From the first kick to the final goal, TSN’s extensive coverage of the 2002 FIFA World Cup was a success with viewers, drawing an average audience per game of 289,000.
TSN’s tape-delayed coverage of the Semifinals, Bronze medal game and Final drew a total of 862,000 viewers. In the Semifinals, TSN averaged 197,000 viewers per game, while the Bronze medal game attracted 189,000 viewers. For the Final, 284,000 viewers tuned in to TSN’s tape-delayed coverage to watch Brazil down Germany 2-0.
Round 1 action on TSN averaged 247,000 viewers per game. In the Round of 16, TSN averaged 439,000 viewers per game, while Quarter-final action on TSN averaged 447,000 viewers per game this year.
During France 1998, TSN drew an overall average audience per game of 348,000 when the games were televised in the middle of the afternoon as opposed to the middle of the night. In 1998, TSN’s live coverage of the Semifinals attracted an average audience of 702,000 for the two games. The Bronze medal game in 1998 drew 477,000 viewers while live coverage of the Final attracted 1,549,000.
“We’re thrilled with these numbers – they far surpass our expectations and we couldn’t be more pleased,” says Keith Pelley, president, TSN. “It wasn’t just the die-hard soccer fans who woke up in the middle of the morning for the matches. Occasional soccer fans and sports enthusiasts also tuned in to watch. That really says a lot about Canadians and their love of sports.”
TSN’s highest-rated match for the 2002 World Cup was the Round of 16 South Korea vs. Italy match on June 18/19, as a total of 756,000 viewers tuned in to watch the home team notch the upset, 2-1, in extra time. (Cumulative rating for live and encore presentations.)
Soccer fans turned out in droves on the TSN.ca Web site during the past two months. In May, leading up to the World Cup, TSN.ca page views increased nearly 5 times to 1,162,000 from the monthly average of 240,000. In June, World Cup page views swelled to approximately 9,000,000. Soccer page views on TSN.ca exceeded all other sports topics in June, representing one third of the total page views for TSN.ca and nearly matching TSN.ca’s traffic during the 2002 Olympic Winter Games.