The live telecast of the FIFA World Cup 2018 matches played in Russia fetched 231 million impressions, making it the most-watched international football tournament in India in recent times. France’s 4-2 victory in the final against Croatia emerged as the most-watched match in the country with a cumulative 15.8 million impressions, according to Broadcast Audience Research Council (Barc) India ratings.
Unlike other international football tournaments or earlier editions of FIFA World Cup, this year the matches were telecast during prime time and that has helped the broadcaster, said Vinit Karnik, business head, GroupM ESP. “Overall, the interest for football in the country is growing. Four years ago, India hosted only one tournament in the I-League; now along with that, there is also the Indian Super League (ISL). The awareness for the sport has grown because of the traction of local football,” he added.
With a rise in the number of games, the marketing spends on the sport have increased manifold over the years. Star India promotes ISL both on air and outdoor. The official broadcasters for FIFA in India, Sony Pictures Networks India (SPNI), just before the FIFA World Cup, released the #MeriDoosriCountry campaign to generate awareness among football fans in India who lack a national connect during the World Cup.
SPN dedicated five channels to telecast the tournament in six different languages. DD Sports, too, aired a select number of matches. “Language feeds in Hindi, Malayalam, Bengali, Tamil and Telugu contributed to 46% of the overall viewership on TV,” said Rajesh Kaul, chief revenue officer – distribution and head – sports, SPNI. “Furthermore, female viewers contributed to 47% of overall TV viewership.”
Sony had aimed at garnering upwards of `200 crore of advertising revenue from the tournament. “We have met our targets for both television and digital in terms of ad sales,” said Rohit Gupta, chief revenue officer – ad sales and international business, SPNI. The revenue from ad sales is estimated to be around `210 crore this year.
SPNI was the official broadcaster of 2014 Rio World Cup too, and according to estimates, during the 2014 edition, the network managed to fetch around `90 crore from advertising. SPNI’s video on demand platform SonyLIV streamed the matches. To watch it live one had to subscribe to a premium pack starting from `49 per month. A five-minute delayed feed was available for free on the platform, and as per the network, 70 million users streamed matches on SonyLIV.
The World Cup final between France and Croatia was played in Week 29 of the BARC India calendar. In the same week, India played England in the deciding one-day international of the three match bilateral cricket series. The football final match aired on Sony Ten 2 fetched 5.7 million impressions to secure the top position as the most-watched sports programme, scoring over the India versus England match telecast on Sony Ten 3, which garnered 5.3 million impressions.
The World Cup held in Russia and other similar events down the line can help boost international sports tourism. “This is going to be a big part of the sports tourism game,” Karnik said.
