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World Cup TV ratings

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Fenway

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Sep 26, 2007
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The Great Canadian Ratings Report: Early results bode well for World Cup of Hockey

A meaningless pre-tournament game between Canada and the U.S. on Saturday night drew an average audience of 903,000 to Sportsnet. That was more than the two CFL Labour Day rematch games that day and more than any NFL game drew in the league's opening week.

The two-game average for Canada's matches against the U.S. (there was another one Friday) was 785,000. That's pretty impressive, considering that the games were basically glorified scrimmages.

In fact, the only thing that beat a summer hockey practice was the Toronto Blue Jays, who drew an average of 1.25 million viewers for their three-game series against the Boston Red Sox.

As crazy as it seems, once this thing gets rolling hockey could even challenge the Jays for top spot.
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Here are the most-watched sports events on English-language television from the past weekend, according to Numeris overnight ratings:

1. MLB, Red Sox at Blue Jays, Sunday, Sportsnet: 1,430,000

2. MLB, Red Sox at Blue Jays, Saturday, Sportsnet: 1,333,000

3. MLB, Red Sox at Blue Jays, Friday, Sportsnet: 1,010,000

4. World Cup hockey, Canada vs. U.S., Saturday, Sportsnet: 903,000

5. NFL, Giants-Cowboys/Dolphins-Seahawks/Lions-Colts, Sunday, CTV: 899,000

6. CFL, Stampeders at Eskimos, Saturday, TSN: 789,000

7. CFL, Roughriders at Blue Bombers, Saturday, TSN: 701,000

8. World Cup of hockey, Canada vs. U.S., Friday, Sportsnet 1/360: 663,000

9. NFL, Bills-Ravens/Packers-Jags/Bengals-Jets/Vikes-Titans, Sunday, CTV/TSN: 657,000

10. NFL, Patriots at Cardinals, Sunday, TSN: 499,000 (NBC viewers not measured)
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U23-Europe game was on ESPN2 Live on Thursday

WORLD CUP OF HOCKEY L ESPN2 NA U23/EUROPE 8:00 PM 10:34 PM 184,000

US - Canada game on Saturday was on a 6 hour tape delay

WORLD CUP OF HOCKEY CANADA/USA ESPN2 1:30 AM 3:51 AM 171,000
 
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Pretty weak ratings in the USA.

Even for Canada, Finland a country of roughly 5.4 million had better raw numbers for their games against Sweden (1.2 million viewers I believe was the number).
 
How in the world did hockey get more views in Canada than American football!?!?

In other news, 3 separate games of a 162 game MLB regular season each drew more viewers than the National Hockey team playing it's fiercest rival...

It's undisputed that the tournament will do well in canada but this here article has a perfect tinge of silliness added to it.
 
kabidjan18 said:
How in the world did hockey get more views in Canada than American football!?!?

In other news, 3 separate games of a 162 game MLB regular season each drew more viewers than the National Hockey team playing it's fiercest rival...

It's undisputed that the tournament will do well in canada but this here article has a perfect tinge of silliness added to it.
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The hockey games were friendlies and the Blue Jays were fighting for first place in the AL East.
 
Russia tv sports ratings

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snipes said:
Pretty weak ratings in the USA.

Even for Canada, Finland a country of roughly 5.4 million had better raw numbers for their games against Sweden (1.2 million viewers I believe was the number).
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Thurday game's average was 527 000 (peak 1 243 000). Saturday game's average was 472 000 (peak 1 136 000). Both games on free tv.
 
Tournament is doing amazing in Canada. Shows that the fans are really digging the tournament.
 
snipes said:
Pretty weak ratings in the USA.
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The NAU23 game went up against the NFL season opener, it was obvious the ratings would be terrible.

The US/CAN game was a 6 hour tape delay broadcast in the middle of the night. There's no reason to tune into that game at that time. You can stream it live and/or record it (since its already tape delayed) and watch it at a more convenient time. Its not really a good reflection of the interest in the tournament but rather the decisions of the network.
 
So Canada vs USA gets less viewers in a country with 320mil people than Finland vs Sweden does in a country with 5mil people?


I see, there was a significant amount of terrible involved with the broadcasting.
 
ijuka said:
So Canada vs USA gets less viewers in a country with 320mil people than Finland vs Sweden does in a country with 5mil people?


I see, there was a significant amount of terrible involved with the broadcasting.
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The population of 320 million won't make a difference.

It would have to be an Olympic final between the U.S and Canada for it to have a chance against N.F.L football in the U.S.

Football is king of the Hill by a large margin in the U.S.

Sweden and Finland are hockey countries, The U.S is football country. It's a gigantic game down there.
 
redcard said:
The NAU23 game went up against the NFL season opener, it was obvious the ratings would be terrible.

The US/CAN game was a 6 hour tape delay broadcast in the middle of the night. There's no reason to tune into that game at that time. You can stream it live and/or record it (since its already tape delayed) and watch it at a more convenient time. Its not really a good reflection of the interest in the tournament but rather the decisions of the network.
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The decisions of the network reflect interest in the tournament. In Canada, hockey is king, so the games get shown in prime time. In the U.S. hockey is well below football, baseball, and probably at least a few other sports, so why would they show exhibition games to an exhibition tournament in prime time, especially when up against, for example, NFL football and baseball pennant races.
 
There's maybe 70 million homes in USA that have any cable. And a third of that are people who have no idea what ice hockey is.
 
RandR said:
The decisions of the network reflect interest in the tournament. In Canada, hockey is king, so the games get shown in prime time. In the U.S. hockey is well below football, baseball, and probably at least a few other sports, so why would they show exhibition games to an exhibition tournament in prime time, especially when up against, for example, NFL football and baseball pennant races.
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I'm not claiming they made the wrong decision. I'm claiming that so few people watched it because ESPN decided that broadcasting college football was more profitable than the game and not because so few people wanted to watch it. And even if people were more interested in college football games, that doesn't give any indication of their level of interest in the exhibition game. It could be anywhere from zero interest to really excited but Alabama's playing right now.

These ratings are meaningless. I didn't watch it at 1:30 AM. I streamed it live through a crappy feed and recorded the late night broadcast so I could skim through it the next day.
 
Murky said:
Sweden is a soccer country, though.
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It is, but it is a hockey country too.

Hockey is a big sport in Sweden, it is not in the U.S, it's a niche sport.

if suddenly hockey in the U.S became as big as it is in Sweden NHL executives and owners might die of a heart attack induced by unadulterated joy.

They would be making money they had never even dreamed of.
 
The CyNick said:
Tournament is doing amazing in Canada. Shows that the fans are really digging the tournament.
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We'll see what the ratings are if Canada reaches the finals. In the a Olympics, it was over 15M IIRC, so almost half the country.

I'd be surprised if this tournaments finals got more than ~3-4M or so.
 
kabidjan18 said:
How in the world did hockey get more views in Canada than American football!?!?

In other news, 3 separate games of a 162 game MLB regular season each drew more viewers than the National Hockey team playing it's fiercest rival...

It's undisputed that the tournament will do well in canada but this here article has a perfect tinge of silliness added to it.
Click to expand...

You are confused that hockey got more than American football, but also confused it got less than baseball?

PS. Canadian Football also fared better than the US version. (except for if you combine 3 different games)

The Jays are huge right now across the country, and will be the biggest story until the NHL season starts, and will continue to match it since they will be well into the playoffs if they are up against each other.
 
Zamuz said:
It's football though, not soccer.
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Soccer is just an abbreviation of association football. To differentiate it from rugby football or gridiron football.

But yes I think football should be used to refer to soccer but with American football it's super annoying.
 
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