(28 June 2006 2:00 pm)

MUMBAI: If you thought that only men follow soccer think again! Soccer's governing body Infront's governing body Infront has announced the results of a study that show that women are increasingly following the football World Cup.

It thus reaches far beyond the traditional male football audience in its universal appeal.

Almost four in 10 viewers are women. The figures reveal that an impressive 37 per cent of the global adult audience watching the Fifa World Cup are women. Sponsorship Intelligence, a UK-based research driven consultancy appointed by Infront Sports and Media and Fifa Marketing and TV, has thus farcollated overnight ratings in 44 markets globally.

The audience in Argentina demonstrates the greatest equality – 50 per cent of the viewers are women. 44 per cent of Argebntian's viewership during the 2002 World Cup were women. Indeed, evidence to date, suggests that the Fifa World Cup TV audiences in Latin America especially Argentina, Venezuela, Uruguay and Mexico, are more gender-balanced than in many other parts of the globe.

In Korean 45 per cent of viewers in this country are reportedly women. This trend continues across Asia with audiences in Singapore and Malaysia comprising 45 per cent and 41 per cent women respectively.

Germany has experienced a 17.6% percentage upsurge in the number of women viewers since the 2002 Fifa World Cup (40 per cent versus 34 per cent) and the Netherlands (38 per cent ), Hungary (38 per cent) and Switzerland (37 per cent) also experienced substantial increases.

The female viewership figures are higher for Portugal (43 per cent), Italy (42 per cent) and Serbia (40 per cent). Major football markets like the UK and Spain are not far behind, with 36 per cent of viewers being women. In France, the figure is 34 per cent.

However in the Czech Republic and Greece the World Cup is mainly watched by men. 24 per cent of women watch the World cup in these two countries.