EuroLeague attendance en route to reaching a new all-time high / News - Basketnews.com

European basketball fans are back after a two-year COVID break, and attendance is likely to skyrocket to unprecedented heights once the current season is over.

Credit: BasketNews.lt/D.Lukšta Credit BasketNews.lt/D.Lukšta

Following two tough seasons of COVID restrictions and measures, fans are finally free to enjoy Europe's top basketball competition. In fact, it looks like the two-year-long hiatus imposed on local fans has made them more 'hungry' than ever before.

A quick look at the attendance in this season's EuroLeague games just serves to prove the point. According to BasketNews' Darius Garuolis, so far, the 2022-23 EuroLeague season has the highest average attendance in league's history.

Over a total of 58 games contested in Europe's top-flight, a total number of 511,969 tickets have been sold, which breaks down into an average of 8,827. That number is slightly higher than the previous record (8,588) recorded in the last pre-COVID season (2019-20).

Currently, we're at Round 7, which means that there's 27 more Rounds to play in the EuroLeague regular season.

If the attendance numbers keep up at the same pace, by the end of the season, around 2.7M fans will have watched at least one EuroLeague outing from the stands.

This season has seen many EuroLeague clubs register new records.

As early as August, Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv announced that all 10,000 season tickets, which include all home matches in the EuroLeague and the Israeli Winner League, have been sold out.

"Building a fast and balanced team and the strategic moves made by the club led to an expression of confidence on the part of our fans," the club's CEO Adli Markos said.

Valencia Basketfans are not holding back on their team's return to the EuroLeague. Two months ago, the club announced that 7,500 season tickets have been sold for the EuroLeague games.

The club has closed the season ticket sale as it has exceeded any expectations. Finding a ticket for any EuroLeague match might be next to impossible for Valencia games at La Fonteta, as selling 7,500 season tickets means that only 500 tickets will be available for every EuroLeague home game.

Another EuroLeague wild card recipient,Partizan Belgrade, are having strong support behind their backs this season, as they've sold 11.500 season tickets. Partizan play EuroLeague home games in Stark arena, which can hold up to 18.000 fans.

Olympiacos Piraeus announced 5,739 season tickets for the current campaign. That's almost half of the Peace and Friendship Stadium's total capacity, but the most tickets the club has sold since the 2008-09 season (8,900), which remains unsurpassable. From 2016-2019, Olympiacos' season tickets were fluctuating between 4,500-5,200.

And of course,Zalgiris Kaunas remain the club that's always ahead of the curve. Just a week ago and for the third time in a row, the Lithuanian club announced they'd have the support of a fully booked Zalgirio Arena in the coming EuroLeague clashagainst EA7 Emporio Armani Milan.

Previously, Zalgiris played with a sold-out crowd againstFC Barcelona(15,146 spectators) andALBA Berlin(14,916 fans). The first EuroLeague home game of the season againstVirtus Segafredo Bolognawas viewed by 11,024 people.

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