Scottish football attendances increase for the 4th season running - near the 4.5m mark

Scottish football continues to attract more and more fans to games with nearly 4.5 million supporters attending matches in the SPFL during the 2018/2019 season.

Rugby Park saw an increase this season as Kilmarnock finished third. Picture: SNS

For the fourth season running the attendances across the four Scottish Professional Football League divisions have increased.

A total of 4,486,145 supporters attended 788 matches across the Ladbrokes Premiership, Championship, League 1 and League 2, plus play-off fixtures. It is an increase of more than 40,000 with 4,445,149 attending the last season.

That number nearly hits the 5 million mark when the Betfred Cup and Irn Bru Cup are taken into consideration.

A total of 379,553 fans attended 95 matches in the Betfred Cup, while 36,975 supporters watched the 56 Challenge Cup fixtures. The total figure of 4,902,673 across all SPFL competitions during season 2018/19 was a 54,839 rise on the than previous campaign.

In addition, 25 of the 42 SPFL clubs experienced a year-on-year increase in league match crowds last season, with more than half of the 12 Premiership clubs recording a rise on average attendances for home games.

Neil Doncaster, SPFL chief executive, said: “After what has been another hugely entertaining season across all four Ladbrokes SPFL divisions, it’s extremely encouraging to see another increase in engagement in Scottish football reflected through a rise in attendances.

“Scottish football continues to punch above its weight in terms of fan attendance per capita, which is testament to the hard work done by the individual clubs to engage supporters in their local communities and the loyalty shown by Scottish football fans to turn out in such extraordinary numbers to support their teams.”