KHL attendance thread 2017-18

After five home game, Barys have 28800 sp.
This is 5760 without Barys.

Its better before last season(first five home game), up 28%.

 

Just like Nazarbayev (Kazakh president) has said. Barys will be a strong mid table team in the KHL.

 

So, haters always have too much time on hands to write a lot of bad stuff, but the KHL attendance seems pretty high this year. What a crowd in Sochi yesterday against Salavat.

 

2014/15	2015/16	2016/17
6 423	6 301	6 124

KHL regular season attendance

5986 in current season

The KHL has started its regular season in August since 2015/2016, coming back to September next season.

Season 2014/2015 had different formula, more games within a conference. Now, everyone plays everyone. It will be changed (not sure if next season or later)

 

I frankly was expecting better numbers, but have a look at top-12.
I'm sure that in the end the attendance will be higher than last year

 

All in all, sure people are more likely to attend games in autumn/winter than they are in the summer so attendance will rise. But that top-12 number is as irrelevant as it gets, I don't know what does it even supposed to tell. Comparing 40% of KHL's top teams to 90% of all the other league's.

KHL's attendance problems have been the same for years, moving the needle 200 to one side or the other doesn't really mean much.

 

Kunlun's doesnt help. Also look at Minsk this season, they have a crap team, lots of people stop showing up.

IMO part of the problem is the same teams are at the bottom of the league every season, who wants to watch their team get hammered every game. Since there is no real draft this is the kind of thing that happens. I think the league needs to do something about somehow spreading the talent around to bottom teams. If league can remedy this and next season kick some teams that are more suitable for the VHL, eventually there will be more parity and even attendances.

 

Well there were still 12k viewers at the last Minsk home game so they are doing fine so far. Even if the team isn't great it isn't hopeless. Riga however is and that turns the team which could be boosting league's numbers into one that's sinking them. Same with SLovan, to lesser extent.

Situation with Kunlun and CSKA is terrible. Spartak started doing fine as soon as they started winning a few games which is all you need, evidently. Same story with Vityaz, people started showing up when they were winning, now it's back to 2k per game again.

Problem is that the teams who should realistically be on their way to the VHL are doing really well this season. Yugra is gone, that's a foregone conclusion. After this season Vityaz is the team which should be there as well, if KHL goes through with what they said before the season. Severstal and Neftekhimik need to be kicked in the long run but not until there is something to replace them. As long as they stay relevant on the ice let them stay.

 

What's the attendance record in KHL? I guess Lev Praha holds it? Quick googling couldn't give me an answer.

Jokerit-SKA outdoor game is close to a sellout, which would mean an attendance of 18 000.

 

Chernyshenko said today that the average this season thus far is 6089

 

Attendance up to 6232. Too bad that Kunlun dragged it down, hopefully next year they'll manage to play more at the real home

 

The KHL wants Beijing as their home. We will see what will happen. The problem is a bureaucracy in China with a reconstruction of some arena near Workers Stadium.

Good news that the attendance increased.

 

yeah good news and there are some circumstances that led to the attendance to be in my opinion even a bit lowe than what it should. EG Ufa starting the season with one billion of games at home, the Neftekhimik mess again at the start of the season, and so on. Removing Yugra and getting Kunlun in Beijing should really boost the attendance even more.

 

Agree.

If you read attendance articles at Biznis Online, they always say - the best attendance figures were in 2014/15 season when there was maximum games between division rivals (and you played with teams from opposite conference just once) in the history of the league. If I get it, the KHL wants to come back to this model. More games within division/conference. So, there should be better attendance in the future, especially if teams with small arenas are gone (or upgrade arenas, lets say Novosibirsk).

 

Only 6,000 a game? I would have expected Moscow and St. Pete’s to have much bigger crowds for their teams.

 

Well SKA basically sold out every game. Their arena has a capacity of around 12000 but due to the team’s popularity they plan to move to a bigger arena with 18000 seats.

CSKA’s barn can only take in 5500 spectators. In addition to that they’ve always struggled to get fans to their games.

Spartak Moscow had 7500 and 8100 in their two playoff games before being sweeped by CSKA.

 

Spartak and SKA seem to be the only two teams with a marketing department.