Indian football fans win the numbers game

Top Indian clubs may have failed to make an impact in the AFC Cup last season but Indian fans certainly did by topping in the numbers game.

According to latest statistics released by the Asian Football Confederation, Indian fans turned out in big numbers overtaking those in other countries.

AFC figures show that 52,000 fans turned up on the five match days to watch East Bengal and Dempo Sports Club in action, with 30,000 cheering on the Bengal outfit during their match against Muktijoddha Sangsad of Bangladesh at the Salt Lake Stadium in March.

The Kolkata side also underlined its solid fan-base with over 40,000 loyally attending all their three encounters.

This constitutes 25 per cent of the total attendance for all the stages of the group matches, which stood at 156,000, AFC said.

If Indian fans dominated the attendance sheet, the opposite was true for Hong Kong with just a shade over 5,000 spectators cheering on eventual quarter-finalists Sun Hei and Happy Valley on six action days.

In fact, just 147 fans were present at the Mongkok Stadium when Happy Valley went down 0-2 to New Radiant club of Maldives.

The AFC's Cup's first match day was watched by over 46,000 people, the highest figure, while match day six -- by which stage almost all the quarter-finalists had been decided -- could gather the support of just 12,000 spectators across the continent.

Malaysian club Pahang received healthy support from their fans, with 17,000 following their wildly swinging fortunes on all days. More than 10,000 attended Pahang's 3-1 win over Happy Valley at the Darul Makmur Stadium in April.

Among the small countries, Maldives were outright winners when it came to spectators interest with 24,512 people attending the matches of Valencia and New Radiant. The attendance during New Radiant's matches never fell below 5,000 on all match days.

There were 8,100 Lebanese spectators at hand for the encounters of Al Nejmeh (6,000) and Al Ahed (2,100) while Jordanian clubs Al Faisaly (4,000) and Al Hussein (7,000) could boast the support of 11,000 fans.

Turkmenistan club Nebitchi, who narrowly lost out on a last eight berth, could attract 7,500 fans, while Nisa's supporters turned out in the lowest numbers, with just 1500 taking their seats during the club's matches.