Which football fixture has the biggest rivalry and how do you measure such a thing?
Which league fixture is the most important to their respective supporters?
Which league match is the most hotly contested?
How can you compare
- Aston Villa v Birmingham City
- Everton v Liverpool
- Manchester City v Manchester United
- Arsenal v Tottenham Hotspur or
- Nottingham Forest v Notts County
Let’s see if we can provide some answers.
The Data Used
All league games since 1888-89 to 2018-19 are included. We recognise all league games that were played at the time in which the player believed were competitive games and that they went the full 90 mins or were accepted as the final result. This includes the league games played in the 1939-40 season, before it was abandoned. Also included are the league games of Accrington Stanley and Wigan Borough in the seasons they did not complete. These are the 6 divisions that the sample was taken from. First Division/Premier League Second Division/First Division/Championship Third Division/Second Division/League 1 Fourth Division/Third Division/League 2 Third Division North Third Division SouthHow we Calculated the Rankings
For each club, eg Bury in 1924-25 we sorted the home games by attendance and then gave the top attendance 50 points, the second 49 points, the third 48 points etc… So for 1924-25 season Bury’s home game against Bolton Wanderers was top, so that gets 50 points. Manchester City was second so that gets 49 points, Huddersfield Town was third so they get 48 points.
Once you have repeated this process for all the fixtures you can then calculate the average for Bolton Wanderers v Bury, home and away, and add the two numbers together. This would give up to a maximum of 100 points per season for both matches. This has then been repeated for all seasons to give an overall average figure.
So going back to Bury in 1924-25. Bury’s away fixtures against the corresponding top 3 home games gives, Bolton Wanderers versus Bury 50 points, Manchester City versus Bury 33 points, and Huddersfield Town versus Bury scored 48 points.
We can see that Bolton Wanderers versus Bury is a popular fixture with both sets of fans. In this particular season Bury versus Huddersfield Town was also popular with both sets of fans. Bury versus Manchester City is more attractive to Bury fans than City fans.
If you average all the meetings between these clubs over time you get a better idea of which fixture is the most popular. You can’t include every fixture, if we did, it would give anomalies relating to fixtures that have not been played many times. Interestingly without further filtering, the top fixture is Durham City versus Wolverhampton Wanderers scoring and Manchester City V York City which both scored 100 points both fixtures had only been played twice. To get a meaningful measure of which fixture is the most popular we have discounted fixtures between clubs who have met less than 20 times. Our view is 20 games is a reasonable measure of a long term interest in a fixture.
Widening our example to all fixtures between Bolton Wanderers v Bury. They have met a total of 62 times. The Bolton home games scored 46.74 out of 50, and the Bury home games scored 47.90, making a total of 94.65. Bury versus Manchester City scored 47.09, whilst Manchester City versus Bury 41.00, making a total of 88.09. Bury versus Huddersfield Town 44.11, whilst Huddersfield Town versus Bury averaged out at 37.93, making a total of 82.04.
| Rankings | |
|---|---|
| Bury v Bolton Wanderers | 94.65 |
| Bury v Manchester City | 88.09 |
| Bury v Huddersfield Town | 82.04 |
Of the three fixtures, Bury versus Bolton Wanderers is more popular with the fans of the respective other clubs, than the other two fixtures.
Other metrics can be used as well. So we have used total attendances to rank fixtures, as well as average fixtures. When using these measures we have this result.
| Total Attendance home and away | |
|---|---|
| Bury v Bolton Wanderers | 1,017,802 |
| Bury v Manchester City | 869,686 |
| Bury v Huddersfield Town | 592,644 |
| Average Attendance home and away | |
|---|---|
| Bury v Manchester City | 19,326 |
| Bury v Bolton Wanderers | 16,416 |
| Bury v Huddersfield Town | 10,583 |
Of the 141 clubs that have played in the Football League in 121 Seasons, there have been a total of 12,068 different fixtures. The only fixture that was played once was Chester versus Wigan Borough. Wigan Borough left the league before the corresponding fixture.
3264 fixtures have been played 20 times or more.
As a separate exercise we have ranked single fixtures the same way. So the most highly ranked single fixture. So for example Bury versus Manchester City scoring 47.09, will be higher ranked than Manchester City versus Bury at 41.00.
We have also considered average and total attendance as a way of ranking fixtures. For total attendance, Manchester City versus Bury 510,608, will be higher than Bury versus Manchester City at 359,078. Therefore the average attendance will also reflect the same difference with 16,322 for the visit of Manchester City to Gigg Lane and 22,200 for the visit of Bury to the various grounds Manchester City have called home.
All these variables have been included in our stats so that the reader can decide which fixture in English league football is the most hotly contested. We were quite surprised at who was at the top. Figures do not lie, these hotly contested fixtures have stood the test of time.
David Coleman October 2019
