The Wimbledon tennis championship "was again the best-attended sporting event" in the U.K. in '16, according to Bill Wilson of the BBC. Thanks to a "Middle Sunday being played this year as a result of poor weather," the tennis championship's attendance of 494,000 was up on the previous year. Overall, total gates at professional sports events in the U.K. were 69.8 million, down 1% on '15, according to Deloitte's sports business group. Meanwhile, football matches "made up two thirds of the total attendance figures." This year's total is "slightly less" than last year's 70.5 million, but in '15 the Rugby World Cup was hosted in the U.K. The top 10 attended showpiece events "were all multi-day affairs, such as Wimbledon and the British Grand Prix." Looking at individual sports, "as opposed to individual events, football was the biggest winner in the attendance stakes, at 45.2 million." Overall, '16 was the "third-strongest year this century in terms of live sport attendances," behind the Olympic and Paralympic year of '12 (75 million), and '15. Deloitte Sports Business Group partner Dan Jones said, "The fact that the total is so high, despite the absence of hosting any major one-off global events, is a reflection of the U.K. public's enduring appetite for watching live sport." Football was followed by horse-racing meetings -- such as Royal Ascot and the Cheltenham Festival -- and equestrian events (7.4 million), which accounted for five of the top 10 best-attended individual events of the year (
BBC, 12/14).
