The FIFA World Cup is the biggest sporting event of the year and the largest sports marketing exercise since the last World Cup.

It is also a lot more besides, a cultural battleground at times, a clash of east and west, a case study in the power of money, and the most controversial sporting competition since the apartheid days in South Africa.

Our job is to bring the stories of what is happening off the field of play to the attention of our Sport for Business readers.

 

SPAIN GERMANY ATTRACTS AUDIENCE OF 521,000

Spain’s draw with Germany on Sunday evening was the most-watched World Cup match of last week on RTÉ, with an average of 521,000 viewers and a share of 38% of those watching TV at the time. There were also 131,000 live streams on the RTÉ Player.

An average of 495,000 viewers tuned in to watch the 0-0 draw between USA and England on Friday, with a 40% share of those watching TV at the time and 134,000 streams on the RTÉ Player.

On Saturday, Argentina’s 2-0 win over Mexico drew an average of 424,000 viewers, with a share of 37%. In addition, there were 118,000 live streams on the RTÉ Player.

The most-watched game to date on RTÉ Player was Argentina v Saudi Arabia last Tuesday 22nd November, with 255,000 live streams.

The 28 games so far in the World Cup have generated 3.1m live streams on the RTÉ Player – an average of 112,000 live streams per game. 53% of World Cup live streams have been on smartphones.

 

13 STILL TO PLAY FOR

This has possibly been the most open World Cup in memory with only three teams securing their place in the knockout stages with one round of games to go.

Gracenote from Nielsen has predicted the likely order of the teams to join Brazil, France, and Portugal over the next four days.

They are England, Netherlands, Spain, Morocco (replacing Belgium from the pre-tournament forecasts), Argentina, Ecuador, Poland (replacing Mexico), Croatia, Switzerland, IR Iran, Australia (replacing Denmark), Uruguay, and Costa Rica (replacing Germany).

They also rate Brazil as having a 38 percent chance of making it to the Final and a 26 percent chance of winning the tournament.

That is a lower chance than the bookmakers. BoyleSports have Brazil as 9/4 favourites (representing a 30 percent chance, and PointsBet as 5/2 favourites (representing a 28 percent chance.

 

SAUDIS VIEWING BLOCKED

Fans in Saudi Arabia have been finding it difficult to watch all of the games being played after the TOD TV streaming service of BeIn TV which owns the rights for pay-TV games in the region was blocked.

As in most countries, a limited number of games are shown free to air, including the famous win over Argentina which led to a public holiday, but not all. Britain and Ireland are in a privileged position being able to see every game without any form of subscription beyond a TV licence.

 

CHINA CROWD SCENES

Chinese TV is also reported to be editing the main international feed from Qatar to avoid showing scenes of crowds in the stadia not wearing masks.

The country is still imposing a high level of lockdowns against Covid, and has stricter public health guidelines that the rest of the world.

Civic unrest is breaking out and showing pictures of the rest of the world unmasked is not seen as the right thing by the Chinese authorities.

TODAY’S SPONSOR IN THE SPOTLIGHT – BYJU’s

It is not the most familiar of names but BYJU’s has been one of the most visible brands on stadium LED boards throughout the campaign to date.

With 150 million learners around the world, it is a global leader in tech-driven, educational content and products. Within a decade of its launch, the company has expanded to cater to a large student community globally – from competitive exam preparation to early learning and coding to professional upskilling courses.

With corporate headquarters in Bengaluru, India, and offices in 21 countries, BYJU’S products are present in over 120 countries.

Nice and powerful statement video as well…

KEEPING UP WITH THE ACTION

Virgin Media may not have the rights but they have developed a neat interactive search engine to give details of all the games and indeed all the major leagues for football around the world.

You can access the tool and keep bang up to date with what is happening here.