Indian Fans Rule World Cup 2019 As Tournament Breaks Record

India once again proved that they are the biggest force in cricket by leading the way in terms of viewership during the ICC 2019 Cricket World Cup. This year’s World Cup took place in the UK in the summer and was won by hosts England. The hosts beat New Zealand in arguably the best final of all time to lift the coveted trophy for the first time in their history.

India, on the other hand, exited the World Cup at the semifinal stage. The Men in Blue finished the group stage at the top of the points table as they suffered just one defeat. However, they could not go past New Zealand in a low-scoring semifinal. The fans, nonetheless, supported the team throughout and made their presence felt.

According to new data and figures released by the ICC on Monday, Indian fans led the way for the viewership. When it comes to consumption of matches on various live platforms, India’s semi-final against New Zealand drew 25.3 million viewers on Hotstar, which is now a world record for the highest ever concurrent viewership of a live stream.

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When it comes to the most watched match of the World Cup, it is no surprise that India vs Pakistan in the group stages was the one, with 273 million unique viewers watching the linear TV coverage, and 50 million more viewers across digital platforms.

This year’s World Cup also became the most viewed ICC event ever, with a global cumulative average audience of 1.6 billion for live coverage. The number of this World Cup was a 38% increase from the 2015 edition and a unique broadcast audience of 706 million viewers. The tournament also recorded an increase in the average watch time per unique viewer, growing by 42%.

“These quite astounding numbers demonstrate the power of live cricket to connect and engage more deeply with diverse audiences around the world. The theatre and drama of live cricket is compelling and the added jeopardy of tournament cricket enables our sport to cut through and aggregate audiences like never before even in our increasingly fragmented world,” ICC Chief Executive Manu Sawhney said.

In the final, an unique audience of 15.4 million watched the match between New Zealand and England, with 8.92 million unique viewers watching at the start of the historic Super Over.