USA-Japan smashes ESPN viewing record
- by Paul Kennedy @pkedit, Jul 18, 2011
[TELEVISION WATCH] Sunday’s Women’s World Cup final between the United States and Japan was seen by an average 13.458 million viewers (7.4 U.S.
household rating), more than double the previous records for the most-watched and highest-rated soccer telecast on an ESPN network.
The previous record was for the USA-Algeria
men’s match at the 2010 World Cup -- 6.16 million viewers, based on a 4.0 household U.S. rating.
The USA-Japan match also ranks as the sixth most-viewed soccer telecast ever
in the United States.
Most-Viewed Soccer Events
| Year | Match | Event | Network | Viewership |
| 1999 | USA-China | Women's World
Cup | ABC | 17,975,000 |
| 2010 | Spain-Netherlands | World Cup | ABC | 15,905,000 |
| 2010 | USA-Ghana | World Cup |
ABC | 15,193,000 |
| 1994 | Brazil-Italy | World Cup | ABC | 14,510,000 |
| 1994 | USA-Brazil | World Cup | ABC | 13,694,000 |
| 2011 | USA-Japan | Women's World Cup | ESPN | 13,458,000 |
| 2006 | Italy-France | World Cup | ABC | 11,961,000 |
What about Spanish TV (Univision) in USA it does not count for ratings, because if you were to count them all, ratings will skyrocket, in order to have a realistic viewership of World Cup you should count all the networks and forget Internet, ESPN 3 And Univision, personnally I saw the games online.
What about all those packed bars and house parties? There must be millions and millions more watching those "viewership" TVs. I know that where I watched there were maybe 150 folks watching what couts as a single viewer!