Scandals and attendance records in football – 05/18/2023 – PVC

It had not been a year since the publication of the Mafia da Loteria Esportiva scandal, by the magazine Placar, the Brazilian Championship recorded its highest average attendance: 23,983 spectators per game. More than 155,000 people paid tickets to watch Flamengo 3 x 0 Santos, the final played seven months after the report denounced 125 players, referees and coaches.

It’s been 41 years and the phenomenon is now similar — and surprising again.

The most modern and globalized manipulation scheme has already made the Superior Court of Sports Justice ask for the preventive suspension of eight players. For the first time, there are athletes who confess to having received money to receive yellow cards or create penalties.

Counterpoint: the Brasileiro has, at the moment, the best public of all its editions. The sixth round had 28,000 spectators per game. After six rounds, the average is 26,000, 13% higher than the 1983 rate.

The equation that the bigger the scandal, the greater the attraction of fans makes no sense. The logic would be the opposite, that is, the more you are sure that you can be deceived when watching a sport, the more you run away from embezzlement.

The Bundesliga had six arranged games in the 1970/71 season. It punished 52 players, two coaches, six club employees, and even so, it lost 15% of attendance the following season. It took three years to return to the previous level, reached only in 1973/74, partly because of the proximity of the World Cup.

Italy lost 15% of spectators, both after Tottonero, their lottery mafia, in 1980, and after Calciopoli, manipulation of arbitration scales, in 2005/06. In the second case, it took three years to recover the previous index, even though it was world champion in Germany. Perhaps due to the relegation of Juventus, the most popular club in the country.

In 1980, the public’s return was faster, probably due to the reopening of the market to foreign players after 14 years. Within two seasons, Italy had become the sport’s mecca and the stadiums were filled to capacity again.

In Brazil, the pandemic closed its doors in 2020 and 2021 and there has been growth every season since 2016, with a slight decline in 2019 – the second best index in history – and 2022.

The occupancy rate of the stadiums in the year of Jorge Jesus’ Flamengo was 49%. At the beginning of Brasileiro it reached 67%.

There is more room for growth with popular spaces in stadiums. The increase in attendance continues, apparently, due to the strengthening of member-supporter plans, especially those with loyalty. The Corinthians player who does not go through the turnstile against Ituano will not have priority in the eventual Libertadores semifinal. The same goes for Palmeirense, although this is not the format adopted by Flamengo and São Paulo, for example.

Until 2019, there had never been three clubs with an average attendance per match of more than 30,000 fans in the same running points championship. In these first six rounds of the Brasileiro 2023, there are seven such teams – Flamengo, Corinthians, São Paulo, Palmeiras, Vasco, Bahia and Fortaleza.

Atlético-MG has an average of 35 thousand in Mineirão. A game at Independência, with a smaller capacity, dropped the number.

It’s supernatural, almost. But a phenomenon to continue to be followed.

The scandal, for now, does not bring down the public.

It takes work. Arrest the corrupt.

And study to reach the highest limit that Brazilians can still reach.

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