A record number of Canadian viewers again rallied around Canada’s men’s national team at the FIFA WORLD CUP QATAR 2022™, with the team’s match against Croatia on Sunday attracting an average audience of 4.4 million viewers on TSN, CTV, and RDS. Sunday’s match surpassed the team’s opener vs. Belgium to become the most-watched FIFA WORLD CUP™ Group Stage match on record, according to preliminary overnight data from Numeris.
Canada vs. Croatia becomes the second-most-watched sports broadcast of the year behind SUPER BOWL LVI, and the third-most-watched FIFA WORLD CUP™ match on record. It also led to TSN and CTV ranking as the first and second-most-watched networks of the day on Sunday, respectively.
Overall, the match reached 9.8 million unique Canadian viewers, with more than one-in-four Canadians tuning in to watch some or all of the live broadcast on Sunday. Audiences peaked at 5.4 million viewers at 11:30 a.m. ET as the two teams battled to what concluded in a 4-1 victory for Croatia.
The FIFA WORLD CUP QATAR 2022™ is uniting viewers across the country, as a total of 18.8 million unique Canadian viewers have tuned in for live game coverage on TSN, CTV, and RDS, accounting for nearly 50% of the Canadian population.
Additional weekend highlights from Group Stage coverage on TSN, CTV, and RDS include Argentina/Mexico on Saturday, which attracted an average audience of 1.8 million viewers, and Spain/Germany on Sunday, with an average audience of 1.5 million viewers.
TSN’s official social media accounts continue to attract major engagement around the FIFA WORLD CUP QATAR 2022™, including 76 million video views on TikTok, as well as 15.9 million views on YouTube, resulting in 1.4 million hours in total YouTube watch time.
Canada returns to the pitch on Thursday, Dec. 1 against Morocco, with pre-game coverage beginning at 7 a.m. ET on TSN and CTV, and 9 a.m. ET on RDS, as well as the networks’ respective websites and apps.
Source: Numeris, P2+ Total Canada, PPM era (Post 2009), Preliminary Data; Subject to Change.
