with 520 million euros in revenue, the competition is profitable – Liberation

2023-08-18 12:11:06

FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023fileFans around the world have responded to the women’s competition, the second sporting event in the world that has generated the most money according to Fifa.

The enthusiasm is there. The FIFA Women’s World Cup, co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand this summer, ‘exceeded $570 million [520 millions d’euros] of turnover, which allowed us to reach the break-even point”, welcomed this Friday August 18 the president of Fifa, Gianni Infantino. “We haven’t lost any money and this is the second most money-generating sporting event, with the exception of course of the Men’s World Cup,” he said. A successful bet for Gianni Infantino, while the flagship competition for female footballers was subject to economic uncertainties until the last moment.

The president of Fifa is full of praise for his competition, “the biggest and best of all time”. Such results “show that our strategy was not too bad. Of course, we still have to do much better, but we are on the right track, ”supported the Italian-Swiss, re-elected in March for a new term running until 2027. All was not won for the World Cup women’s football, which was struggling to find broadcasters, particularly in France. Barely a month before the first match of Les Bleues, a co-broadcasting agreement had been reached between France Télévisions and the M6 ​​group, following a lengthy sequence of negotiations. Fifa’s financial ambitions were deemed too high.

Records d’audience

Finally, the supporters of the nations in competition responded present and the matches of Les Bleues broke audience records in France – even if they remain lower than those of the audiences of the French men’s team. Fifa last February announced record revenues for the 2019-2022 cycle of some $7.6 billion, up 18% from the previous period. The Federation has also tripled the endowments compared to the 2019 edition in France, bringing the winning fee to a historic total of 152 million dollars (135 million euros).

The quarter-final, disputed by France and Australia, alone represents 69.6% of audience share and 5.7 million viewers. Followed by the August 8 match where Les Bleues faced Morocco and the July 29 match between France and Brazil, having won 45.7% and 36% audience share respectively.

Gianni Infantino believed in it hard as iron. He defended this year the choice to expand the Women’s World Cup to 32 participating selections, which until then had only 24. “They said: it’s not going to work, the level is too different, you will have scores of 15-0 will be bad for women’s football and its image,” he said. “But I’m sorry, Fifa was right. We had many countries around the world who thought they had a chance to participate. Everyone now believes there is a chance to shine on the world stage,” assured the boss of world football. This ninth edition of the World Cup was marked by the emergence of new nations, such as Jamaica, Morocco and South Africa, which reached the knockout stage for the first time.

The competition ends this Sunday, August 20 in Sydney and will see Spain and England compete, two selections which had never before set foot on the lawn of a World Cup final, and which dream of adding their name on the charts.