On The Ball | Liverpool and Man United streets ahead in English Premier League TV ratings
- North West rivals in front of rest of Big Six according to a new study from the University of Liverpool
- Numbers back up thinking behind controversial Project Big Picture proposals backed by both boardrooms
Liverpool and Manchester United are the teams everyone wants to watch.
No other club in the English Premier League comes close to matching their appeal. That is the verdict of a study into televised football audiences in the UK published last month.
The research by the Centre for Sports Business at the University of Liverpool Management School looked at viewing figures for 790 English top-flight games screened between 2013 and 2019. The evidence in Armchair Fans: Modelling Audience Size For Televised Football Matches suggests that Anfield and Old Trafford are in a league of their own in attracting television viewers.
It is striking how far the north west giants are ahead of the pack. The academics used an exhaustive range of criteria to assess the pulling power of all 28 clubs who competed in the Premier League over the period. AFC Bournemouth were used as a reference point based on alphabetical order.
The south-coast club have a tiny fan base and are a recent arrival in the top flight after spending most their existence in the lower leagues. Only three other Premier League participants in the six-year study attracted fewer viewers: Wolverhampton Wanderers, Fulham and Cardiff City. At the other end of the scale are the England’s traditional powerhouses.
