Football TV ratings
FC Bayern’s failure was obviously good for ARD’s “Sportschau”.
As of: 5:27 p.m. | Reading time: 3 minutes
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The past Bundesliga season attracted significantly more viewers to the TV sets than before. This applies above all to the ARD “Sportschau”, but also to other channels. The growth in the 2nd league was even greater than in the 1st league.
Football fans watched significantly more Bundesliga football on television again. After the declines of previous years, ARD’s “Sportschau” recorded an increase in the past season with the summaries of the 1st league late on Saturday afternoon. And other football formats on Sky and ZDF also increased.
According to ARD, an average of 3.845 million people watched the “Sportschau” on Saturday from 6:30 p.m. in the 2023/24 season. This is a visible increase after 3.662 million in the previous season. “Although television usage is declining overall, the reach has increased by almost 200,000,” commented ARD sports coordinator Axel Balkausky: “We are very satisfied with the numbers.”
Why was there an increase again after recently declining numbers? “You can see what influence it has when the same club doesn’t always win the championship and there is an unexpected outcome to the season,” said the ARD sports director. After the monotony of eleven Munich championships, Bayer Leverkusen won the title for the first time this season.
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“The fans see it’s interesting again,” said Balkausky. In addition to the exciting relegation battle, the ARD sports coordinator pointed out another aspect. “Bayern’s failure also arouses interest,” he said: “There are also fans who like to see Bayern lose.”
Leverkusen only 14 times in the “Sportschau”
However, ARD rarely featured the champions themselves, and Bayer Leverkusen is in last place in the TV rankings of the “Sportschau”. The TV classic only showed summaries of Leverkusen’s games 14 times. The fact that Bayer was featured less than any other Bundesliga football team in the traditional sports program is mainly due to their successful European Cup appearances.
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After the Thursday games in the Europa League, Leverkusen only played again in the domestic league on Sunday. There was also no report in the “Sportschau” about the increasing Bayer stakes in the top game on Saturday at 6:30 p.m. For comparison: Bayern Munich and Borussia were each shown 19 times on ARD late on Saturday afternoon.
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The increase in spectators in the 2nd league was even greater than in the 1st league. An average of 2.18 million viewers saw the reports in the “Sportschau” on Sunday. In the previous season there were 1.89 million. “The 2nd league was very exciting for a long time, we noticed that in the numbers,” said the ARD sports coordinator. “It is of course also noticeable that many big names are there,” he said, referring to Schalke 04, Hertha, HSV and other traditional clubs.
Sky reported a record
The second division growth at Sky was even more significant than at ARD. The pay-TV broadcaster reported an increase of 25 percent. The average reach of a second division match day was 1.91 million.
This also offset the seven percent decline in the 1st league (2.75 million), so that Sky editor-in-chief Alexander Rösner was able to report a record: “In the entirety of the Bundesliga and 2nd Bundesliga, we achieved our previous record again just exceed it.”
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ZDF’s “Sportstudio” was also able to slightly increase its average audience from 1.83 to 1.91 million viewers. Sat.1, on the other hand, recorded a decline from an average of 3.99 to 3.49 million viewers for its five live games in the first league. The main reason for the minus is the ratings flop in the experiment with the 3.30 p.m. game, which was broadcast for the first time and had fewer than 1.5 million viewers.
