Infographic: 2014 NRL Crowds and TV (Halfway Review)

We have tipped over the half way point of the 2014 NRL Season, so its time again to see how crowds and TV ratings are tracking over the 99 Games played thus far.

Dave Smith, NRL CEO, set the crowd average target at 16,500 in the ambition to grow the game. After 13 Rounds of the Telstra Premiership that target has been surpassed with an average of 16,617 walking through turnstiles across the country.

The 2013 NRL Premiers, the Sydney Roosters, are one of the most watched teams on Free-to-Air coverage featuring in 5 of the top 10 games in 2014. The Brisbane Broncos also feature heavily with a mass of Friday Night fixtures seeing them secure 4 of the top 10 games on Channel 9.

Over on Fox Sports, 2012 Premiers, the Melbourne Storm claimed the top two spots, including the highest rating Pay-TV game of the season against St. George Illawarra in Round 6.

While the Sydney Roosters hold top spot for FTA ratings, the Broncos lead the competition with an average home crowd of 35,869 after 6 fixtures at Suncorp Stadium. Second to them are South Sydney who's home ground in ANZ Stadium has seen an average crowd of 22,853 in the 6 games played.

Queensland lead the way on the crowd front with over 21,000 on average attending matches at Suncorp, 1300SMILES and Cbus Super Stadia. This is compared to only 16,090 in NSW fixtures after 57 games across the state.

Game I of State of Origin saw the highest ratings ever as over 4 million nationally tuned in to watch the NSW Blues take a 1-0 series lead for the first time in 11 years. Channel 9's Game II coverage could break these records again as the Blues hope to secure the Origin shield for the first time in 8 years.

Take a scroll through the infographic below and be sure to let us know what you think! We will revisit at the end of the season with a full summary with an animated infographic (Preview here)

Click here for a larger standalone version (4mb)