Fremantle chief executive Steve Rosich believes the club is set to defy its on-field struggles and post a profit for the 2018 season after setting a membership record.

The Dockers had 55,121 members as of yesterday.

“That is not only a record for the club and the first time we have gone past 55,000, it is in line with what we forecast for the 2018 season,” Rosich said.

He acknowledged that a rebuild presented challenges for the club.

The Dockers have lost their past three matches, will start Sunday’s game against Adelaide without suspended skipper Nat Fyfe and had their home crowd against North Melbourne affected by rain.

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There is the prospect of more wet weather for Sunday’s match.

But Rosich said when viewed in the context of the competition the Dockers remained in a strong financial position.

West Coast are the only club to generate higher membership and corporate revenue than Fremantle, while the club’s “net sponsorship return” was third in the competition behind only Sydney and Geelong, he said.

The shift to the new 60,000-seat Optus Stadium had been the catalyst.

“We had a very successful transition to the new stadium with less than three per cent of our members from the prior year not shifting,” Rosich said.

“We are at capacity at both the top end and the affordable end of seating, but we still have some capacity to fill in the middle-range seats.

Camera Icon Fremantle chief executive Steve Rosich believes the club is set to defy its on-field struggles and post a profit for the 2018 season after setting a membership record and going past 55,000 members. Credit: Getty Images

“In terms of our attendances we are currently averaging just under 46,000 for our home games (excluding the bought game against Gold Coast), which is around 14,000 higher than at Domain Stadium last year.

“Last season only four clubs had an average attendance of above 46,000. Optus Stadium has been a big driver of that.

“We rank second behind West Coast for corporate support and we rank second behind West Coast in membership revenue, with a significant margin to the third-placed club.”

Rosich said ticket sales for the North Melbourne game were in line with a crowd of about 43,000, but rain had cut the attendance to 37,515. There were concerns the crowd for Sunday’s match against the Crows could be similarly affected by bad weather.

The Dockers are giving members incentives to attend the remaining home games this season by offering the chance to win a trip to the grand final.

“We have grown our support, we have grown our revenue, but costs have gone with it,” Rosich said.

“We are still going to be a profitable football club. We are forecasting a profit of less than a million.”