SC Bern on-the-trot highest fan presence

Article posted by Coliseum, May 8^th, 2023

Image: Lanxess Arena, Raimond Spekking (via Wikimedia Commons), CC BY-SA 4.0

Switzerland’s ice hockey team SC Bern has the maximum fan attendance any European team can boast of for the 22^nd consecutive season and the Swiss National League continues to lead in the European league with 7,005 fans per game.

‘penny-del.org’ stated that it is only the second time that the 7,000 mark has been reached in Europe. As the best club in the PENNY DEL (Deutsche Eishockey Liga – German Ice Hockey League), the ice hockey club Kölner Haie (Germany) occupies a strong second place in Europe.

SC Bern is an ice hockey team based in Bern, Switzerland. They play in the National League, the top tier of the Swiss hockey league system. For the 18th year in a row, the club boasted the highest attendance of fans as an ice hockey team in Europe for the 2018-2019 regular seasons, averaging 16,290 spectators.

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The PostFinance-Arena is an indoor arena in Bern, Switzerland. It is primarily used for ice hockey and is the home arena of SC Bern. It was opened in October 1967 and currently accommodates 17,031 supporters.

The National League is a professional ice hockey league in Switzerland and is the top tier of the Swiss league system. Prior to the 2017-2018 seasons, the league was known as National League A. During the 2018-2019 seasons, the league had an average of 6,949 spectators per game which is the highest among European leagues.

The Deutsche Eishockey Liga or DEL is a German professional ice hockey league and the highest division in German ice hockey. Founded in 1994, it was formed as a replacement for the Eishockey-Bundesliga and became the new top-tier league in Germany as a result.

The Kölner Haie is an ice hockey club based in Cologne, Germany that plays in the professional Deutsche Eishockey Liga. The team was one of the founding members of the DEL. The Kölner Haie play their home games at the Lanxess Arena, which opened in 1998, located in district Deutz.

The Lanxess Arena is an indoor arena, in Cologne, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is known as the 18,500-capacity home of the Kölner Haie. The arena opened in 1998 and can accommodate 20,000 people for concerts. With its capacity of 18,500, it is the largest ice hockey arena outside North America.

‘penny-del.org’ further stated that Switzerland continues to dominate the annual attendance rankings among European men’s ice hockey clubs and leagues. With an average of 14,750 spectators, SC Bern is in the top spot. While the 2021-2022 seasons were still subject to some pandemic-related restrictions, the 2022-2023 seasons saw an almost complete rebound in European ice hockey. The Swiss National League came close to equaling its own European league record of 7,074 from 2019-2020, but the 7,005 average is the second best ever for a European ice hockey league and also only the second time a league in Europe has exceeded the 7,000 mark.

The last time a club other than Bern topped the attendance table was the Kölner Haie in 2001 (11,529 spectators). With an average of 13,901 spectators in the recently concluded 2022-2023 seasons, German Coach Uwe Krupp’s team has occupied a strong second place in Europe. The league average in PENNY DEL is 6,000 spectators.

Two other German clubs are also above the 10,000 mark. Despite a very difficult season on the ice, the professional ice hockey team Eisbären Berlin (Germany) with an average of 11,278 spectators in the 17,000-capacity Mercedes-Benz Arena in Berlin and the professional ice hockey team based in Mannheim (Germany) – Adler Mannheim – with 10,225 spectators in the 15,000-capacity SAP Arena in Mannheim – boast a loyal fan following.

The four-time Champions Hockey League winner, the Swedish professional ice hockey club Frölunda HC based in Gothenburg (Sweden) just missed the 10,000 mark with an average of 9,908 spectators in the 12,044-capacity Scandinavium. It is the 33^rd time in the last 34 seasons that Frölunda boasts the maximum numbers of fan attendance as an ice hockey club in Sweden.

The Czech ice hockey team HC Sparta Prague set a new club record with 10,837 spectators in the 18,000-capacity O2 Arena in Prague, Czechia, which is also an all-time high for a Tipsport Extraliga (the highest-level ice hockey league in the Czech Republic) club.

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