Championship keeps pace as fourth most watched league in Europe

The Sky Bet Championship is set to retain its place as the fourth most watched league in Europe.

With a total audience of 9,851,413, the league falls only behind the Premier League, Germany’s Bundesliga and the Primera Liga in Spain.

The average attendance in the Sky Bet Championship reached 17,847, increasing by 7% with an extra 1,228 fans at each of the 552 matched played this season.

Across the  Football League, the total number of people watching matches increased by 615,685 during the 2014/15 season, a four per cent increase on the previous year.

The campaign just ended is the 12th in succession where crowd have topped the 15m mark and more than 16.3m fans passed through the turnstiles at matches played in the Sky Bet Championship, League 1 and League 2.

In Sky Bet League 1 average attendances topped the 7,000 mark (7,038) with a total of 3.9m attending matches throughout the season.

Crowds for matches in Sky Bet League 2 are at their highest levels for more than a decade and totalled 2.6m during 2014/15. The average gate of 4,679 delivered an increase of nearly eight per cent.

The Football League has enjoyed a long period of sustained attendance growth. In the 28 years since the introduction of the play-offs, gates for matches have more than doubled.

Shaun Harvey, chief executive of the Football League, said: "It is very heartening to see Football League crowds showing such a healthy increase.

"Having more than 16 million fans at our matches is a great endorsement of the entertainment our clubs provide and I would like to thank everyone that has bought a ticket and backed their team during a memorable season."