This World Cup has so far seen the lowest average attendance for group games since 2002 - but the stadiums are as packed to capacity as ever.

When Egypt took on Uruguay in the second game of this year’s World Cup people couldn’t help but notice more than a few empty seats at the Ekaterinburg Stadium.

The official attendance for that game was just 27,015, which worked out at 82 per cent of capacity.

That’s the lowest attendance for a group game since Slovakia v Paraguay at the 2010 World Cup when just 26,643 filled the 40,911 capacity Free State Stadium in Bloemfontein.

However, the Egypt-Uruguay game in Ekaterinburg appears to have been just a blip in the overall turnout for this summer’s tournament in Russia.

The group stages have so far had an average attendance of 47,324 at the time of writing.

That’s the lowest for a group stage since the 2002 World Cup in Japan and South Korea, but is also the sixth highest average for a first round group stage in World Cup history.

Year: Average attendance

1930: 24,630
1950: 32,231
1954: 24,145
1958: 22,277
1962: 23,554
1966: 46,159
1970: 46,343
1974: 47,396
1978: 39,383
1982: 38,776
1986: 39,049
1990: 45,278
1994: 67,413
1998: 43,012
2002: 40,965
2006: 51,617
2010: 47,600
2014: 51,133
2018: 47,324



The stadiums in Russia have been 98 per cent full on average.

Only one World Cup since Italia 90 has had a higher average than that - 2006.

Stadiums for that tournament were operating at 99 per cent capacity.

Year: Per cent capacity

1990: 78 per cent
1994: 97 per cent
1998: 95 per cent
2002: 81 per cent
2006: 99 per cent
2010: 90 per cent
2014: 98 per cent
2018: 98 per cent