Finally, football has taken over India, claimed the FIFA U-17 World Cup's director of the Local Organising Committee, Javier Ceppi yesterday. "In the 36 group league matches, there were more than 800,000 people present in the stands over six cities. That averages around 23,000 people attending every match while India's matches had an average of 49,000 which is astonishing.
Javier Ceppi
The number is double of not only the last U-17 World Cup in Chile, but also bigger than the number of spectators who attended the group league matches of the ICC 2011 World Cup! It gives us immense satisfaction to compare this U-17 edition even with the senior World Cups. The tournament has brought something for the Indian crowd," said the Chilean. The ICC World Cup in India had an attendance record of 12,29,826 people, at an average of 25,098 people in 49 matches in the whole tournament.
