Almost 250,000 people attended this season’s Carabao Cup opening round fixtures, the highest number this century since the new format of the competition was introduced in 2001/02.

Round One’s cumulative attendance has increased by 45% compared to last season’s and is 39% higher than the average opening round attendance over the last 20 years.

Over 35,000 watched Leeds United beat Shrewsbury Town at Elland Road whilst over 15,000 saw Ipswich Town continue their solid start to the season with a victory over Bristol Rovers to see them through to Round Two.

One fixture in Round One still remains to be played with Queens Park Rangers hosting Norwich City on Wednesday 16 August.

The Sky Bet EFL also enjoyed a record opening weekend with over half a million supporters attending matches across the Championship, League One and League Two, making it the highest aggregate opening weekend attendance this century.

In the Sky Bet Championship, there was an impressive rise of 44.2% in attendances compared to the opening weekend of 2022/23 with 317,272 supporters attending across 12 fixtures.

EFL Chief Executive, Trevor Birch said: “Round One of the Carabao Cup has produced some great games, brilliant goals and shocks results and it’s great to see that fans are attending in such strong numbers to watch the Cup action unfold live.

“This large mid-week turnout follows a record-breaking start to the EFL season with over half a million supporters also enjoying the opening weekend, the highest number this century, which is a testament to the quality on the pitch, atmosphere in the stands and interest in EFL competitions.”