Blog Initiative: Failure to qualify for the World Cup does nothing to dampen local TV audiences

Initiative’s most recent ViewerTrack shows that TV audiences for World Cup 2006 are very high in several countries which haven’t even qualified to play. This highlights that Soccer is a game that maintains its truly global appeal to people even when there is no direct local involvement.

Among non-participating countries, the World Cup has so far been most popular in Hungary, relative to the size of its population. Each match has been watched by an average of 13 per cent of its population. The last time Hungary qualified for the World Cup was in 1986. 50 years ago, they were considered the best team in the world and were nicknamed the “Magical Magyars”. Very high ratings have also been achieved in Bulgaria (12 per cent), Norway (10 per cent) and Austria (10 per cent).

These average ratings are even higher than in a number of countries whose teams are playing at the World Cup. In the UK, 9 per cent of the population has watched on average so far, and in France that figure is 8 per cent, both figures are higher than their overall average for the 2002 tournament which stood at 7 per cent for both countries. The average rating in the host nation, Germany, is significantly higher than the UK and France, at 14 per cent.

Major international soccer tournaments often draw large audiences among non-participating countries. At the last World Cup, half of the top 16 countries ranked by average audience hadn’t qualified for the tournament.

Comments

UK Terrestrial Viewers had the choice between "Sword of Sherwood Forest" on Channel Four or rgentina 6 Serbia & Montenegro on BBC One. Men in Tights playing on a Green Background in both. I watched ARG6S&M0 via an External Aerial and listened to the Commentary via Cable with its Two Second Delay. So I was spared the exuberant rantings of JP until I had fully appreciated each move. I also recorded directly to VCR, DVD and PVR Hard Drive questioning how these options are factored back into the figures given on this excellent Blog Site ?

For the record the www.FIFAworldcup.com Official Match Statistics claim that Argentina had Nine Shots on Goal and Two Off Target. Our CAP2 system says that Argentina "earned 7.2 Goals from Nineteen Scoring Opportunities to average 0.42 Goal as just Two had been discarded as each not considered to be even worth 0.043 [1/24th] Goal. In our preMatch Simulation we had predicted that Argentina would hit an average 0.33 Goal so close. Serbia & Montenegro "earned 0.55 Goal from 12 Scoring Opportunities to average 0.06 after Three were Discarded". They should have at least hit a 0.20 Goal average.

So Argentina "deserved to Win by a 6.65 Goal Margin of Victory" or 0.65 Goal more than their actual Six-Nil scoreline. Mainly because Hernan Crespo was not Offside on 35m50s when his Goal was ruled out. Keeping up the average of the Match Officials who have each made at least One such Decision shown to be wrong by the Immediate SloMo Replay in each of the 21 World Cup Gmes so far played.

Which will continue until a minimal system of Time Outs are introduced to get these Errors overruled within a maximum 90 Second Delay to reach a fair and accurate Verdict.

Posted by: Bob Copeman | 16 June 2006 at 04:19 PM

It is not my fault if there are no new Initiative Blogs to which I can attach a comment about CZECH REPUBLIC 0 GHANA 2 which has just ended. Our CAP2 analysis says that Ghana "earned 4.6 Goals from 32 Scoring Opportunities to average 0.18 Goal after Six were Discarded as each not worth even 1/24th Goal". Whereas the FIFA Official Match Statistics claim Eight Shots On out of 20 Attempted so ignoring at least Six "Scoring Opportunities" ? Add in that the Czech Republic "earned just 1.45 Goals from Twenty Seven Scoring Opportunities to average just 0.08 Goal after Eight were Discarded" and still Five more Scoring Opportunites than the FIFA Official Match Statistics ?

So Ghana "deserved to Win by a 3.15 Goal Margin of Victory" or +1.15 Goal more than the Actual Score Line so it wasn't close. But my main complaint is about the "Live Text Commentary" from the BBC Sport Web Site which at the 93m21s Final Whistle had printed details only up to 84 Minutes with a claim to refresh every Two Minutes but as usual almost immediately wiped itself out up to that point. Either the Press Association or whoever is writing these LTCs for the BBC want us to print out their Efforts despite all the Errors or Omissions or they will continue undeterred with this nonsensical habit ?

And there was that Andy Gray voice over for the "Limited Edition Big Mac" Commercial whilst we read that High Streets throughout the UK are deserted during World Cup matches. So are McDonalds suffering the same Customer Drought or are these Commercialswhich are still permitted before the proposed "watershed" bucking this trend ?

Posted by: Bob Copeman | 17 June 2006 at 07:19 PM

Brazil "deserved to Win against Australia by a 2.55 Goal Margin of Victory" so +0.55 Goal more than the actual 2-0 Score Line. Our CAP2 system says that Brazil "earned 3.9 Goals from 27 Scoring Opportunities to average 0.18 Goal after Five First Half efforts were each Discarded as each not considered to be worth 0.043 [1/24th] Goal. The Official FIFA Match Statistics said that Brazil had 6 Shots On Target out of 16 Attempted so ignoring at least Six Scoring Opportunities ?

One Australian Effort stopped because Sterjovski thought he heard the Whistle blown for Offside. At least a year ago I advised that this was likely to happen and that we had here in Birmingham the oldest manufacturer of Whistles in the World [Hudson] who for an extremely modest budget could manufacture a completely unique sounding Whistle for the 2006 World Cup along with gold presentation models etc., As usual absolutely nothing was done.

A commendation for Budweiser whose two American Presenter vignettes must be one of the TV success stories so far ? But surely they should have filmed at least 50% more than the actual number of slots needing to be filled so that there would be little need for repeats ? The cost compared to what they are paying ITV to share Main Sponsorship would surely have been marginal ? 28 games into the 64 match schedule and we have already seen some 4 or 5 times...?

Since few of us want to watch any Football match a second or even a third time why do Advertisers assume that we do not mind watching their Adverts Ten, Fifty or in the case of British Eurosport sometimes up to One Thousand times ? And of course there is the "Crazy Frog" syndrome where battering our Eardrums into submission is supposed to sell product ? Today saw the Debut of the Pepsi World Cup Advert which since Coca Cola is an Official Sponsor might be classed as "Ambush Marketing". And yet England have apparently taken 3,000 Bottles of Pepsi Cola's Gatorade with them to Germany and not 3,000 Bottles of Coca Cola's Powerade ?

And a word on the Dectech Prediction Model which originally nonsensically came up with vastly different Win Percentages whether the Country was playing at Home or Away when of course except for Germany all 31 Countries were effectively playing on Neutral Grounds. Dectech then reworked their Predictions coming up with some very odd figures. For instance for the Czech Republic v Ghana they came up with a 75.3% Win Prediction for the Czechs who actually lost 0-2 to Ghana. This morning Dectech claimed to have reworked all their Predictions but still gave a 76% Win prediction to the Czech Republic ? And well after our CAP2 system said that Ghana "deserved to Win by a 3.15 Goal Margin of Victory" ?

We do not have sufficient evidence to question the Dectech Probability Model as we suspect it is based on Goals or Shots each of which are ungraded. Whereas our CAP2 ssystem measures the Speed of the Football over its flightPath to grade each [and any Required Saves] on a Scale of Twenty Four whilst retaining the option to Discard any not considered to even be worth 0.043 [1/24th] Goal ?

Posted by: Bob Copeman | 18 June 2006 at 07:58 PM