One of my favorite blogs does a lot of analysis based on Google search results for a location. I’m not equipped to do their level of analysis but I figured I could do something smaller to see if I could find any interesting patterns about sports in Australia. What I did was develop a list of the major metro areas in Australia based on a list on Wikipedia. I then searched for each city plus the term “Super 14″ or Socceroos. An example search: “Super 14″ Canberra. Next, I recorded the number of search results for each search. Having done that, I got the following results:
Socceroos more popular:
- Albury, New South Wales
- Ballarat, Victoria
- Bathurst, New South Wales
- Bendigo, Victoria
- Bunbury, Western Australia
- Bundaberg, Queensland
- Burnie, Tasmania
- Cairns, Queensland
- Canberra, Australian Capital Territory
- Coffs Harbour, New South Wales
- Devonport, Tasmania
- Dubbo, New South Wales
- Geelong, Victoria
- Geraldton, Western Australia
- Gladstone, Queensland
- Hervey Bay , Queensland
- Hobart, Tasmania
- Kalgoorlie, Western Australia
- La Trobe Valley, Victoria
- Launceston, Tasmania
- Lismore, New South Wales
- Mackay, Queensland
- Mandurah, Queensland
- Mildura, Victoria
- Nowra, New South Wales
- Orange, New South Wales
- Queanbeyan, New South Wales
- Rockhampton, Queensland
- Shepparton, Victoria
- Toowoomba, Queensland
- Townsville, Queensland
- Tweed, New South Wales
- Wagga Wagga, New South Wales
- Warrnambool, Victoria
- Wodonga, Victoria
- Wollongong, New South Wales
Super 14 more popular:
- Adelaide, South Australia
- Bomaderry, New South Wales
- Brisbane, Queensland
- Darwin, Northern Territory
- Gold Coast, Queensland
- Melbourne, Victoria
- Newcastle, New South Wales
- Perth, Western Australia
- Port Macquarie, New South Wales
- Sunshine, Queensland
- Sydney, New South Wales
- Tamworth, New South Wales
Socceroos and Super 14 equally popular:
- Boulder, Western Australia
It looks like regional patterns of liking rugby in Queensland and New South Wales hold up. Adelaide, Melbourne and Perth can probably be explained as being larger media markets where they have a number of newspapers covering national leagues and a large number of book makers in the area who promote their Super 14 related betting. Melbourne and Perth can probably also be explained as they both have teams. The absence of the Super 14 possessing team Canberra is likely a result of the Socceroos playing a number of games in Canberra, and the commitment of the government to supporting its national sides.
Boulder is something of an enigma. I cannot explain it. I searched for both later in the day and there was a 30 results difference that favored the Socceroos by 30 results.
I’m not sure what this means in terms of any larger patterns that could be discussed. It would need a larger sample of search terms to have real meaning about the comparative interest in soccer versus rugby. It is something I may consider doing in the future.