Amy Hunt and Jakob Ingebrigtsen both delivered the kind of nights that stay with you. So why weren't more people there to see either of them at the European Champs on Monday night?

There were two performances on the opening night of the European Athletics Championships that will live long in the memory and neither of them had anywhere near the crowd they deserved.

The first was Amy Hunt's, out in front of the field in the women's 100m, timing her run to perfection to take the European title on home soil. The second was Jakob Ingebrigtsen's – the sight of a man who had not raced in almost a year hauling himself back through a 5000m field from somewhere near the back to somewhere near unbeatable. Different events, different disciplines, but the same feeling watching them: this is what a home championships is supposed to give you.

Yet Monday's evening session, the one with both of those finals in it plus shot put golds for Jessica Schilder and Leonardo Fabbri and a storming mixed 4x400m win for Norway, drew an official crowd of 13,623 into a stadium that usually holds 18,000 and this week 23,000 with the additional temporary seating. That is barely a thousand more than turned up for the morning's heats and qualifying. The back straight stand, in particular, looked like someone had forgotten to open it.

Steve Cram, on commentary as Hunt crossed the line, said what a lot of us were thinking in real time. "A little disappointing in terms of spectators, I have to say that," he said. "Particularly down the back straight there. There's not very many people at all in those stands."

Ingebrigtsen was a little more unforgiving when quizzed about it, saying: “We made the most out of it. The people who showed up are very enthusiastic. If the seats are packed with people who don’t care about it, that’s not great. But the people who were here live for the sport of athletics and they cheer for everyone and love to see us compete and that’s the most important part.”

It is not for lack of trying by the organisers, who have run a thorough marketing campaign for months and will point out, fairly, that Friday, Saturday and Sunday evening sessions are close to sold out. But the early sessions have been a different story and the finger of blame keeps landing on price. Category A seats in the main stand have gone for £110, category B for £90 – and, oddly, it is those seats that have sold better than the cheaper £60 and £40 tickets further round the ground. Add £22.50 for the park-and-ride, or a 45-minute walk if you opt for the cheaper £17.50 alternative, and an £18.50 barbecued pork roll if you fancy feeding yourself while you're there and you can see why some people who might have come along on a whim decided against it.

Hunt's agent, Nick Harwell, put it plainly on X after her win: "Crazy prices. Such a shame." Jenny Meadows, who coaches Keely Hodgkinson and Georgia Hunter Bell with her husband Trevor Painter, said much the same thing, adding that she'd heard from fans confused about parking and, in some cases, not even aware the championships were on at all. Sports broadcaster Sonja McLaughlan went further, pointing out that prices rise to £150 for the closing three days and that a sport rarely handed a free week on terrestrial television, without football to compete with, deserved better than a flat, sparse-looking stadium.

A Birmingham 2026 spokesperson pushed back with the numbers: 170,000 tickets sold, half of them at £30 or under, adult tickets starting at £10, and a £6.31 children's ticket for Friday morning named after Mondo Duplantis' world record. "Birmingham 2026 is delighted with ticket sales for the championships, which have far surpassed our targets," they said.

When Denise Lewis won heptathlon gold in front of a half-empty, rain-soaked Olympic Stadium in Sydney 26 years ago, it didn't matter so much, because she said "the right people were there". There is something to that. But Lewis, now UK Athletics president and watching all this unfold in her own city, will know better than most that a home championships is supposed to be about more than the right people. It's supposed to be about all the people – the ones who might wander down on a whim, see a British sprinter win gold and a Norwegian legend drag himself back from a year out and fall in love with this sport for the first time.

On Monday night, too many of those seats stayed empty for that to happen.