More Than 20 Million Watch England’s Victory Over Croatia
More than 20 million people tuned in to BBC One last night to watch England qualify for the quarter finals of the European championships after securing a nail-biting 4-2 victory over Croatia.
Unofficial overnight figures from BARB show that a peak of 20.4 million viewers stayed at home to watch England’s final group game, which saw teenage prodigy Wayne Rooney net two goals to become the tournament’s top scorer.
Audiences for the highly anticipated match, which also saw goals from Paul Scholes and Frank Lampard, averaged just over 18 million, securing a massive 68.6% share of the available audience for BBC One between 7:45pm and 10:00pm.
The early evening kick-off time of last night’s clash meant that millions of football fans would have watched England’s victory in pubs and bars across the country. However, this so-called ‘lager-in-hand’ viewing is not measured by BARB.
Average audiences for the match were higher than those for England’s Euro 2004 debut against France, which attracted 17.6 million sports fans to ITV1 earlier this month. It is estimated that the France game has been seen by a cumulative average audience of 85 million individuals across 30 countries around the world (see 20.7 Million Watch England Lose Out To France).
However, last night’s viewing figures did not manage to beat England’s historic clash against arch-rivals Argentina in the 1998 World Cup Finals, which attracted a peak of more than 23 million to BBC One back in 1998.
BBC One is expecting record audiences for England’s quarter final clash with tournament host-nation Portugal on Thursday. Ratings look likely to be boosted by the fact that England have not got past the group stage in the European Championships since 1996.
The eight official sponsors of the Euro 2004 tournament will not doubt to rejoicing over the viewing figures so far. However, analysis of the coverage so far shows that Hyundai is winning the sponsorship war with its on-pitch advertising gaining more exposure than any other brand associated with the event (see Hyundai Takes The Lead In Euro 2004 Sponsorship War).
BBC: 020 8743 8000 www.bbc.co.uk
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