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With the new Premiership 2003/2004 football season starting this weekend, traffic to football sites has increased by 33% in the last 12 weeks, now accounting for 0.94% of all Web traffic in the UK, according to Hitwise. The most visited football site is Football365.com, which accounted for 7.26% of football site traffic, and unsurprisingly the most visited club site is Manchester United.
Manchester United is also the most popular name in searches, with Real Madrid second following the departure of Mr Beckham last month. Chelsea fans have had good reason to check their club's site regularly of late, with daily news and speculation about the latest signings using the millions of new owner Roman Abramovich, but the site has climbed no higher than 9th, well below its Premiership position.
Anyone who has watched TV coverage of matches in the last year or two and wondered whether the frequent pictures of women in the crowd are just the cameraman's whim... think again: Hitwise demographics show that over 25% of site visitors are female. And whether or not you agree with Arsene Wenger's contention that the balance of power in the league is shifting towards London, the capital and SE account for a healthy 27% of visitors - 15% are from the traditionally football-crazy North West with smaller %s in other regions.
The most bookmarked football sites at present are fantasy football sites - the Sun's Dream Team site www.dreamteamfc.com is well in the lead with a 29% share of what Hitwise terms the 'Sports - Fantasy sector' - and is the 5th most visited football site overall, while the Telegraph is the top Fantasy site among the broadsheets. The average Sun Dream Team visitor spends 14 minutes and 28 seconds on the site making their team selections, however much they may have agonised over them offline first.
| Overall Football rank | Name | Domain | Market Share | Bookmarks |
| 3 | Manchester United | www.manutd.com | 3.10% | 1.34% |
| 4 | Liverpoolfc.tv | www.liverpoolfc.tv | 3.08% | 0.99% |
| 6 | Leeds United | www.leedsunited.com | 2.39% | 0.66% |
| 7 | Tottenham Hotspur FC | www.spurs.co.uk | 2.00% | 1.38% |
| 9 | Everton Football Club | www.evertonfc.tv | 1.61% | 0.48% |
| 10 | Manchester City Football Club | www.mcfc.co.uk | 1.60% | 0.78% |
| 11 | Arsenal.com | www.arsenal.com | 1.58% | 1.14% |
| 12 | West Ham United FC | www.whufc.com | 1.55% | .16% |
| 13 | Chelsea Football Club | www.chelseafc.co.uk | 1.49% | 1.28% |
| 15 | Southhampton FC | www.saintsfc.co.uk | 1.03% | 1.41% |
Most popular Football - Fantasy sites, week ending 9th August:
| Overall Football rank | Name | Domain | Market Share | Bookmarks | Average Session Time |
| 5 | Dream Team | www.dreamteamfc.com | 28.82% | 6.91% | 14:28 |
| 25 | Telegraph Fantasy Football | www.telegraphfantasyfootball.co.uk | 8.87% | 7.03% | 10:52 |
| 37 | Fantasy Premier League | fantasy.premierleague.com | 5.73% | 5.65% | 13:56 |
| 39 | The Times Fantasy Football | www.timesfantasyfootball.co.uk | 5.59% | 8.45% | 11:48 |
| 49 | Telegraph Fantasy Football Online | www.flfantasyfootball.com | 4.91% | 4.58% | 07:54 |
Most searched for football keywords*:
| Rank | Search Term | Share |
| 1 | manchester united | 3.32% |
| 2 | real madrid | 2.52% |
| 3 | liverpool fc | 2.40% |
| 4 | arsenal | 1.81% |
| 5 | leeds united | 1.47% |
| 6 | football transfers | 1.40% |
| 7 | man utd | 1.33% |
| 8 | chelsea fc | 1.21% |
| 9 | everton | 1.19% |
| 10 | newcastle united | 1.10% |
* based on a 12 week rolling period
Source for all tables: Hitwise, based on the behaviour of over 25 million global Internet users and how they interact with 300,000 websites across 150+ categories. See www.hitwise.co.uk for further details.
All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas unless otherwise stated.
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