Liverpool now the UK’s favourite football team – says new YouGov FootballIndex tracker

New tool also reveals the factors driving UK clubs’ popularity.

To mark the launch of our new tool – YouGov FootballIndex – we’ve ranked the UK’s favourite footballing sides.

Specifically, we asked members of the public to name their favourite football club and it’s good news for Premier League champions-in-waiting Liverpool FC who win with the support of 8.3% of the population.

That places them comfortably above traditional rivals Manchester United (see the top ten above). And while Manchester City may have reigned on the pitch last season, they come only fourth in our current rankings (which are taken as an average score over the last ten days), behind Chelsea in third.

So, what is YouGov FootballIndex?

Our new YouGov FootballIndex tool monitors the health of 40 British and European sides against 16 separate metrics, tracking the opinions of the British public every day.  Look at the chart below, for example, to see how Liverpool have widened the ‘favourite team’ gap on rivals Manchester United over the month of May.

As well as engagement metrics like Word of Mouth, Buzz and viewing habits, YouGov FootballIndex also tracks brand health. Users can gauge the public’s perceptions of clubs’ management, players and coaches, fan culture, tradition and their record of success – even the attractiveness of their football.

And as a vital component, YouGov FootballIndex reports on fan funnel metrics too. As well as asking the public about their favourite teams, it will tell you how aware the public is of a club, how likeable they consider it and their intentions to watch a match live. And all of this data can be filtered for age, gender, income, region, social grade and more.

That kind of functionality will not just allow clubs to see how popular they are but also what factors are contributing to their fan funnel. Take the chart below as an example.

It shows how Liverpool manage to combine having a large fan-base with being well-liked. But to the left of the chart, it also shows how pairs of teams like Wolves and Everton, Newcastle and Spurs and Manchester City and Arsenal each have similar sized fan-bases (measured by favourite club) but very different scores for likeability. And while Chelsea may be the third most favourite team in the UK, they are only the sixth most-liked team of our ten.

If your club wants to compete off the pitch as well as on it, YouGov FootballIndex is the tool for you.