The season ends with attendances up- but the weather hits us hard

So that was 2017/18- a season which kept us enthralled until the very last weekend and which brought joy, heartbreak, excitement and some of the most horrible weather in living memory. That weather, as you might imagine, had a significant impact on our attendances- indeed, it continued to have an impact even after it improved. How so? Read on.

If you were to cast your mind back twelve months to April 2017 you might remember your team having to play a little catch up due to earlier postponements. Compare that with last month, however, and you might well have been following a side which had to play three times a week for almost the entire period as a result of our terrible winter. Exhausting, wasn't it?

To illustrate that rather better, in April 2017 our clubs participated in 189 matches. In 2018 that number was 250!

As you might imagine, that number of games in such a short period had an impact on attendances, with some clubs having to switch matches away from their usual home grounds just to get them played, some having to play on Thursday evenings; and, of course, for some supporters the cost of three matches a week was prohibitive. Sixty seven thousand, five hundred and seventy six hardy folk turned out to watch our clubs last month- four and a half thousand more than the same period last season- but the average attendance fell due to the number of games played.

Looking at the season as a whole, the news is positive, with a 3.3% rise overall- but the impact of the weather becomes obvious when we consider that the same statistics showed a 12.3% rise up until the end of January.

For many of our clubs, weather notwithstanding, the season has been very positive in terms of bums on seats and feet on terraces. Here is our popular ‘Growth League Table,’ showing the clubs who increased their attendances the most as compared to the previous season and the percentage rise they celebrated:

Growth (%)
1st Aveley 201.1
2nd Walton Casuals 174
3rd Haringey Borough 172.8
4th Billericay Town 86.7
5th Heybridge Swifts 86.6
6th Bowers & Pitsea 70.6
7th Dorking Wanderers 49.1
8th Brightlingsea Regent 42.3
9th Barking 41.3
10th Carshalton Athletic 37.7
11th Thurrock 29.3
12th Romford 28.8
13th Cray Wanderers 27.7
14th Witham Town 26.4
15th Phoenix Sports 21.8
16th Norwich United 20.2
17th Hendon 19.5
18th Tilbury 19.2
19th Lewes 18.3
20th Grays Athletic 17.5

Now we have the playoffs to come, and of course we expect some bumper attendances, but here are our top ten largest attendances of the season so far in each Division:

Premier Division

2417 Dulwich Hamlet v Needham Market 07.10.17.
2206 Billericay Town v Folkestone Invicta 28.04.18.
2158 Dulwich Hamlet v Enfield Town 17.02.18.
2004 Dulwich Hamlet v Folkestone Invicta 06.01.18.
1988 Billericay Town v Hendon 07.10.17.
1971 Dulwich Hamlet v Burgess Hill Town 21.10.17.
1866 Dulwich Hamlet v Tooting & Mitcham U 28.08.17.
1832 Dulwich Hamlet v Lowestoft Town 25.11.17.
1828 Dulwich Hamlet v Brightlingsea Regent 09.12.17.
1752 Dulwich Hamlet v Leatherhead 23.09.17.

North Division

514 AFC Sudbury v Bury Town 01.01.18.
444 Heybridge Swifts v Soham Town Rangers 28.04.18.
425 Bury Town v Haringey Borough 28.04.18.
421 Bury Town v AFC Sudbury 19.04.18.
410 Bowers & Pitsea v AFC Hornchurch 24.03.18.
407 Witham Town v Heybridge Swifts 23.02.18.
398 Aveley v AFC Hornchurch 05.01.18.
394 Canvey Island v Grays Athletic 11.11.17.
384 AFC Sudbury v Canvey Island 12.08.17.
379 Hertford Town v Ware 30.09.17.

South Division

1134 Lewes v Chipstead 28.04.18.
881 Guernsey v Phoenix Sports 22.04.18.
802 Lewes v Hastings United 26.12.17.
785 Carshalton Athletic v VCD Athletic 28.04.18.
777 Lewes v VCD Athletic 24.03.18.
764 Lewes v Horsham 10.04.18.
743 Guernsey v East Grinstead Town 12.08.17.
726 Guernsey v Shoreham 18.11.17.
705 Guernsey v Carshalton Athletic 14.10.17.
699 Hastings United v Lewes 28.08.17.

Thanks for all of your marvellous support over the season- and thanks to our statistician Mike Wilson for his continual hard work crunching and collating the numbers so that those of us who haven’t graduated beyond counting with their fingers and toes don’t have to do it! We’ll be back with the playoff figures very soon.