World Cup fever builds

JACK MILNER

Most discussions tend to look at the Fifa World Cup and the Olympic Games as the two events vying for the title of most popular. The answer, however, is not so simple.

Firstly the Summer Olympics and the World Cup don’t fall in the same year. The 2012 London Olympics had a global reach of 3,6 billion people – the highest in Olympic Games history – in 220 countries and territories around the world. More than 900 million people watched the opening ceremony.

In SA the 2010 Soccer World Cup had a global viewership of 2,2 billion.

There are many ways to explain the difference. The World Cup has a fixed number of matches and that is all viewers can watch. This year there are 64 matches in total and at an average of 100 minutes each, allowing for extra time later in the tournament, the maximum broadcasting hours are around 6 400.

The Olympics has almost non-stop action of 16 hours of sport every day. While the Beijing Games televised for 61 700 hours, the London Olympics broadcast approximately 100 000 hours. There was also live streaming for the first time globally on more than 170 websites and other digital platforms during the Games.

In SA, television coverage of London 2012 was seen by 26,5 million viewers, representing 67 per cent of those with access to television. The most watched event was the women’s football match between Sweden and South Africa, with 2,7 million viewers.

But when one studies the details of all the sporting events, the sands are shifting all the time. The first question is: What defines a sporting event? Is it just a tournament that starts on one date and runs for a month or so, or do you take a whole series of sporting events that run over a number of months, but all under the same banner?

If it is the latter, then even the World Cup is surpassed, although it is by another football tournament – the European Champions League. This tournament runs over some seven months and it has by far the highest viewership of any sporting event.

One could probably counter that by saying that if you include all the World Cup qualifying games over a space of almost three years, it puts the World Cup way out front.  

The single most watched annual sporting event for a number of years has been the Super Bowl in the US, but in 2009 that was surpassed by the European Champions League final.

The most watched annual event, running over two weeks, is Wimbledon with The Masters golf tournament next best on the list.

Forbes magazine has put a financial spin on its calculation. To determine the most valuable sporting event brands – the equity built up in a name over many years – it ranked them on gross revenue generated per day of competition.

In top position is the Super Bowl with a brand value of $420 million. In second place are the Summer Olympics with a brand value of $230 million followed by the Fifa World Cup (brand value $120 million) and the fastest growing of them all the Uefa Champions League (brand value $110 million).

The Euro tournament is the biggest driver of corporate hospitality spend in sport – $200 million and climbing. This seems to indicate that as far as football is concerned, there is far more passion for club soccer than patriotism for one’s country.  

The annual sporting event watched live by the most number of people is the Tour de France. Of course nobody has to pay to get in.

The Tour de France attracts 12 million spectators along the route in a typical race. On average spectators travel 130 km to see a stage of the Tour and spend on average six hours at a time at the roadside. Some 30 per cent of those spectators are women.

The Fifa World Cup kicks off on Thursday, June 12 with the match between hosts Brazil and Croatia. Two Israeli companies have been employed to handle security at some of the stadiums. The Arena Patanal, in Cuiabá, which will seat 44 000, will be protected by the Israeli company’s advanced security systems. Operators of the system will be able to control many safety and security features simultaneously as well as other systems, such as the PA system, access to protected areas, gates, press boxes, locker rooms, and lighting.

Fifa has approved and tested the Israeli gateway control system for the stadium’s entrances, which allows for hundreds of gates, doors, and turnstiles to be controlled.

Another company is providing Hermes 900 unmanned aerial vehicles to carry out safety and security missions for the Brazilian Air Force, such as crowd surveillance.

It could not as yet be established whether there are any Jewish players in any of the teams, but if there are, we will find them!