Former Premier League club had stadium bigger than Arsenal and Liverpool, hosted loudest ever gig, before being condemned

Charlton Athletic have been languishing down in League One for several seasons, with attendances showing steady decline.

Their average crowd at home last season was 13,436, a far cry from their capacity of 27,111.

As results slump on the pitch, those have dropped even further with fewer than 12,000 watching games at The Valley several times this season.

It is a far cry from the sellouts the club had during their Premier League years, where they expanded and renovated their stadium to be the biggest in south east London.

The club even wanted to expand that capacity to more than 40,000, before relegation from the top flight ended that dream.

The Valley is undoubtedly one of the best stadiums in the third tier of English football, but used to look very different.

The club could once upon a time boast about having one of the biggest grounds in world football.

The famous East Stand terrace was among the largest around and helped boost the capacity to well over 70,000.

Charlton’s record attendance is an incredible 75,031 for a 1938 fifth round FA Cup game against Aston Villa.

To put that into context, that is the 17th biggest crowd to attend a football match ever in the United Kingdom.

That is more than the record home attendances for Arsenal [73,707] and Liverpool [61,905], while Old Trafford’s capacity is currently at 74,310.

Jimmy Seed’s Addicks spent 15 years in top flight football, interrupted by the Second World War, and attracted huge crowds to The Valley before relegated to the second tier in 1957.

During that period, however, the club won their only major honour when they lifted the FA Cup in 1947.

Football was not the only attraction that drew huge crowds at The Valley, with The Who playing two famous gigs there in the 1970s.

Aro