As 'CROWDED HOUSES,' my look at attendances in European football, nears completion, here's another extract. This time it's the most successful fourth tier in the world, what started out as England's Division Four in 1958.

ENGLAND’S FOURTH

There has been a national fourth division (now bearing the ridiculous ‘EFL League Two’ title) in England since 1958 when the two existing regional third levels were merged, with the top half in each forming a national third division and the bottom half the fourth. Perhaps because of the way this was done, with some clubs falling into the bottom league very narrowly - in the Third North there was just two points difference between 12th (the cut-off point for the Third Division) and 17th - there has been a generous four promotion places available right from the start.

Nowadays the first three of the twenty-four teams go up automatically and clubs from 4th-7th play-off for the final spot. There has been automatic relegation from this level (and the Football League structure as a whole) since 1987 and currently the bottom two clubs go down automatically.

This makes for what is usually a highly competitive league, with many current members promoted from non-league in recent seasons. Highest crowd in 2015-16 was 18,746 for Portsmouth’s 2-1 defeat at home to Northampton Town while the lowest of 1,026 watched Morecambe defeat Dagenham & Redbridge 1-0.

The play-offs attracted six figures – just. 100,093 watched the five matches for an average of 20,019. There were huge disparities between the two semi-finals as the two best supported teams in the division – Portsmouth and Plymouth Argyle – drew 32,633 to their two games while the other tie involved the second worst supported team in the league – Accrington Stanley – and another not particularly well supported - AFC Wimbledon. Their two games were watched by a total of 9,504. AFC Wimbledon’s 2-0 victory over Argyle in the final attracted 57,956 to Wembley – almost 7,000 more than the League One play-off Final.

The initial Fourth Division season set an average of 7,698, which remains the best ever. The arbitrary cut-off for entry (effectively relegation) saw a diverse membership. Ten of the initial twenty-four clubs are no longer league members but another seven have since played in the top flight – three of them within a decade of starting out in the fourth tier. Three of the seven future top tier clubs have played in Europe.

The division established some notable attendance feats in its early years. In 1960-61 Crystal Palace established an all-time average high of 19,092. A crowd of 37,774 for their Good Friday 2-0 home defeat by Millwall set an individual match record for the division which at the time was also a world record for a fourth tier game – it has subsequently been overtaken by games in Brazil, Scotland and English fourth level play-offs.

Palace, along with Peterborough United and Oldham Athletic, averaged higher than any third tier club in England that season – a feat repeated by Brighton in 1964-65. The smallest ever crowd was 625 for Scarborough’s 4-2 home win over Wrexham on a Friday evening in December 1990 but it wasn’t even the league’s post-war worst as a third division match between Rochdale and Cambridge United was attended by just 588 in 1973-74. In fact the lowest level’s smallest gate is only the fifth worst in almost 130 years of league football. The worst seasonal average was 2,519 in 1984-85.

The 2016 play-off Final saw the second largest crowd ever for a fourth tier league game. Bristol Rovers and Shrewsbury Town established the record in the 2007 play-off Final when 61,589 – a new world record at this level - saw Rovers win 3-1. In 2015-16 the average came close to hitting the 5,000 mark last achieved in 2004. At 4,921 it was the second best figure since 1972. Occupancy was almost half, at 49.72%. It was a higher rate than thirty-four top divisions in Europe.

Despite the constant struggle to survive for many clubs, the English set-up has been a success over many decades. In 2015-16 it had a higher average attendance than thirty-two European top tiers and has been the best supported in Europe, if not the world, at this level every season since its inception bar one – 2012-13 when Rangers played in Scotland’s bottom tier.

2015-16 AVERAGES WITH % OCCUPANCY RATE IN BRACKETS

16443 (81.81) Portsmouth

9057 (55.27) Plymouth Argyle

8226 (80.44) Luton Town

8096 (67.40) Bristol Rovers

7211 (57.69) Oxford United

5332 (57.51) Leyton Orient

5279 (68.98) Northampton Town

5262 (54.72) Cambridge United

4860 (24.02) Notts County

4838 (26.95) Carlisle United

4169 (88.33) AFC Wimbledon

4008 (45.39) Exeter City

3984 (38.68) Wycombe Wanderers

3936 (40.72) Yeovil Town

3890 (49.66) Hartlepool United

3439 (42.01) Mansfield Town

3349 (48.40) Stevenage

3218 (38.98) York City

2731 (38.95) Newport County

2405 (40.11) Crawley Town

2358 (45.06) Barnet

1979 (32.56) Dagenham & Redbridge

1951 (38.58) Accrington Stanley

1572 (24.27) Morecambe

SEASONAL AVERAGES LEAGUE TWO

1958-59            7698

1959-60            7210

1960-61            7016

1961-62            6165

1962-63            5874

1963-64            5488

1964-65            6347

1965-66            5462

1966-67            5412

1967-68            6070

1968-69            5569

1969-70            5296

1970-71            5006

1971-72            4961

1972-73            3763

1973-74            3925

1974-75            3483

1975-76            3731

1976-77            3838

1977-78            4222

1978-79            4182

1979-80            4258

1980-81            3074    

1981-82            3621    

1982-83            2809

1983-84            2817

1984-85            2519

1985-86            2551

1986-87            3108

1987-88            3211

1988-89            3291

1989-90            3426

1990-91            3222    

1991-92            3393

1992-93            3339

1993-94            3417

1994-95            3374

1995-96            3560

1996-97            3373

1997-98            3201

1998-99            3813

1999-00            3916

2000-01            3915

2001-02            4379

2002-03            4458

2003-04            5390

2004-05            4502

2005-06            4194

2006-07            4133

2007-08            4337

2008-09            4175

2009-10            3855

2010-11            4175

2011-12            4406

2012-13            4389

2013-14            4351

2014-15            4686

2015-16            4921