Opinion
Football’s homecoming gives World Cup audience figures a boost
29.06.2006Kevin Alavy, Senior Analyst “It’s coming home, it’s coming home, football’s coming home …”
From a TV audience perspective, whether or not Becks lifts the World Cup in Berlin on 9th July matters far less to the BBC and ITV audience numbers than the fact that football has returned to Europe for World Cup 2006. This has meant that matches have been played during the afternoon and evening. Consequently, UK average audience figures during the Group Stage have jumped by 10 per cent compared with four years ago. Viewing figures for the second round have been even more impressive, nearly doubling versus World Cup 2002.
Both BBC1 and ITV1 will be very pleased with the audience numbers. BBC1’s average programme audience during the group stage was 4.7 million, just behind ITV1’s 4.9 million. But ITV1 had exclusive live coverage of two of England’s group games, and BBC1 only one. So BBC1 will be confident of taking the lead during the knockout stages, when they had exclusive live coverage of England’s second round and quarter-final matches, against Ecuador and Portugal, respectively.
The good news for the broadcasters doesn’t end there. As well as attracting more viewers, the female audience share is higher than ever. An incredible 47 per cent of the in-home TV audience for England’s 2-2 draw with Sweden was female.
The boost to viewing in the UK from the improved time zones was quite predictable. What couldn’t be taken for granted, however, was the performance of Sven’s boys. And by getting through to the quarter-finals at least, English interest has been guaranteed until at least the final week. If England are still in the tournament by the time you’re reading this, the BBC and ITV will be licking their lips in delight.
And it’s not just the in-home viewing figures which have been so impressive. Initiative’s REAL Youth panel monitoring the media and consumer behaviour of 16-24 year olds shows, on average, up to a third of the youth population follow coverage of England’s matches out-of-home. With these viewers not captured within the BARB viewing statistics, the total UK TV audience will have been significantly higher than the official numbers.
Our work via the REAL Youth panel also shows that football fans haven’t only been following the World Cup via broadcast TV. More people than ever before are keeping an eye on the tournament via the internet and mobile. They like the experience. 69 per cent of young people who have accessed World Cup 2006 action online – some of whom have watched live streaming of the matches via the BBC Sport website - rated the service as good or very good.
These trends have been replicated abroad. All the other major powers of world football – France, Italy, Germany, Brazil and Argentina – are in Europe and South America. They have also benefited from the improved scheduling arrangements compared with four years ago – and with the fact that all of those teams at least reached the quarter-finals. Audience figures in all these countries are sharply higher. Some of the fastest growth anywhere in the world has been seen in football-mad Brazil (up 61 per cent) and Argentina (57 per cent), where matches were played during the middle of the night in 2002. Argentina’s own games in World Cup 2006 have watched by, on average, nearly 50 per cent of their population!
These figures all stack up to the World Cup maintaining its pre-eminent position among the world’s major sporting events. According to Initiative’s ViewerTrack, Brazil’s first group game, against Croatia, drew a larger live average global audience than the opening ceremony of the 2004 Summer Olympics. Of course, later games in the knockout stages of the tournament will be watched by even more people. The difference in viewing figures between the World Cup and other sports is even greater. For example, the cumulative global audience for World Cup 2006 is on target to be equivalent to more than six Formula One seasons.
With World Cup 2010 to be held in South Africa, and the 2014 tournament likely to be held in South America, viewing figures in the key European and South American football markets should remain as impressive for the next two World Cups, at least. Given the audience fragmentation which is happening in other sports and other genres of TV programmes, the World Cup will continue to retain its ability to reach larger audiences for single events than anything else.
