Commentary
TV Watch: USA-Wales draws almost 12 million viewers
- by Paul Kennedy @pkedit, Nov 23, 2022
The USA's 2022 World Cup opener against Wales averaged 8.3 million viewers on Fox and 3.4 million viewers on Telemundo.
The match was their first broadcast involving the USMNT at the World Cup. It did not qualify for the 2018 World Cup, the first men's tournament for which Fox and Telemundo had the English- and Spanish-language media rights.
The previous two English-language audiences for a USMNT opener at the World Cup were 13.1 million for USA-England on ABC in 2010 and 11.1 million for USA-Ghana on ESPN in 2014.
U.S. audiences for the 2014 tournament in Brazil were boosted by more favorable kickoff times. The USA's second group match against Portugal averaged 18.2 million viewers on ESPN.
English-language audiences:
2022 U.S. World Cup:
8.3 million USA-Wales, FOX
2014 U.S. World Cup:
18.2 million USA-Portugal, ESPN
16.5 million USA-Belgium, ESPN
11.1 million USA-Ghana, ESPN
10.8 million USA-Germany, ESPN
2010 U.S. World Cup:
14.9 million USA-Ghana, ABC
13.1 million USA-England, ABC
6.2 million USA-Algeria, ESPN
5.2 million USA-Slovenia, ESPN
Fox and Telemundo have broadcast the last two Women's World Cups. The USWNT openers delivered 5 million viewers in Canada in 2015 (USA-Nigeria) and 2.62 million viewers in France in 2019 (USA-Thailand).
Streaming. USA-Wales drew an Average Minute Audience of 563,000 viewers on Fox digital platforms, making it the most-streamed group-stage match in Fox history.
The match was also broadcast in Spanish on Peacock, NBC's digital network that carries many Premier League games.
Across Peacock and Telemundo’s digital streaming platforms, USA-Wales delivered 1 million viewers, making it the most-streamed World Cup game in Spanish-language history, beating out Sunday’s Qatar-Ecuador opener, which averaged 832,000 viewers.
Through the first four matches, streaming represents 27 percent of Telemundo's total viewing.
Photo: Ulmer/Imago/Icon Sportswire
USA/England on Black Friday will break all the records.
Not a TV numbers person, but this one is no brainer, try as we may, it is still the case that the largest and probably fastest growing audience for soccer in the USA, is by far, Spanish speaking. Telemundo, not Fox, is in the catbird seat for viewership of the WC 2022 in the USA. The USA Wales game numbers will pale compared to the Mexico game v Poland yesterday. I attended Columbia v Senegal in Samara Russia in 2018. The stadium was full, 35,000, of Russians and a small section of Senegalese, and the rest, Columbians, a sea of yellow, who got thier tickets using their Columbian passports in the FIFA lottery using the follow your country option that required a passport from the country, but, many, thousands, were residents of the US. They traveled on Columbian passport b.c. that would match their WC tix for the visa into Russia. I stayed at the Marriott in Samara that the Columbian team was in. Every day chatted up Columbians queueing up outside waiting for a glimps of their footballing heros. Many from Columbia, but also, many from Arizona to Florida, New Jersey, all over USA.