Saturday night’s thrilling penalty shootout between the Matildas and France is likely to have gained the largest TV audience since Cathy Freeman won gold at the 2000 Olympics held in Sydney.
The nail-biting Women’s World Cup game has smashed a number of ratings records. Based on Seven’s preliminary data, the tense penalty shootout between the two teams had a peak audience of 7.2 million. There was an average estimated audience during the game of 4.17 million.
This would mean it is the most-watched television event in Australia in more than 20 years. Back in 2000, it is estimated that a record 8.8 million viewers watched Cathy Freeman’s iconic 400-metre final at the Sydney Olympics.
The Matildas v France game’s adjusted average audience of 4.17 million included a national broadcast audience of 3.69 million viewers on Seven (2.62 million in the capital cities) plus 472,000 viewers on 7plus. It is the #1 TV program of the year.
The 472,000 viewers on 7plus makes the Matildas v France game the biggest streaming event ever seen in Australia.
According to the preliminary, non-adjusted OzTAM data, the game peaked at 4.43 million viewers on broadcast and dominated its broadcast timeslot, scoring an 81.2 per cent commercial audience share in total people, 85 per cent in 25 to 54s and 91.2 per cent in 16 to 39s.
So far, Seven’s coverage of the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023 has reached 11.9 million broadcast viewers plus another 2.3 million on 7plus. More than 269 million minutes of content has been watched on 7plus to date.
The Matildas will now take on England in the Semi Final, to be played at Stadium Australia in Sydney this Wednesday, 16 August, with coverage on Seven and 7plus starting at 7.00pm AEST.
