billsportsmaps.com

April 12, 2011

Minor League Baseball: the 3 Double-A leagues…the Eastern League, the Southern League, and the Texas League. Map, with all 30 teams’ 2010 average attendances, locations, and MLB affiliations.

Filed under: Baseball,Baseball: MiLB Double-A — admin @ 11:56 am

Please note: there is a more recent map of this (2016) here…
Affiliated Double A minor league baseball (MiLB): location-map of 3 leagues, the Eastern League, the Southern League, the Texas League (2015 attendances)/+ the 3 new teams in Double-A baseball since 2011 (Pensacola, Biloxi, Hartford)/+ illustrations for the 4 highest-drawing Double-A teams in 2015 (Frisco, Birmingham, Richmond, Reading).
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Double-A Baseball map – 3 leagues/30 teams, with 2010 attendances and each team’s MLB affiliation
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Below – list of Double-A teams’ metro-area populations
[Note: click on image below to enlarge]…

The map shows the location of all 30 Double-A teams. There are 3 Double-A leagues in Organized Baseball. Each Major League Baseball team has one of the 30 Double-A teams in its farm system. The Double-A, or AA level of baseball, is two steps below Major League Baseball. These days, however, Double-A baseball often is the launching pad for young talent that is on a fast-track to the Major Leagues.
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Each team’s home ball cap logo is placed on the map next to the ball club’s location.
The regions in the United States that the 3 Double-A leagues themselves are based in can be seen via the thin black lines on the map which serve to separate, geographically, the three leagues’ teams.
The 12-team Eastern League covers all of the Northeastern USA, plus eastern Ohio, Maryland, and Virginia. The Eastern League averaged 4,663 per game last season.
The 10-team Southern League covers the region of North Carolina west through Tennessee, and south to include Mississippi, Alabama, and northern Florida. The Southern League averaged 3,188 per game last season.
The 8-team Texas League covers the region of south-western Missouri, south through Arkansas, south-west through Oklahoma, and, of course, Texas. The Texas League averaged 5,264 per game last season.

The teams’ average attendances are within their league attendance list. Next to each team’s 2010 home, regular-season average attendance is their home ball cap logo, and the logo of their Major League Baseball parent-club. [At the very top, center of the map page are all the MLB teams' logos - listed alphabetically with the team name under it (in case you are not familiar with MLB iconography).]

Below, the highest-drawing Double-A ball club – the Frisco RoughRiders…
[Note: to see a full-screen view, click on images below.]

Photo credits – Skyscrapercity.com thread ‘Little Ballparks‘. Bing.com/maps/Bird’s Eye view. FriscoMovers.info.

Of the 3 leagues, the Texas League draws the highest these days. The Texas League pulled in an average of 5,264 per game in 2010. It must be pointed out, though, that 3 of the 8 teams in the Texas League come from pretty large metropolitan areas (the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex; San Antonio, Texas; and Tulsa, Oklahoma). That being said, no one has ever called Springfield, Missouri or Corpus Christi, Texas large cities – and the Springfield Cardinals and the Corpus Christi Hooks (an Astros farm team) both draw above 5,000 per game. Both these two Texas League teams share the marketing advantage of being a farm team of a relatively close-by MLB team – Springfield, MO {metro population ~430,000) is 191 miles south-west of the St. Louis Cardinals in St. Louis, MO; and Corpus Christi, TX (metro population ~431,000) is 184 miles south-west of the Houston Astros in Houston, TX.

The Frisco Roughriders, a Texas Rangers farm team, are extremely close-by their parent-club. Frisco is located 23 miles north of Dallas, and 34 miles from the Texas Rangers’ home in Arlington, TX. The Frisco RoughRiders drew the highest of all 30 Double-A teams in 2010, pulling in 7,886 per game. That is now the sixth-straight year that the Frisco RoughRiders led all 30 Double-A teams in average attendance. Furthermore, Frisco had a higher average attendance than 20 of the 30 Triple-A teams last year, and had the 12th-highest average attendance among all minor league teams in 2010 [Note: list of entire 2010 minor league teams' average attendances (334 teams) is linked to at the end of this post.]. The second highest-drawing Texas League team in 2010 was the Tulsa Drillers – a Colorado Rockies farm team, who drew 6,185 per game last season.

The Eastern League draws the second-best of the 3 leagues, with an average of 4,663 per game in 2010. Like the Texas League, the Eastern League also has some pretty large metro areas, including the Greater Washington, DC/Baltimore, MD metro area (where the Bowie Baysox of Bowie, Maryland come from); the Greater Cleveland/Akron, Ohio metro area (where the Akron Aeros come from); the Greater Richmond, Virginia metro area (where the Richmond Flying Squirrels come from); and the Greater Hartford, Connecticut metro area (where the New Britain Rock Cats come from). Also, like the Texas League, there are several mid-sized cities in the Eastern League with 300,000 to 600,000 metro areas (4 teams). Unlike the Texas League, the Eastern League has teams that come from small cities with metro areas lower than 300,000 (4 teams).

In the Eastern League there is a factor that on first glance might seem to deflate attendances but seems to increase fan interest and attendance. That is the fact that every Eastern League ball club is within less than a 2-hours’ drive to one or more Major League ball clubs, with the exception of the Binghampton Mets (who are about 2 and a half hours away from the New York Yankees and about 3 hours away from their parent-club, the New York Mets). The near proximity to MLB teams that Eastern League teams have does not seem to depress attendances, especially when you compare gate figures with the lower drawing Southern League. I think easy proximity to an expensive outing at, say Fenway Park (home of MLB’s Boston Red Sox), encourages many folks in New England to instead follow the Red Sox on television and actually go to a ball game in Manchester, NH or New Britain, CT, or Portland, ME – for about one-quarter of the expense. But the Eastern League’s decent gate figures despite being surrounded by so many Major League teams might be more a case of the fact that sports fans in the Deep South don’t really follow baseball as much as sports fans in the Northeast do.

Having said that, it is ironic that the Eastern League’s best-drawing team last season was a team from the South – the brand-new ball club called the Richmond Flying Squirrels – a San Francisco Giants farm team, who drew 6,626 per game. [The Richmond team came from Norwich, CT, where they were a NY Yankees affiliate. They moved to Richmond, filling the gap left when the city of Richmond lost their Triple-A team after the 2009 season, when the Atlanta Braves moved their Triple-A team to Gwinnett, Georgia - a county adjacent to Atlanta.] The Reading Phillies are the second-best drawing Eastern League team. Reading pulled in 6,615 per game last season. The Reading/Philadelphia Phillies’ partnership has gone on for 45 consecutive seasons, and the Reading Phillies now have one of the two longest-running-affiliations with one Major League ball club (the other 45-year partnership is the affiliation of the Lakeland Tigers of the Class-A Florida League with the Detroit Tigers). [The previous longest-running affiliation was the Appalachian League (Rookie League) Bluefield Orioles with the Baltimore Orioles, which lasted 53 years, from 1958 to 2010. The Bluefield Blue Jays, as they are now known, were dropped by Baltimore over the winter and are now part of the Toronto Blue Jays farm system].

With teams such the Reading Phillies and the Frisco RoughRiders, MLB teams have seen the synergistic effect of placing a minor league farm team close to the parent-club’s location – Reading, Pennsylvania is just 47 miles west of Philadelphia. Other Eastern League teams that drew above 5,000 per game last season were the Portland (Maine) Sea Dogs – a Red Sox farm team (that is 99 miles north-east of Fenway Park); the New Hampshire Fisher Cats – who are a Toronto Blue Jays farm team; the New Britain Rock Cats – who are a Minnesota Twins farm team; and the Trenton Thunder, a New York Yankees farm team (that is 64 miles south-west of Yankee Stadium).

The Southern League draws the lowest of the three Double-A leagues, averaging 3,188 per game in 2010. Southern League ball clubs generally come from 400K to 600K metro-areas, with 3 locations – Jacksonville, FL (the Jacksonville Suns); Birmingham, Alabama (the Birmingham Bulls); and Raleigh/Durham, NC (the Carolina Mudcats) being the only relatively large-sized metro-areas in the Southern League. The only Major League team at all close-by for 90% of the teams in the Southern League is the Atlanta Braves, with the exception of the western Tennessee team called the Jackson Generals being closer to St. Louis than it is Atlanta. Jackson, TN is also the smallest Double-A city, with a metro population of around just 107,000. Even the Jacksonville Suns are closer to Atlanta than their parent-clubs’ location in Miami, Florida. The Jacksonville Suns, a Florida Marlins farm team, were the highest-drawing Southern League team last season, drawing 5,141 per game.
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In the following weeks, I will have posts on each of the 3 Double-A leagues, with ball club profiles including ballpark photos and metro-area populations.
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Here is an interesting list, from the Ballpark Digest site, ‘2010 Baseball Attendance by Average [Minor Leagues]‘.
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Thanks to the contributors to the pages at en.wikipedia.org, ‘Minor league baseball‘.

Attendance figures from NumberTamer.com/ -Numbertamer.com’s Minor League Baseball – 2010 attendance analysis [pdf] (Note, league attendances begin on page 28 of the 60 page pdf.)

Comments (8)

April 6, 2011

Argentina, 2011 Clausura.

Filed under: Argentina — admin @ 4:59 pm

Map of Primera División de Argentina – 2011 Clausura

Hasta El Gol Siempre [Argentina football coverage from Sam Kelly].

Primera División de de Argentina table {Soccerway.com).
2010 Aperuta champions were Estudiantes de La Plata. In the 2011 Apertura, eight rounds (of 19) have been played, and Estudiantes again have the lead, albeit by goal difference over River Plate. River have not won a title since the 2008 Clausura, and are coming off a good 4th place finish in December, yet so bad have they been in the previous two seasons that los Millionarios must still concern themselves with the relegation table (more on that later). Six other clubs are within touching distance of first place, including two, Vélez Sarsfield, and San Lorenzo, who would go top if they won their game in hand. In other words, it is shaping up for another tight, wide-open, and interesting campaign in Argentina.
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The maps on the map page show the locations of the 20 clubs in the 2011 Clausura of the Primera División de Argentina. 4 of the clubs’ crests are shown on the main map, and 16 of the clubs’ crests are shown on the inset map of northern Buenos Aires Province which is centererd on the Greater Buenos Aires metropolitan area and the autonomous city of Buenos Aires. Each club’s profile box shows the club crest, the club’s current kits, and information on the club including – year of formation, location; stadium name and capacity; national professional titles (and year of last title); Copa Libertadores titles (and year of last title); total appearances in the Copa Libertadores competition (and year and result of their last appearance); the length of consecutive seasons the club has currently spent in the first division (and year the club was last promoted); and where the club finished last December in the 2010 Apertura.

The enlarged inset map of the northern region of Buenos Aires Province includes the autonomous city of Buenos Aires [which is a Federal District similar to Washington, DC in terms of it's political status]. Usually around 70% to 80% or so of the top flight clubs in Argentina are from this concentrated region – that is…the autonomous city of Buenos Aires (7 clubs currently), Greater Buenos Aires (7 other clubs currently), and the nearby city of La Plata (2 clubs currently). For the 2010-11 season (ie, the 2010 Apertura and the 2011 Clausura), 16 of the 20 clubs come from this region. All Argentine professional titles have been won by clubs from this region, with the exception of the 9 titles won by two clubs from the city of Rosario, Santa Fe Province (those two clubs being Newell’s Old Boys, with 5 titles; and the currently-second-division-club Rosario Central, with 4 titles). Speaking of the title drought suffered by the other provinces, I should mention the recent rise of an Argentinian club that is pretty far removed geographically from Buenos Aires, and that is Godoy Cruz, who hail from the far western province of Mendoza, which is way closer to Santiago, Chile than it is to Buenos Aires. Godoy Cruz made a credible run for the title a year ago, in the 2010 Clausura (finishing in 3rd place, 4 points behind champions Argentinos Juniors), and are again in competition for their first-ever national title. Godoy Cruz are also playing in their first-ever Copa Libertadores, and have a chance of advancing to the Round of 16 (if they win in Quito, Ecuador next week versus LDU Quito [note: they lost, and are now eliminated from the 2011 Copa Libertadores, along with Independiente]).
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There are structural aspects which make Argentinian top flight football unusual…the split season that produces 2 champions per season, and the 3-year average which comprises the relegation process.

As to the split season, a random element is introduced when a championship is decided based on a schedule where a club plays the other clubs just once (and not twice, as is of course the usual case). The bottom line is that the competition becomes very wide-open. Eleven different clubs have won a title in the last 10 years in Argentina, and two clubs have won their first-ever championships.

Primera División de Argentina recent title winners, since 2001-02 (the last ten seasons/ and the last 20 championships)..
11 different title winners
Boca Juniors, 4 titles (last in 2008 Apertura).
River Plate, 4 titles (last in 2008 Clausura).
Estudiantes, 2 titles (last in 2010 Apertura).
Vélez Sarsfield, 2 titles (last in 2009 Clausura).
Argentinos Juniors, 1 title (2010 Clausura).
Banfield, 1 title (2009 Apertura).
Lanús, 1 title (2007 Apertura).
San Lorenzo, 1 title (2007 Clausura).
Newell’s Old Boys, 1 title (2004 Apertura).
Independiente, 1 title (2002 Apertura).
Racing, 1 title (2001 Apertura).

Clubs that won their first National title in the last 10 seasons…
Lanús.
Banfield.

{2010-11 Primera División de Argentina Relegtion table, aka the Promedio here (en.wikipedia.org)}.

As to the other aspect of Argentine top flight football that makes it stand apart from most other first division leagues – the Promedio, or 3-season relegation table – there is no way on earth that I am going to defend this cynical system. It is by definition ant-democratic, because it rewards the status quo and creates a non-level playing field for top flight survival. It has been said that the three-year average as a basis for relegation was introduced in 1983-84 because both Boca Juniors and River Plate were under threat of relegation then (the old fashioned way). Since relegation is now decided on a 3-year average, it makes it much harder for newly-promoted teams to stay in the first division. The big clubs love it, because one bad year is not going to send them down, and they don’t have to worry about unloading too much young talent to European clubs, and then suffer a bad season, because there will be future seasons where they can bring their points average back up above the drop zone. None of the Big 5 – Boca Juniors, Independiente, Racing, River Plate, and San Lorenzo – have gone down since the Promedio system was introduced in 1983-84. The 3-year average as a basis for relegation is grossly unfair to small and often provincial clubs, who battle to finally get a chance in top flight football, only to see themselves go straight back down because they didn’t finish in or near the top half of the table. This season all three recently-promoted clubs – Quilmes, All Boys, and Olimpo – might suffer relegation, and for more than one of these clubs it will probably be because of the Promedio. Olimpo, a club from the southern, and much colder, region of Buenos Aires Province, has seen this before. In 2007-08, Olimpo finished in 16th place in the 2007 Apertura, and then 15th place in the 2008 Clausura – and were relegated. That showing would have kept them up in most any other country. In 2006-07, the aforementioned Godoy Cruz ended up with 43 points (when the 2006 Apertura and the 2007 Clausura points were added together), which was better than the points total that season of 5 other teams…Banfield, Belgrano, Gimnasia La Plata, Newell’s Old Boys, and Quilmes- and Godoy Cruz were still relegated, thanks to the three-year average [Godoy Cruz gained promotion back to the Primera División the following season (2007-08)].

A 3-year system of relegation, as opposed to a one-year system of relegation, rewards entrenched interests who have gained competitive advantage over other less powerful interests by fiat, so that the less powerful interests must therefore overachieve to stay on an equal footing with the elite. It is no surprise that the only other prominent place a multi-season system of relegation in football has also been adopted is in Mexico, where the elite have been stacking the deck against the disenfranchised for centuries.
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Meanwhile, at this time of the season, when the Clausura campaign is starting to shape up, there is the fact that 4 or 5 clubs must juggle their league campaign with their Copa Libertadores campaign. That can stretch thin a club’s resources and negate a real chance at a Clausura title. In the 20 seasons since the Apertura/Clausura league system has been instituted, no Argentine club has ever won a Clausura title and a Copa Libertadores title simultaneosly.

The 5 Argentine clubs in the 2011 Copa Libertadores Second Stage [ie, the group stage]…
Argentinos Juniors [final match at home v. Fluminense on Wed. 20 April - in contention for advancement {see this}],
Estudiantes [Advanced to Round of 16 as 2nd place in Group],
Godoy Cruz [eliminated in Second Stage],
Independiente [eliminated in Second Stage],
Vélez Sarsfield [Advanced to Round of 16 as 2nd place in Group].

Independiente, the club that has won the most Copa Libertadores titles, with 7, has a third thing which the club must concern itself with – the threat of relegation. Independiente would probably be in a much better position if they weren’t also in the Copa Libertadores, but there you have it – in Argentina, a club can simultaneously be in the final 32 of the most prestigious competition in South America, yet still be around only two bad results away from being relegated to the second division. Independiente find themselves in this situation after stretching their squad in their successful 2010 Copa Sudamericana campaign, which, as winners, secured their place in the 2011 Copa Libertadores. But in concentrating so much on gaining admission to the Copa Libertadores, Independiente finished in last place in the 2010 Apertura, and are now in the bottom third of the current Promedio table.
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Thanks to the contributors to the pages at en.wikipedia.org, ‘Primera División de Argentina‘.
Thanks to RSSSF, and the contributors to this list, ‘Copa Libertadores 1960-2010 Club Histories‘.
Thanks to NordNordWest for the blank map of Argentina, here (en.wikipedia.org).

Comments (1)

March 31, 2011

Major League Baseball: Attendance map for 2010 regular season, with percent changes from 2009, and percent capacities.

Filed under: Baseball,Baseball >paid-attendance — admin @ 9:05 am

2010 MLB attendance map

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Please note: to see the most recent MLB paid-attendance map-and-post, click on the following: category: Baseball >paid-attendance.
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On the far left of the map page you will find, for all 30 MLB teams, four statistics – A). 2010 attendance figures (for home, regular season games). B). 2010 versus 2009 percentage change in average attendance. C). Ballpark seating capacity. D). 2010 percent capacity [average attendance divided by ballpark capacity].

The map shows each ball club’s location, and their home cap. Each cap is sized to reflect the ball club’s 2010 average attendance.
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From the Biz of Baseball site, from March 29, 2011, by Maury Brown, ‘Is MLB Poised to see an Attendance Rebound in 2011?‘.

The New York Yankees drew the highest in 2010, supplanting 2009 attendance leaders the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Dodgers had an off-season, and attendance plummeted -5.3 %. Before the New York Yankees new stadium was built (and their capacity shrunk from 56,936 to 50,086), the Yanks were average attendance leaders year-in, year-out for a five-year period (from 2004 to 2008). Before that, the Seattle Mariners were the best-drawing ballclub, from 2001 to 2003. And if that is not surprising enough in context of where the Mariners are today (Seattle was the 19th best draw in the Major Leagues in 2010), then how about the fact that a decade ago, in 2000, the best-drawing ballclub in North America was the now-hapless Cleveland Indians {see this, 2000 MLB attendance, from Baseball-reference.com}. The Cleveland Indians have gone from the best-drawing MLB team to the worst-drawing MLB team in the space of 10 years.

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The largest percentage increase from 2009 to 2010 was with the Minnesota Twins, who had a 35.1 % increase. Second best percentage increase was the 17.9 % increase at the turnstiles that the Cincinnati Reds produced. Third highest increase was the 11.9 % produced by the Texas Rangers. All three of those teams had playoff-qualifying seasons. For the Twins, both playing in their brand new Target Field and being in yet another playoff run contributed to a 100.1% capacity. That made Minnesota one of 3 teams in Major League Baseball to play to full capacity in 2010 [the other two were the Philadelphia Phillies and the Boston Red Sox].

Minnesota ended up with an average attendance of 39,798 per game – which was 10,332 per game higher than the Twins drew in 2009 in their last season at the dreary Metro Dome. Minnesota had the sixth-best average attendance in Major League Baseball last season. Listed below are the top 10 draws in MLB last year.

Here are the top 10 highest-drawing teams in Major League Baseball in 2010…
1. New York Yankees, 46,091 per game (92.0 % capacity); up +0.4 perecent from 2009.
2. Philadelphia Phillies, 45,027 per game (103.2 % capacity); up +1.3 percent from 2009.
3. Los Angeles Dodgers, 43,979 per game (78.5 % capacity); down -5.3% from 2009.
4. St. Louis Cardinals, 40,755 per game (92.7 % capacity); down -1.7 percent from 2009.
5. Los Angeles Angels, 40,133 per game (89.1 % capacity); up +0.3 percent from 2009.
6. Minnesota Twins, 39,798 per game (100.1 % capacity); up +35.1 percent from 2009.
7. Chicago Cubs, 37,814 per game (91.9 % capacity); down – 4.5 percent from 2009.
8. Boston Red Sox, 37,610 per game (100.6 % capacity); down -0.5 perecent from 2009.
9. San Francisco Giants, 37,499 per game (89.5 % capacity); up +6.2 percent from 2009.
10. Colorado Rockies, 35,940 (71.3 % capacity); up +9.2 percent from 2009.
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Thanks to ESPN, for attendances, here.
Thanks to MLB.com/shop, for ball cap photos.

Comments (6)

March 26, 2011

Baseball in Mexico: Liga Mexicana de Béisbol (Mexican League), 2011.

Filed under: Baseball,Baseball: MiLB Triple-A,Mexico: Béisbol — admin @ 4:04 pm

[Note: to see my most-recent post on Mexican League baseball, click on the following: category: Mexico: Béisbol.

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Click on image below for full map page of the Mexican League...

Mexican League
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On the map...
On the map page, each team's profile box includes the team's year of formation, their ballpark and capacity, and their Mexican league titles (and year of last title). The team's home and away uniforms are also shown. At the lower left of the map of Mexico is the 2010 final standings and playoff results, and next to that is 2010 Mexican League teams' average home attendances.

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The Mexican League is one of 3 Triple-A minor leagues in Organized Baseball. Unlike the other two Triple-A leagues, which are: the Pacific Coast League (based in the west and midwest of the USA), and the International League (based in the east and midwest of the USA), the Mexican League's teams are not affiliated with any of the 30 Major League Baseball clubs. In fact, the Mexican League has three minor leagues of its own, the Liga Norte de Mexico, the Liga de Beisbol del Noroeste de Mexico, and the Liga de Mexicana de Beisbol Academia (a winter league). The season is scheduled for 104 games, and runs from the middle of March, to mid-July, with the playoffs in late July/early August, then, in mid-August, the Serie Final (Final Series).

The Mexican League was founded in 1925, with 6 teams. The only original team that has survived to this day are Águilas Rojos de Veracruz (Veracruz Red Eagles), although there was a Mexico City team back then, and there is now a different, present-day Mexico City team - Diablos Rojos del México (Mexico City Red Devils), who were formed in 1940 and have won the most Mexican League titles, with 15 (their last title in 2008).
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By the late 1930s, and into the 1940s, the Mexican League began to attract, via lucrative contracts and a more racially-tolerant atmosphere, a large contingent of top players from the Negro Leagues in America. Among the Negro League stars that crossed the border to play in Mexico were 'Satchel' Paige, Josh Gibson, 'Cool Papa' Bell and Ray Dandridge (all Baseball Hall of Fame members). During this era, Cuban-born players also arrived in numbers to play in the Mexican League. The combined effect of this was that Mexican-born players were pushed aside, as only a few, such as Angel Castro and Jesus Valenzuela, were competitive with the Negro League and Cuban players. And in 1946, white MLB players like Sal 'the Barber' Maglie and Hal Lanier were lured to play south of the border by fat contracts. But MLB put a stop to this with legal action in 1948, and at this point in time, with the 1947 breaking of the color barrier by Jackie Robinson, top drawer black ballplayers were able to join MLB teams, so the Mexican League ceased being a viable option. By the mid-1950s, the Mexican League was in dire financial straits. New owners in the ranks were instrumental in making the league part of Organized Baseball in the USA, first as a Double-A minor league circuit, then in 1967, the Mexican League became a Triple-A league.
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Currently, there are 14 teams in the Mexican League (down from 16 teams in 2010). 2010 (and 2009) champions were Seraperos de Saltillo (Saltillo Serape Makers), who beat Pericos de Puebla (Puebla Parrots) 4 games to 1 in the 2010 Serie Final.
From Baseball de World.com, from 17 August, 2010, "Saltillo Seraperos Capture LMB Crown'.
From PitLane.mx, Agosto 18, 2010, 'Los bicampeones del beisbol mexicano...'

Photo credits - llbmexico.com Seraperos de Saltillo site. MinorLeagueBaseball.com/Travis Minix stats. PitLane.mx. Bing.com/maps.

Saltillo is the capital city of the state of Coahuila in northern Mexico, south and west of the southern panhandle of Texas, and 240 mi. (400 km.) west of Monterrey. Saltillo has a metro area population of around 725,000 {2005 census figure}. Its most famous exports are Saltillo tile, and the locally-woven, multi-colored zarapes (serapes). Saltillo has a sizable auto industry, with a GM assembly plant, a Chrysler truck assembly plant, and two engine facillities. I wouldn't say Saltillo is the Detroit of Mexico (with Saltillo boasting more scenic beauty and less urban decay), but 37% of the cars and 62% of the trucks produced in Mexico are assembled in Saltillo. The Saltillo Serape Makers draw pretty well by current Mexican League standards, pulling in 5,272 per game 2 seasons ago, and, 4,946 in 2010, when they just barely made it into the 8-team playoffs, but then over-achieved in the post-season, going on to win their second consecutive title. Saltillo actually drew in to the 10,000s in 2005 and 2006, and in the 9,000s in 2007. Within that time period, another nearby team, 9-time-title-winners Sultanes de Monterrey (Monterrey Sultans), were drawing 17,990 per game in 2006, 9,639 per game in 2007 when Monterrey won the title, and 12,424 per game in 2008. But owing to the global economic collapse in late 2008, Mexican League attendances plummeted in 2009 and 2010, pretty much across the board, with turnstile increases only in teams that were doing well that season, such as with the 2010 Zona Norte first-place Mexico City Red Devils, with a +1,641 per game increase (to 5,280 per game), and the 2010 Monterrey Sultans (who had the fourth-best record in 2010), with a +2,013 per game increase (to 6,731 per game). You can see just how bad the poor economy has affected Mexican baseball's drawing power, because Monterrey's average attendance last season was only 37% of what it was just 5 years ago. And the Mexican League's last expansion - in 2003, when it added 2 teams to make a 16-team league - that has been wiped away with the off-season demise of the Chihuahua Dorados and the Nuevo Laredo Owls.
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Below is the list of Mexican League titles won by active ball clubs...

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The Mexican League teams that make up the 2 divisions of -Zona Norte (North Division) and Zona Sul (South Division)

There is a cluster of 5 Mexican League teams in the north-east region of Mexico just south and west of Texas, including the aforementioned Saltillo Serape Makers and Monterrey Sultans. The other 3 teams in this cluster are Acereros de Monclova (Monclova Steelers), Vaqueros Laguna (Laguna Cowboys), and Broncos de Reynosa (Reynosa Broncos). Monclova Steelers have no titles, but draw well (highest attendance in 2009 at 8,114 per game; and 2nd highest draw at 5,304 per game last season). Laguna Cowboys also have no titles, and draw OK (6,014 per game 2 years ago). Reynosa is a city in the state of Tamaulipais, which is home to many of the foreign-owned factories known as the maquiladoras. Reynosa have 1 title to the franchise, but that was the first version of the team (which existed in the Mexican League from 1963 to 1976, and won the 1969 title). This third-version Reynosa Broncos (III) team came from Tijuana in 2009, as Potros de Tijuana (Tijuana Colts), who drew 8,361 per game in 2007, but 2 years later went bust, and were shipped by the league to Reynosa, Tamaulipas to re-start the Broncos franchise. (Basically they pulled a maneuver similar to what the Cleveland Browns (NFL) did, and contravened actual franchise-shift history and adopted the stats and titles of the old team. In other words, the Reynosa ball club are pretending they own the title that a previous Reynosa ball club won.) These 5 teams plus the aforementioned Mexico City and Puebla teams make up the Zona Norte. Puebla Parrots have won the fourth-most titles, with 4 titles (their last in 1986). Puebla moved over from the Zona Sur in the off-season to re-balance the league after the 2 teams dropped out. Now that those two teams (Nuevo Laredo and Chihuahua) are gone, the present Zona Norte teams look to have a considerably higher drawing power than the present Zona Sul teams.

The Zona Sul is made up of 5 teams which are strung out along the southern Gulf of Mexico coast, one team in the interior south of the capital, and one team on the coast facing the Caribbean. That last ball club is Tigres de Quintana Roo (Quintana Roo Tigers), of Cancún, Quintana Roo state, who are tied with Monterrey for the second-most titles, with 9 (their last title in 2005). The Tigres de Quintana Roo/Diablos Rojos de México rivalry is the biggest rivalry in Mexican baseball. The Zona Sul team from the interior is Guerreros de Oaxaca (Oaxaca Warriors), who moved from Mexico's second-largest city, Guadalajara, in 1996. Two years later, in 1998, Oaxaca won the title. The other 5 teams in Zona Sul are...the venerable but 40-years-on-without-a-title Veracruz Red Eagles; the title-less and least-supported Petroleros de Minatitlán (Minatitlán Oilers); one-time-title-winner (1993 title) Olmecas de Tabasco (Tabasco Olmecs); the perpetually cash-strapped/two-time title winners (last in 2004) Piratas de Campeche (Campeche Pirates); and the best-supported Zona Sul team, three-time title-winners Leones de Yucatán (Yucatán Lions), who won their third title in 2006. The Yucatán Lions' color scheme - dark green with orange trim - is an example of how in Mexican baseball, a considerable number of teams employ green, dark green, or teal as their primary color (5 teams), while the second-most popular primary color for a team is red (4 teams). This is like the colors of the Mexican flag. It's a counterpoint to the plethora of MLB teams in the USA who sport variations of the American flag's red, white, and blue [13 MLB teams total with variations/combinations of red-white-and-blue].
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Thanks to Baseball-Reference.com.
Saltillo ballpark at night from llbmexico.com
Thanks to the contributors to the pages at en.wikipedia.org, and es.wikipedia.org, ‘Mexican League (baseball)‘.
Liga Mexicana de Béisbol
For the blank map of Mexico, thanks to Sémhur at Wikimedia Commons, ‘Mexico states blank map svg‘.
Thanks to Ballparkdigest.com, for 2010 Mexican League attendances, here (all minor leagues’ 2010 average attendances). Thanks to The Biz of Baseball.com for 2009 attendances.

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March 20, 2011

2011 NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament, Regional Semifinals (aka the Sweet Sixteen) – 16 teams, with average attendances.

Filed under: NCAA Men's Basketball — admin @ 10:40 pm

2011 March Madness, Sweet Sixteen map

I wonder if there are any current examples of March Madness predictions all being correct up to the Sweet Sixteen right now – in other words, a still-perfect bracket. I saw where it was said there were 9.2 quintillion possibilities for possible winners in a 64-team bracket {see this}. Last year, on ESPN radio it was mentioned that after just the first 16 games (in the round of 64) were played, there were only 56 still-perfect brackets out of 4.8 million on-line brackets filled out – and that was after just 16 out of 16 games correctly picked. By this time in the tournament – the start of the Sweet Sixteen round – it’s 56 games you have to pick correctly, and it goes up to 60 games before the Regional Finals round (when there are 8 teams left). After that, there’s 7 more games. The total number of games in the tournament, counting the 2 Play-in games, is 65 games (for the 68-team field). The odds for a perfect bracket is one in 147,573,952,589,676,412,928 {see this, ‘”Perfectly Improbable: A flawless NCAA bracket“, by James A. Russell at the Kansas City Star}.
There are no documented cases of anyone ever filling out a perfect bracket.
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There are three states with 2 teams still alive…North Carolina, Virginia, and Wisconsin. The 2 teams from North Carolina are – the Duke Blue Devils and the North Carolina Tar Heels. The 2 teams from Virginia, both from the city of Richmond, are – the Richmond Spiders and the VCU Rams. The 2 teams from Wisconsin are – the Marquette Golden Eagles and the Wisconsin Badgers. The biggest upset was probably the #8th-seeded Butler Bulldogs (from Indianapolis, Indiana) over #1-seeded Pitt. But those two 11th-seed teams, Marquette and VCU also had big upsets over Syracuse and Purdue, respectively. This is VCU’s first appearance in the Sweet Sixteen.
Upsets in the 3rd Round (round of 32 teams) -
#11-seed Marquette Golden Eagles over #3-seed Syracuse, by 4 points.
#11-seed VCU Rams over #3-seed Purdue, by 18 points (!).
#10-seed Florida State Seminoles over #2-seed Notre Dame by 14 points (!).
#8-seed Butler Bulldogs over #1-seed Pitt, by 1 point.
#5-seed Arizona Wildcats over #4-seed Texas, by 1 point.
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Thanks to the contributors to the pages at en.wikipedia.org, ‘NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Championship‘.Attendances from NCAA.org, here

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March 18, 2011

2011 NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament, 3rd Round (32 teams), with team attendances.

Filed under: NCAA Men's Basketball — admin @ 9:19 pm

2011 March Madness map, round of 32

CBS Sports/College BK home.
ESPN/College Basketball home.

Photo credit- Justin Edmonds/Getty Images via sportsillustrated.cnn.com, here.

The big upset in the Second Round (round of 64) was in a match-up between two teams from Kentucky, with the #13-seeded Morehead State Eagles beating the #4-seeded Louisville Cardinals by one point, courtesy of a three-pointer with 5.4 seconds left by Morehead State senior guard Demonte Harper.
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I found out that, going by the accumulated 26-year Tournament history of all round of 64 pairings, there was about a 1-in-5 chance that a 13th-seeded team would defeat a 4th-seeded team. [the numbers being based on results since the Tournament expanded to a 64-team field, in 1985]. Statistically, it was a 21.15 percent chance that the #13 would beat the #4 seed. This section of the ‘NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Championship’ page at en.wikipedia has a list of all the outcomes of the round of 64 teams’ pairings…(‘First-round games/Upsets‘).

I decided to just go ahead and update that list to include the 2011 Second Round (round of 64) results.
Below is the List of results in terms of the Seedings in the modern-era/round of 64 teams, in the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament (1985-2011)…

As you can see, the results follow a mathematical curve with 2 deviations, or anomalies…
1). There are slightly less #5th-seeded teams winning over their #12th-seeded opponents than the next set of pairings (which is 6th seed vs. 11th seed).
2). An occurrence of the #9-seeded teams beating the #8-seeded teams more times in total (6 more times over 108 games).
My interpretation…
#5 vs. #12 anomaly – [The 12th-seeded teams beating their #5th-seeded opponents more times total than the next category (of 11th-seed vs. 6th-seed).] I would say that is just an example of how difficult it actually is to evaluate a team’s actual strength, and that in a few more seasons, that 12-seed-versus-5-seed statistical blip will even out (as it started to do this season, with only one of the four 12th-vs. 5th seed outcomes – Richmond over Vanderbilt – going to the 12th-seeded team).
#8 vs. #9 anomaly – How much difference, strength-wise, will there be between any given #8 team versus any given #9 team? There will be very little difference. So the psychological aspect then kicks in, with the players on the #9 team taking their slightly-lower status as a “diss”, and taking it out on their #8-seeded opponent, and pulling off a slight upset.
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First Round upsets…
#13-seed Morehead Eagles over # 4-seed Louisville, by 1 point.
#12-seed Richmond Spiders over #5-seed Vanderbilt, by 3 points.
#11-seed Gonzaga Bulldogs over #6-seed St. John’s, by 15 points.
#11-seed VCU Rams over #6-seed Georgetown, by 18 points (!).
#10-seed Florida State Seminoles over #7-seed Texas A&M, by 7 points.
#9-seed Illinois Fighting Illini over #8-seed UNLV, by 11 points.
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Here are some lowest-seeding milestones in NCAA Basketball Tournament history…
Lowest-seeded team to win an NCAA Basketball Tournament title – 8th-seeded Villanova Wildcats, in 1985.
Lowest-seeded team to make it to the Final Four – 11th-seeded LSU Tigers in 1986.
Lowest-seeded team to make the Regional Finals (aka Elite Eight) – Missouri Tigers in 2002.
Lowest-seeded team to make it to the Regional Semifinals (aka the Sweet Sixteen) – [tie] 14th seed – Cleveland State Vikings in 1986, and Chattanooga Mocs in 1997.
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Thanks to the contributors to the pages at en.wikipedia,org, ‘2010 NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Tournament‘.
Attendances from NCAA.org, here.

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March 16, 2011

2011 NCAA Basketball Tournament, Second Round map (64 teams), with team attendances.

Filed under: NCAA Men's Basketball — admin @ 8:56 pm

Click on image below for the full-page map of the ’2011 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament, Second Round (64 teams), with team attendances’…

2011 March Madness, Second Round map (32 teams)

CBS Sports/College BK home.
ESPN/College Basketball home.

I have to admit that I was so caught up in getting the 68-team Tournament map out as quickly as I could, that I failed to notice how the new expanded field of 68, and the Play-in games, have messed with traditional Tournament bracket pools and March Madness picks. That is because 4 of the 8 teams in the Play-in games are not 16th-seeds, but instead are 11th or 12th seeds. Most everyone who follows the NCAA Basketball Tournament knows no 16th seed has ever beaten a #1 seed, so putting 4 significantly higher seeds in the preliminaries, and having one of those games end close to midnight (Eastern Time), just over 12 hours before the 64-team field begins play the following day…well, that has turned the process of being in a Tournament bracket pool from a fun thing to something more like a chore. Because if you are serious about winning the bracket pool you’re in, you probably want to have that USC-or-VCU spot down correctly, and not just guess on it, since it looks like most Tournament bracket pools are by-passing the Play-in games, yet most Tournament bracket pools’ deadlines will still be on Thursday morning. That means the bracket-player on the East Coast who doesn’t want to risk starting the Tournament bracket pool already-one-result-wrong has to stay up until almost midnight, find out who won that last Play-in game, then rush to submit that bracket by the next morning. Like I said, it’s more like work than play now to be in a Tournament bracket pool – on the East Coast, at least. Why couldn’t the NCAA have the 11th and 12th seed Play-in games on Tuesday? I mean, they know how many people are involved in Tournament bracket pools. Who’s kidding who – bracket pools made the Tournament what it is today.
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The map shows the 64 team field. On the far right of the map page are all the 68 teams’ average attendances from last season (2009-10 season). [I would have listed 2010-11 average attendances, but the NCAA does not release the current-season attendance figures until May]. I decided to include the attendances of the 4 teams that were eliminated in the Play-in round…they are listed in light gray, and their logos have been removed from the map itself. In the next two maps – the map of Third Round (32 teams); and the map of the Regional Semifinals, aka Sweet Sixteen (16 teams), I will continue this procedure.
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Thanks to the contributors to the pages at en.wikipedia,org, ‘2010 NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Tournament‘.
Attendances from NCAA.org, here.

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March 13, 2011

2011 NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Tournament – the 68 teams, with list of all-time appearances by team.

Filed under: NCAA Men's Basketball — admin @ 5:50 pm

2011 March Madness map/all 68 teams
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The map page shows all 68 teams that have qualified for or have been selected for the 2011 NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament. The teams’ names, city or town location, and conference affiliation are listed at the far right. The map shows team locations. At the far left, all the teams are listed with respect to how many Tournament appearances they have made, all-time. Also in that list are each team’s previous appearance in the Tournament, and each team’s NCAA Basketball Tournament titles (with the year of their last title denoted).
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The states with the most teams in the 2011 Tournament are: Pennsylvania and Virginia.
The 5 Pennsylvania teams…Bucknell, Penn State, Pitt, Temple, and Villanova. The Bucknell Bison are from Lewisburg, which is in the sparsely-populated hills of east-central Pennsylvania, and has a population of just 5,620 {2000 figure}.
The 5 Virginia teams…George Mason, Hampton, Old Dominion, Richmond, and Virginia Commonwealth University. The VCU Rams and the Richmond Spiders are both from the city of Richmond, which has a city population of around 204,000 and a metro-area population of around 1.2 million {2010 figure}.
California, Indiana, North Carolina, Ohio, and Tennessee have 4 teams each in the Tournament.
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#1 seeds are:
Ohio State [in the East Region].
Kansas [in the Southwest Region].
Pittsburgh [in the Southeast region]
Duke [in the West Region].
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The newly-instituted Play-In games comprise 8 teams playing in 4 games over a two-day period, in Dayton, Ohio. The 8 Play-in teams/games are:
Tuesday -
UNC Asheville vs. Arkansas-Little Rock [16th-seeded teams].
UAB vs. Clemson [12th-seeded teams].

Wednesday -
Texas-San Antonio vs. Alabama State [11th-seeded teams].
USC ) vs. VCU [16th-seeded teams].
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First round begins at 12:15pm ET on Thursday, with the winner of the UAB/Clemson game vs. West Virginia. By Thursday morning, I will have a map of the field of 64, with 2010 average attendances for each team listed.
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Thanks to the Bracketology 101 blog.
Thanks to the contributors to the pages at en.wikipedia.org…
‘2011 NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Tournament‘.
‘NCAA Men’s Division I Tournament bids by school‘.

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March 10, 2011

2010-11 FA Cup, Sixth Round Proper, with match-ups.

Filed under: 2010-11 FA Cup,Football Stadia — admin @ 3:21 pm

FA Cup 6th Round

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Click on the box below to see the 4 match-ups, featuring profile boxes of each of the 8 clubs still alive in the 2010-11 FA Cup competition…

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BBC/FA Cup/ home.
Leading scorers on each club…
Arsenal – [tie] Samir Nasri (23 years old/born in Marseille, France) – 14 goals (9 LG; 1 FA; 2 LC; 2 EU), Robin van Persie (27 years old/born in Rotterdam, Netherlands) – 14 goals (10 LG; 1 FA; 2 LC; 2 EU).
Birmingham City – Nikola Zigic (30 years old/born in Backa Topola, Socialist Rep. of Serbia, FYR)- 8 goals (5 LG; 3 LC).
Bolton Wanderers – Johan Elmander (27 years old/born in Alingsas, Sweden) – 10 goals (9 LG; 1 FA).
Manchester City – Carlos Tévez (27 years old/born in Ciudadala, Greater Buenos Aires, Argentina) – 21 goals (18 LG; 3 FA).
Manchester United – Dimitar Berbatov (30 years old/born in Blagoevgrad, Bulgaria) – 19 goals (19 LG).
Reading – Shane Long (24 years old/born in Gortnahoe, Tipperary, Ireland) – 20 goals (18 LG [League Championship]; 2 FA).
Stoke City – [3-way tie] Robert Huth (26 years old/born in East Berlin, East Germany) – 7 goals (6 LG; 1 FA), Kenwyne Jones (26 years old/born in Point Fortin, Trinidad and Tobago) – 7 goals (5 LG; 2 LC), Jonathan Walters (27 years old/born in Birkenhead, Merseyside, England) – 7 goals (3 LG; 3 FA; 1 LC).
West Ham United – Carlton Cole (27 years old/born in Croydon, south London) – 11 goals (5 LG; 2 FA; 4 LC).
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FA Cup Sixth Round matches on television…
United Kingdom
Birmingham City v Bolton Wanderers, Saturday 12th March, 12:45pm GMT (ESPN-UK).
Manchester United v. Arsenal, Saturday 12th March, 5:15pm GMT (ITV-1).

Stoke City v West Ham United, Sunday 13th March, 2pm GMT (ITV-1).
Manchester City v Reading, Sunday 13th March, 4.45pm GMT (ESPN-UK).

United States and Canada
Birmingham City v. Bolton Wanderers, Saturday, March 12, 7:45am ET (Fox Soccer Plus).
Manchester United v. Arsenal, Saturday, March 12, 12:15pm ET (Fox Soccer Channel).

Stoke City v. West Ham United, Sunday, March 13, 10:00am ET (Fox Soccer Plus).
Manchester City v. Reading, Sunday, March 13, 12:45pm ET (Fox Soccer Channel).
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Here are the clubs that have made it to the FA Cup Sixth Round Proper for the second consecutive season…
Birmingham City
Reading
Stoke City.
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Photo credits -
Birmingham City/St. Andrews…Bing.com/maps/Bird’s Eye satellite view, here.
Bolton/Reebok Stadium… http://www.helibott.com/stadiums.html .
Manchester United/Old Trafford… http://www.manutdpics.com/prints-234/old-trafford-gallery.html .
Arsenal/Emirates Stadium… http://www.byrnegroup.co.uk/p/h/Projects/Emirates_Stadium/234/
Stoke City/Britania Stadium…Bing.com/maps/Bird’s Eye satellite view, here.
West Ham/Boleyn Ground [aka Upton Park]…Fussball Tempel.net (West Ham/Boleyn Ground photo).
Manchester City/City of Manchester Stadium [aka Eastlands]… The Sun.co.uk (Manchester City/Eastlands photo).
Reading/Madejski Stadium…Bing.com/maps/Bird’s eye satellite view, here.
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Thanks to Historical Football Kits site, for the kit illustrations, http://www.historicalkits.co.uk/
Thanks to ESPN Soccernet, for current attendance figures.
Thanks to the FA Cup silversmiths, Thomas Lyte Silver, for the photo of the FA Cup trophy, here.

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March 4, 2011

2010-11 UEFA Europa League, Knockout Phase – Round of 16, with match-ups.

Filed under: UEFA Cup / Europa League — admin @ 11:15 am

2010-11 UEFA Europa League, Round of 16

2010-11 UEFA Europa League Knockout Phase, Round of 16…1st Leg matches, on Thursday, 10 March – with 4 matches to kick off at 7:00 pm GMT (2:00 pm ET), and 4 matches to kick off at 9:05 pm GMT (4:05 pm ET) – fuxture list here (from UEFA.com).

Like I did with the 2010-11 Champions League Round of 16 {here}, besides the main map (which you can see by clicking on the image above, and features club crests sized to reflect 2009-10 average attendance from domestic home league matches), I have made two extra pages of material which show the match-ups, with profile boxes, of the 16 clubs still alive here. The profile boxes feature 2 stadium photos. If you want to see a larger image of any given photo, you can find the links to the photos in the Photo credits section at the bottom of this post.

The matchups/club ptofile boxes are split up into two separate pages – the first one shows the 4 fixtures that will be played first, on Thursday 10 March, at 7pm GMT. The second shows the 4 fixtures that will start 2 hours and five minutes later, at 9:05 pm GMT.

The following gif has the 4 match-ups featuring a 1st Leg game with a 7:00 pm GMT kick-off:
Bayer Leverkusen v. Villarreal CF.
SC Braga v. Liverpool.
PSV [Eindhoven] v. Rangers.
CSKA Moscow v. FC Porto.
Click on the rectangle below…

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The next gif has the 4 matches featuring a 1st Leg game with 9:05 pm GMT kick-off:
SL Benfica v. Paris Saint-Germain.
Dynamo Kyiv v. Manchester City.
FC Twente v. Zenit [St. Petersburg].
Ajax v. Spartak Moscow.
Click on the rectangle below…

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Photo credits (first gif) -
Bayer Leverkusen… Aerial photo of recently renovated and expanded BayArena from HansBoerner.de. Interior photo with fans’ banner of cartoon-superheroes-in-Leverkusen-garb by Christof Koepsel/Boingarts/Getty Images, from BleacherReport.com, here.
Villarreal…Interior photo of El Madrigal from VillarrealCF.es/gallery. Exterior photo of El Madrigal from BDfutbol.com.
Braga…Aerial image of Estádio Municipal de Braga [aka Estadio AXA] from Bing.com/maps/Bird’s Eye satellite view, here. Interior photo of Estádio Municipal de Braga, showing the sheer rock face of the quarry the stadium site was carved out of, by jorge-11 at Flicker.com, here.
Liverpool…Photo of the Anfield Kop from RedCardCity.com. Aerial photo of Anfield from FanZone.co.uk.
PSV…Aerial photo of Philips Stadion by FXL at en.wikipedia.org, here. Interior photo of Philips Stadion from PSVzeeland.nl.
Rangers…Interior photo of Ibrox by poity_uk at Flickr.com, here. Exterior photo of Ibrox from Football-Pictures.net, here.
CSKA Moscow…Luzhniki exterior, RussianMap.info. CSKA Fans by enot_female at Flickr.com.
Porto…Interior photo of Dragão from WN.com/FC Porto [Note: click on Images at top, then find the photo in the Porto image set in the 3rd row, center.]. Exterior of Dragão from Ticket4football.com.
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Photo credits (second gif)-
Benfica…Aerial image of Estádio da Luz from Bing.com/maps/Bird’s Eye satellite view, here. Interior photo from forums.ElectronicArts.co.uk, here [Scroll half way down page.].
PSG…PSG/Parc des Princes photo, from Boygues.com…here in full, city-wide view [which includes Eiffel Tower]. Photo of PSG fans releasing flares at Ultrasspirit.com.
Dynamo Kyiv…Lobanovsky exterior shot at article.wn.com, here [Click on Photos at top, and find Lobanovsky exterior photo in top row of Dynamo Kyiv football photo set.]. Fans’ banners photo at en.wikipedia.org, here, via White-blue.kiev.ua.
Manchester City…Aerial shot of City of Manchester Stadium [aka Eastlands] from TheSun.co.uk. Photo of City fans with scarves held above their heads next to a stadium scoreboard that is reminding everyone that Man U are not actually located within the city limits of Manchester, by David Rawcliffe at Propaganda-Photo.com.
Twente…Exterior photo of De Grolsch Veste from The StadiumConsultancy.com. Interior photo of fans at the article ‘Twente is landskampion‘, from NuPhoto.nl.
Zenit…Interior photo of Petrovsky stadium from Liveinternet.ru/images. Aerial photo from VictorProfessor.livejournal.com. Liveinternet.ru/images.
Ajax…Exterior photo of Amsterdam Arena from Football-Pictures.net, here. Interior photo from Soccergaming.net/forums, here.
Spartak Moscow…Exterior photo of Luzhniki Stadium at FSF.org.uk/ Ground Guide. Photo of Spartak fans’ banner with Michelangelo’s-god-passiing-spark-of-life-to-man motif, by Jose Luis Enchaufegui (aka high296) at Flickr.com, here.
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Thanks to the contributors to the pages at en.wikipedia.org, ‘2010-11 UEFA Europa League‘.
Thanks to E-F-S site, for attendance figures.
Thanks to EuropeanUltras.com, for having photo credits (which pointed me to PSVZeeland.nl).

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