A document released by Everton to support their new stadium planning application appears to suggest that Liverpool have double the number of fans in the city compared to their blue neighbours.
The question of city dominance is both a contested topic and a somewhat irrelevant one—without one club or the other having sustained support, the rivalry couldn’t exist in the way it does if one of the pair languished leagues further down.
Despite Everton at times doing their best to ensure that actually happens, both have remained a top-flight club over the years—and on the global scale, Liverpool’s dominance is absolute.
Boasting far more supporters worldwide, and an embarrassingly superior trophy haul—it’s 14 trophies and counting since the last time Everton enjoyed any silverware—there’s no question that Liverpool are the bigger club.
But that hasn’t stopped the Goodison Park club claiming local supremacy, with the self-styled “People’s Club” suggesting they have the backing of the city residents compared to the Reds.
However, in Everton‘s own planning application document, a survey concluded that “around half the sample considered themselves Liverpool Football Club supporters, and around a quarter considered themselves Everton supporters.”
In other words, the Reds have around a 2:1 advantage when it comes to local-based support.
The document, which was shared on Twitter by Dave Phillips, also states that the spread roughly correlates to the expected split across the city, suggesting that Everton themselves know they are in deficit in terms of attracting local fans.
In mitigation, the survey was based on speaking to around 2,000 people in the city centre, which while being a reasonable number, cannot definitively be said to be representative of a city of well over half a million people.
Should further surveys be undertaken and point to a similar spread, it would be logically concluded that this is indeed the rough split in the city.
Given recent successes by the Anfield club, that upper hand in attracting young, local supporters can expect to continue, many of whom in turn will go on to pass their passion and dedicated following to the next generation of Scousers.
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