This summer season’s 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup changed into record-breaking. Around fifty-nine million humans watched Brazil’s last sixteen sports against World Cup hosts France, making it the most-watched women’s football match of all time. The event in France broke the 1 billion viewers mark for the first time because the opposition started in 1991. The Lionesses’ semi-very last defeat to eventual winners attracted eleven.7 million visitors, representing 50.8% of the audience, and became 2019’s highest UK TV audience to this point.
People have been on the ground, too. According to FIFA, 24 video games were bought out, taking the number of healthy tickets bought to more than 1 million. Some 54. This was also the summer the media awoke to the power of girls’ recreation. While the BBC released its #ChangeTheGame marketing campaign to exhibit lady athletes, The Telegraph appointed its first dedicated girls’ sports writing crew. Five of the ‘maximum watched’ videos on the BBC Sport website between 7 June and 14 July featured girls’ recreation, in line with evaluating sports coverage conducted by the Women’s Sport Trust.
And permit’s now not forget about the emblem hobby. The likes of Coca-Cola, Visa, Boots, and Lucozade Sport were the most massive names queuing as much as women’s soccer this summer season. In the United States, brands splurged $96m (£87m) on TV ads in or around the World Cup, according to Kantar figures, greater than double the employer’s earlier estimate of $43m (£39m).
Even though the tournament is over, manufacturers are nonetheless involved. This week, Procter & Gamble – through its deodorant emblem Secret – introduced a $2 hundred 000 (£ 684) investment in US women’s football. It is the usage of the cash to purchase nine 000 tickets to 9 National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) games this season. P&G plans to fill 1,000 seats at one domestic sports event for each of the nine teams, supplying the tickets to local partners, girls’ organizations, young people’s sports activities groups, and not-for-profit establishments in a bid to develop local support for the women’s game.
The FMCG claims the investment will assist in enhancing attendance, grow a passionate network of girls’ football fanatics, and ensure female athletes get the attention they deserve, which it believes will cause a boom in NWSL ticket sales. This is a shrewd circulate by P&G. Not handiest is it capable of the trip to the crest of a wave following the US team’s World Cup victory, but by throwing its weight behind the NWSL, the agency is positioning itself as a brand devoted to retaining women’s football in the spotlight.
Similarly, Barclays has emerged as a key supporter of ladies’ sport in the UK after signing an 8-determine deal to turn out to identify the sponsor of the Women’s Super League (WSL) until 2022. A report investment in UK women’s sport, the deal is thought to be well worth more than £10m over the next 3 seasons. The significance of Barclays’ sponsorship cannot be overstated for the reason that the Football Association’s director of the ladies’ expert sport, Kelly Simmons, advised Marketing Week in July that her priority is to make the WSL sustainable. Over the next five to seven years, the FA desires the WSL to generate sufficient sales to stand on its very own, no matter the whims of a club’s chairman or owners.
For this cause, preserving the exhilaration once the World Cup buzz has died down is crucial, as is working out how to pitch the sport going ahead. It is essential to have a method that receives people via the gates to look at girls’ soccer so that it doesn’t devalue the sport and all the goodwill built up through the World Cup fulfillment. The derby between Manchester City and Manchester United in advance this month – the first given that United became promoted to the WSL – is exciting living proof.
Some 31,213 tickets have been offered for the match at the Etihad Stadium, smashing the previous WSL report of 5,265 enthusiasts who watched Arsenal topped 2019 champions in Brighton in April. Despite the £7 price for person tickets, more humans attended the Manchester derby than the conflict between Chelsea and Tottenham the same weekend, which attracted a crowd of 24,564 no matter being unfastened to attend.
