& a blog

following up on my post quantifying the rough costs of world cup 2010, i thought i would offer a brief assessment of the costs of seeing club soccer in various places around the world.

we start with the home team, the new england revolution, who can be seen at home about every 10 days for $19 paid at the door, minutes before kick off.

we then consider my overseas favorites, arsenal fc, who can be seen for a mere 169 euro ($248 as of this post) at their new posh home stadium for a premiership match.

champions league match-ups (at least the early ones) are a steal at 148 euro, a trifling $217.

if we head south from england to spain things get a little more reasonable. a fc barcelona game against primera liga foes will set one back a fair 95 euro ($139).

in the netherlands, the top dutch teams like ajax are perhaps the fairest priced in europe, with a standard game costing 55 euro ($80), and grudge matches like psv eindhoven doubling that to 109 euro ($160).

the rest of europe rounds out as follows, italy’s ac milan is about 115 euro a match ($170), scottish glasgow rangers games are 245 euro ($360), and olympic marsielle tickets are 135 euro ($198).

then again, if you go south of the us to mexico, you can catch cruz azul for a pithy 200 pesos ($19.50).

of course, these costs are not the only costs of seeing these games, and for full hotel-transportation-soccer game wonderfulness, it seems that this website will work out soccer vacations.

but the bottom line? soccer in the united states is bargain basement cheap. i mean REALLY cheap. the cheapest. and if the revolution’s defeat of atlante in route to the superliga crown tells us anything, american soccer must be better than its mexican counterpart.

once again, here are the rankings:

(by price lowest to higest)

1. new england revolution $19 usa
2. cruz azul $19.50 mex
3. ajax $80 ned
4. barcelona $139 esp
5. ac milan $170 ita
6. olympic marsielle $198 fra
7. arsenal $248 eng
8. rangers $360 sct