snooker.org 'hits': a few observations
The top 20 countries going by hits alone are as follows:
UK 1057268
Germany 184355
Thailand 115952
Finland 91816
Spain 88316
Ireland 83185
Sweden 75017
Turkey 67628
Norway 57224
Belgium 53391
Russia 51352
Poland 50624
France 49998
Netherlands 47103
USA 43126
Portugal 40767
Romania 40704
Hong Kong 36947
Italy 36291
Pakistan 35931
But if you break it down per head of population, which is surely a fairer way of comparing these countries, the list looks like this:
Ireland one hit per 59.8 people
Finland 60.3
UK 63.2
Norway 94.7
Sweden 134.6
Hong Kong 202.9
Belgium 217.1
Portugal 250.1
Netherlands 363
Germany 451.3
Romania 472.6
Spain 537.1
Thailand 558.7
Poland 747.6
Turkey 1236.4
France 1348.2
Italy 1666
Russia 2841.8
Pakistan 6147.7
USA 7675.2
Going by that, there's more interest in snooker in the Republic of Ireland than there is in any other country on earth. The Republic of Ireland is the nearest neighbour to the country that (quite rightly) hosts more tournaments than any other country, and yet we haven't hosted a ranking event or prestigious invitational for eight years.
Now, I do think that these things do slightly favour countries with smaller populations as that average is harder to keep down the bigger your population is. Ireland, Norway and Finland have the three smallest populations and they're all in the top four. I would still say that the UK, quite comfortably, has more interest in snooker than any other nation. It's also possible that countries outside the top 20 in terms of total hits would rank highly per head of population.
But there's no doubting that Ireland ranks very, very highly in terms of interest levels, and I think it's baffling that we've been getting nothing in return for that.
Looking at that as well, it looks like interest in neighbours Norway, Finland and Sweden is really high. Granted these countries' populations are small, and will therefore never have the X-Factor of a UK, Germany, USA or, for that matter, Turkey, but as far as filling venues is concerned, you'll have an easier job in Ireland, Norway, Finland and Sweden than you'll have almost anywhere else. All have bigger populations than Wales, which has held at least one ranking event every season for umpteen years.
Seems a little odd to me.
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Pink Ball - Posts: 22312
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