11/21/24
October 15, 2005
Boomtime for French rugby: Two of French rugby's most famous clubs, Stade Français and Stade Toulousain, will today break a record when they play. The match has been moved to the Stade de France and every ticket has been sold. This means that the 80,000 or so who will watch will be the largest crowd ever for a regular-season match in France, in any sport. The previous record was 57,603 for Olympique Marseille against Paris St. Germain.
Rugby union often draws big crowds in surprising venues. 30,000 people turned up to watch Madagascar beat Ivory Coast last month, and I didn't even know they played the game in Madagascar. Club rugby in France has always had a pretty large fan base.
posted by the red terror at 12:07 PM on October 15, 2005
"the largest crowd ever for a regular-season match in France, in any sport" That gives me some interesting perspective on the 110,000+ that attend every Wolverines game here in Ann Arbor.
posted by dzot at 12:22 PM on October 15, 2005
All right! Rugby rocks. Blows away faux "he-man" sports like football, (american style).
posted by RedStrike at 02:27 PM on October 15, 2005
amen and word up.
posted by chicobangs at 03:12 PM on October 15, 2005
Attention le fumeur de la mauvaise herbe: 80,000 spectateurs pour une match de rugby? Que de monde!!! Qu'est-ce qui se passe???
posted by ohiodonnell at 04:00 PM on October 15, 2005
dzot--- Point taken, but a huge difference is that Michigan has always had the biggest football program in NCAA history, there's a hundred years of history there -- they built that stadium and subsequent additions specifically for the fan base at a huge university. Remember, a varsity program has the built-in luxury of alumni, where every student and ex-student feels like they have membership in a club. Whereas rugby in Paris has usually been a non-starter. The international test matches in Paris have always attracted huge interest, but on a regional basis, clubs in the north went begging, all the interest was in the south of France (kinda like the way ice hockey is more popular in the North-East of the U.S. than has historically been the case in the southern states). GO BLUE!!
posted by the red terror at 08:38 AM on October 17, 2005
Seems strange that more people can attend a rugby union match in Madagascar than the stadium can hold. This site says the capacity of the stadium where the game was held is 22,000. http://www.worldstadiums.com/africa/countries/madagascar.shtml
posted by Texas Rattlesnake at 01:32 AM on November 11, 2005
Sacre Bleu! 80,000 spectateurs pour une match de rugby? Vichysoise! Je pense que tu es un gateaux.