Apollo capacity - 3,500
Arena capacity - 21,000
The Apollo is a much better venue on the whole than the Arena by a mile, fair enough, but those numbers are not a coincidence.
The residual die hards are there, I am still friends with many of them, but that number is ever decreasing year by year, scandal by scandal. You can deny that all you want, but it is true. Everyone has their breaking point, I've reached mine and plenty of my friends have before and after me. Others have their's ahead of them. It will come for most of them, while others will play dumb and ignore until the bitter end. I saw Morrissey a good number of times between 04 and 15. I wouldn't see him now if you paid me.
Compare the general public's feelings towards Morrissey now and to, let's say, the 2004 comeback. Hell, even the 2012 gig at the MEN Arena did well, but the complaints from people after was regarding the setlist, as well as the venue. Come to Manchester now, however, and no casual music fans will want to go and see Morrissey any more, thanks to his own little outbursts that come time and again. Go and see how quiet the Smiths night at S&G had tragically gotten, even before the pandemic. There is no good will now, not even for a nostalgia act which one could interpret Morrissey as being despite his output.