The table depicts the distribution of European players by six distinct types of sports between 1999 to 2009, with 5-years intervals.
It is noticeable that football was consistently the prevalent sport, and yoga and golf, conversely, were the least appealing throughout. Another notable point is that most given sports witnessed an upward trend in players over the observed period, except for football and basketball, which exhibited decline.
Concerning the preferred sports in 1999 with figures over a quarter, it is evident that football maintained its leading position, notwithstanding experiencing a considerable plunge of 9%, finishing at 48% in 2009. This was followed by swimming, with an initial figure of 32%, it rose by a mere 2% by 2004 and remained stable until 2009. In contrast to basketball, the data demonstrated a gradual drop by 1% each five years, reaching 24% by the end of the timeframe.
Regarding the remaining categories, tennis witnessed a significant growth from a quarter to 30% in 2004, before increasing at a lesser extent of 3% by 2009. Next came with volleyball, it commenced at 17%, prior to rising by 3% in the first duration and then demonstrating a fall of 2%. Ultimately, yoga witnessed a plateau at one-tenth in the first five years and ascended to 13% in 2009, whereas golf, despite being the least popular with 8%, overtook yoga with 13% in 2004 and reached 17% by 2009.