The World’s Most Dangerous Spectator Sports

Risk of death or injury to participants has always been an unspoken draw card for some of the world’s most popular sporting events. From the circuses of Ancient Rome to the Extreme Sports of modern times, an understated bloodlust has often been an essential ingredient in a sport’s mass appeal.
However, what few sports fans know is that attending a live sports event, or even watching it on television can be a potentially fatal undertaking. Every year thousands of spectators around the world are relegated from the mortal coil while watching their favourite sports.

Football

Football is without a doubt the most dangerous spectator sport on the planet, claiming thousands of lives every year. The most obvious danger to football fans is the unfortunate tendency football stadiums have to collapse at inopportune moments, often leading survivors to initiate equally lethal stampedes.
However, a silent killer stalks the lounges of football fans around the world, with over 2000 football fans dying from football infarction each year in the United Kingdom alone. This hidden scourge is experienced as a massive heart attack brought on by extremely high pulse rates combined with low levels of fitness and under-oxygenated blood.

Baseball and Cricket

The two sports have been lumped together due to the fact that the killer in both cases is often the game’s highest scoring shot. With both games capable of putting even the most keen of supporters to sleep, a home run in baseball or a well struck six in cricket can be lethal when directed at the cranium of an inattentive fan.
The high levels of alcohol consumption over several hours by spectators of both these games adds to the body count, as fans become susceptible to the lethal combination of sunstroke and alcohol poisoning.

Motorsports

Motor racing fans suffer some of the more spectacular spectator injuries, with fans attending races at risk of terminal encounters with pieces of disintegrating motor vehicles. Rubber tires are often responsible for spectator deaths at races, and spectators seated close to the racetrack are at greatest risk of being struck by airborne debris.
Fans who gather to watch rally drivers in action are amongst those most likely to experience a lethal encounter with their sports heroes. The lack of traction on rally circuits, combined with the absence of protective barriers, means that loss of control by the driver can result in horrific accidents.

Basketball

The construction of high capacity basketball stadiums has led to tens of thousands of basketball fans being packed into a relatively small space. While a trip to a basketball game is unlikely to be lethal, spectators’ close proximity to the court has led to on-court brawls spilling over to the stands on more than one occasion.
In the case of the famous Pistons-Pacers brawl of 2004, the proximity of spectators to the players encouraged one dissatisfied fan to hurl a beer mug at Pacer’s player John Artest, for which he was promptly repaid with a beating at the hands of Artest, as a massive brawl erupted between players and crowd.

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