisi

28,017 – Sporting Lisbon

26,156 – Heerenveen

33,000 – Olympiacos (L16)

36,753 – Sporting Lisbon (QF)

Again, drastically low numbers. Looking into that season a little further, more people turned up for a League Cup 3rd round tie earlier in the season against Norwich on a Tuesday night (42,153), than a very exciting and very winnable UEFA Cup Quarter Final against Sporting Lisbon.

Perhaps some of this could be partly down to the disillusionment of the fans towards Graeme Souness’ Newcastle side but it still does not add up for me.

Even a couple of years later, this time under Glenn Roeder, we reached the last 16 of the UEFA Cup and the attendances never went above the 30,000 mark. As a reference point, we had more fans going to first round League Cup games under Steve Bruce than we did for these earlier knockout games in Europe.

It’s amazing when you think about it!

Certainly, by that stage, having pretty much taken European football as a given for the best part of 10 years, you could say that many of our fans were taking European football for granted. Almost as a given right.

Perhaps the same way that I look at England qualifying for major tournaments, where I don’t really care up until the Quarter-Final stage.

We did of course, have that one season under Alan Pardew in the UEFA Cup, in which the knockout round attendances improved significantly with approximately 45,000 for Anzhi and a jam-packed 52,000 sell out for the Quarter Final against Benfica. A huge 16,000 more compared with eight years previous at the same stage against Sporting Lisbon.

So, I ask again, what gives? What can we expect for next season?

Obviously your season ticket doesn’t include non-league games… but that has always been the case.

I do know that at times in previous Champions League years, applying for tickets, in block in advance of the games, at the first instance, was the method chosen by the club. Clearly this was a mistake and probably driven by the need to bring in guaranteed cash / revenue before the transfer deadline.

Looking at those seasons, at 30 quid a game, that could set you back the best  part of 100 quid up front and that is only for yourself. What if you go to the game with your partner, or your two kids? As a family, if you are used to taking the kids, then you were essentially being asked to fork out 150-200 quid all in one go. That’s tough money to come by now, never mind 20 years ago!

We took massive followings away to the likes of Juventus, Barcelona and approximately 15,000 to the San Siro against Inter Milan, so were people saving their money for the away games? Possibly.

In those days too, you had a second group stage, so were people hesitant to sign up for the first stage, and were thus banking on the second group stage? You’d think maybe not but that’s another 100-200 quid in advance.

Was the Champions league not that big back then?

Due to the 24/7 media attention, the money in the game, the TV etc, the Champions League has undoubtedly become the most watched sport competition in the world. However, looking at other PL clubs from the same 2002-2003 season, Man U sold out all their CL home games that season at around 67,000. Arsenal sold out Highbury and Liverpool were close to sell out for their games too.

So, I guess, I don’t really have an answer? It’s always puzzled me.

I think there is no doubt that next season, if we qualify for the Champions League, then tickets will be virtually impossible to come by. Season ticket holders will almost certainly take their seats, then it will go to members, and likely little to be left over for general sale.

Even the Europa League or Conference League, which you would have to admit, we’d fancy ourselves of getting to the final of if the stars aligned, attendances will likely be just as high, partly due to the recent experiences of how the League Cup Final tickets were allocated.