# How many people are watching the English FA Cup Final? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 30, 2009, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-are-watching-the-english-fa-cup-final/498166 "2009-05-30T15:58:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3ec8ea/32.png) [@The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Great_Philosopher)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2009, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-are-watching-the-english-fa-cup-final/498166/21 "2009-05-31T20:59:20Z")
Clearly 400+ million people didn’t watch the FA Cup Final this year - that figure seems to only come from the FA themselves, and after searching around their site for a bit I can’t find any source for where they got it (it’s tough to even find a source where they mention that figure). Maybe that’s the _potential_ global audience if everyone with the international channels showing it decided to watch the game, or something like that. One thing I would point out though is that English football is extraordinarily popular in southeast asia and parts of Africa, and probably other areas as well - in southeast asia for instance I found that if you introduce yourself as English, your interlocutor will immediately start rattling off football clubs, trying to guess which one you support (“English? Oh, Liverpool? Tottenham? West Ham? Southampton? …”), so you can’t rule out a high viewing figure a lot higher than the 10% of viewers in England that watch the game. But anything in the hundreds of millions does sound a bit ridiculous, and I’m sorry I can’t find where the FA ‘sources’ that figure. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Kal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9de053/32.png) [@Kal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kal)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2009, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-are-watching-the-english-fa-cup-final/498166/22 "2009-05-31T21:26:43Z")
There was something about over-inflated viewing figures for sporting events not too long ago. Ah, after a quick go on the ol’ Goog, here you are: [TV’s great viewing mirage - Or how what was said to be a global audience of a billion turned out to be just eight million.](http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/general/tvs-great-viewing-mirage-768839.html) > [@](#): > > November’s so-called “clash of the Titans” match in the Premier League between Manchester United and Arsenal reported before kick-off to be a game that would draw one billion people globally actually attracted, ahem, less than one per cent of that figure. Yesterday’s report says the total world-wide in-home audience was 8m people, with a reach of 27m. > > Before the game, a Premier League spokesman was quoted as saying: “It is no exaggeration to say it could be watched by one billion people.” But, as a League spokesman clarified yesterday, the emphasis should have been on “could be”. > > The game was screened in 203 territories, and potentially in 611m homes. The reality is that only a tiny fraction of those who could watch, did watch. Official figures from Broadcasters’ Audience Research Board (Barb) show the live audience was 1.477m people on Sky Sports in the UK. This was the single largest market. The rest of Europe, combined, added a few million more. North America and South America together added fewer than a million. The balance was in Asia. And from a [blog](http://www.adambowie.com/weblog/archive/002361.html): > [@](#): > > … plenty of reports claim that “an estimated 1bn people watched the Premier League game between Arsenal and Manchester United in November 2007.” > > I don’t know who was doing the estimating, but they’re wrong. > > The reason for the billion estimate was because the game was airing in primetime in the Far East. Everyone knows that countries like China are finding English football ever more popular. Except, that of course, while the population of the country is roughly 1.3bn, comparatively few of them can watch football. It’s a premium commodity! > > But as of the end of last year, WinTV which bought the rights to Premier League games for three seasons from the start of this one, only had 20,000 subscribers. ---
**Author:** ![Wakinyan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wakinyan/32/352_2.png) [@Wakinyan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wakinyan)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2009, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-are-watching-the-english-fa-cup-final/498166/23 "2009-05-31T21:35:34Z")
I live in Sweden, and while the Champions Leage were all over the place – even though there is no competitive Swedish team in that leage – I didn’t know that there has been an FA Cup final recently, at all. Based on that, although very acecdotal of course, I’d say that there is not a very big interest in this game outside of Britain. - So I don’t believe the figures, but what the do I know? ---
**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2009, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-are-watching-the-english-fa-cup-final/498166/24 "2009-05-31T21:40:03Z")
I think that the figure is the subject of conflation of two ideas: a) The number of people who watch a match, and b) The number of households/people who have the possibility of watching a match. For example, here in the US, the match **could** have been watched by well over 150 million people, one supposes, based solely upon the fact that their cable system offered it. The number who will have actually watched it is a tiny fraction of that amount. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2009, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-are-watching-the-english-fa-cup-final/498166/25 "2009-05-31T21:59:57Z")
> [@DSYoungEsq](#): > > I think that the figure is the subject of conflation of two ideas: > > a) The number of people who watch a match, and > > b) The number of households/people who have the possibility of watching a match Quite right. ‘Potential audience’ is a more correct term, and one which it’s possible to encounter at times, but not in publicity being pushed out for any upcoming fixture. Edit: even then, ‘potential audience’ tends to be replaced with ‘the total population of the countries with which we have broadcast agreements’, which is different again. ---
**Author:** ![chowder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/977dab/32.png) [@chowder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chowder)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2009, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-are-watching-the-english-fa-cup-final/498166/26 "2009-06-01T06:58:58Z")
> [@Chez\_Guevara](#): > > I defy anyone to find a football thread during the past 3 years in which you haven’t pulled this kind of shit. > > Every football fan on this message board knows your views on Manchester United so for Christ’s sake, give it a fucking rest. Dear oh dear, who pissed in your cornflakes then?. Anyways: It never does any harm just to remind people just what my views are on you know who. Keep reading, betcha I pull this kind of shit again;) ---
**Author:** ![fiddlesticks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddlesticks/32/18129_2.png) [@fiddlesticks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fiddlesticks)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2009, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-are-watching-the-english-fa-cup-final/498166/27 "2009-06-01T17:22:45Z")
> [@DSYoungEsq](#): > > I can remember WAYYYYYYYYYYYYY back when (1970 something) when the FA Cup final was shown on Wide World of Sports. Arsenal were in the final; beyond that I don’t recall much about it at all. That was back when WWoS showed all sorts of **interesting** things on a Saturday. 🆒 It was on at 9am here too…by the time I remembered it was on, it was over. That FA Cup final on WWoS probably was cut up between segments of ice boat racing from Lake Geneva Wisconsin and some bits of the Monaco Grand Prix, with Jackie Stewart commentating. Followed by pro bowling and the dulcet tones of Chris Schenkel. The good ol’ days, indeed. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2009, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-are-watching-the-english-fa-cup-final/498166/28 "2009-06-01T18:20:40Z")
It was on Canal+ in Spain, which automatically means several thousand bars showing it, plus the people who saw it at home. I don’t know how many actually watched, but if anybody who was in a bar while the TV was showing it got counted, that can be a lot of people. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-many-people-are-watching-the-english-fa-cup-final/498166.md?page=1)