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Rugby League Australia Most Popular Sport?

Perth Red

Post Whore
Messages
65,803
According to this article rugby league is our most popular sport. Its quite funny how insecure soccer and Aussie Rules fans are.
So,
we’re 11th in participation, behind afl in crowds and memberships, behind soccer and union in interest in international game, not national at the top tier and behind afl in revenue generation.
And the summary of all that is we are the most popular ? Only with couch potatoes it would seem. We might be doing ok on Twitter as well.
 

Perth Red

Post Whore
Messages
65,803
I would say there is more Rugby League fans in Australia than AFL fans. We are by far the most popular sport in NSW/ACT and QLD which is almost 60% of the population. So that makes sense. We are also way ahead in merchandise sales too.

It's a shame we can't translate this into revenue though.
This has it more of a 55-45% split afl and nrl states to nrl population .
the great unknown is the reach of each code outside of its heartland states. Arguably afl has a stronger presence and fanbase in qlnd, act and nsw than RL does in the afl dominant states.
We know the games presence in tassie and SA is virtually non existent and pretty minor in Vic and WA (due to lack of investment and strategy).

 

Wb1234

Referee
Messages
22,625
The article is actually comparing 15 Australian nrl clubs vs 18 Australian afl clubs

the warriors ratings aren’t included and would probably add close to ten million more tv viewers

then with origin and other rep games as well

when all fans are counted rugby leagues is the winner

but I’m sure the Tasmanian afl team will help bridge the chasm after the dolphins get included for league
 
Messages
12,667
I would say there is more Rugby League fans in Australia than AFL fans. We are by far the most popular sport in NSW/ACT and QLD which is almost 60% of the population. So that makes sense. We are also way ahead in merchandise sales too.

It's a shame we can't translate this into revenue though.
We might have more bandwagon fans who don't attend games or become club members, but that's not the type of person our game needs. A true fan either attends games or buys a membership package and merchandise every year. I hear people say they support a club, yet don't know where they are on the ladder or who plays for them. These people aren't fans. They might "Like" a club's Facebook page, but other than that they couldn't give a f**k about the game.
 
Messages
12,667
Attendance - Home, Away & Finals
Competition2022/2320222021/222020/212019/202019
AwFuLOff-Season32,620Off-SeasonOff-SeasonOff-Season36,317
NRLOff-Season17,121Off-SeasonOff-SeasonOff-Season15,800
BBLTBDOff-Season7,3718,85618,520Off-Season
A-League9,288Off-Season5,6025,6828,617Off-Season

NRL has increased its attendances while two of the other three went backwards. Should be interesting to see if this trend continues. Not bad considering the Warriors played at Dolphin Oval for much of the season.
 
Last edited:
Messages
12,667
Wow
PaflRed straight into bat for his beloved Aflol
Bless
He's right though. The only metric we won is TV RATINGS, which is based on OzTam's surveillance or 12,000 people's viewing habits across Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney. Attendances and participation are more accurate gauges of a sport's health as they're based on veritable data.

OzTam ratings are just a small unrepresentative sample of 12,000 respondents that is projected onto 26,000,000 Australians. For all we know our ratings could be higher or lower, but we won't know until everyone is monitored.
 

bipolarbob

Juniors
Messages
38
in defence of Perth red...
I'm moving the Perth in feb next yr. no NRL team to watch. there's no way I'm watching kickaball union (i value my neck to much!), not really interested in football (soccer) so ill be off to watch the AFL (go west coast!), there's a whole market of uk born fans in Perth just begging for a nrl team.
it looks to me to be an untapped market.
 

Mr Angry

Not a Referee
Messages
51,783
Cricket, whilst Victorians are crap at it, like all things, they show up to watch, Starc, Cummins, Smith.

Indians, they love it too.

You have your answer.
 

Mr Angry

Not a Referee
Messages
51,783
I watched Mark Geyer at the WACA for the Reds.

Matter of timing, just happened to work in WA at the time.

St. George they played, lost from memory, but had a crack, crowd was happy enough.
 
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