MUMBAI: Cricket craze in India is probably the higher than in any other country in the world is a cliché. It is normal for Indians to sit eyes glued to the idiot box as their male team players chase or hammer leather. Women’s cricket had not fascinated the average Indian until this year during the ICC Women’s World Cup 2017 in which their braveheart lassies’ made it to the finals – winning every match till then. The finals of the World Cup between women from India and England on July 23 saw ratings breach an unprecedented 19.533 million impressions (All India) according to Broadcast Audience Research Council of India (BARC) data. More rural impressions were recorded at 9.962 million than urban which were slightly lower at 9.571 million. However, in the case of all the other matches that India featured in saw higher viewership from urban markets than rural markets.38.6 percent more men watched the match than women – to put in numbers – men and women viewership was 11.346 million and 8.187 million impressions respectively.

The breakup of networks was 14.263 million impressions (8.286 million male and 5.977 million impressions female) on the Star Sports Network and 5.27 million impressions (3.06 million male and 2.211 million impressions female) on DD National.

The India-England final witnessed a reach of 13.7 million. Indian women played only one match that they won quite convincingly by 95 runs against India’s arch foe and neighbour – Pakistan. This was match 11 on 2 July 2017. The match scored 2.933 million impressions on an All India basis. Reach-wise, the India-Pakistan match was sampled by more viewers than those during India-Australia semi-final match. The India-Pakistan match witnessed a viewership of 9.2 million whereas the semi-final saw a viewership of 6.5 million.

Please refer to the table below: (TG: All India, 2+)

A press release just after the final match circulated by Hotstar, the OTT platform on which the matches were also beamed, stated that India’s second-ever entry into a Women’s World Cup final had a peak concurrency of 1.9 million simultaneous viewers. And this happened in the tragic forty eighth over with India needing 11 runs to win off 12 balls. UP and Maharashtra contributed to 25 per cent of the total viewership on Hotstar.

From the UK, a record 1.1 million reportedly watched the final played between India and England. It was also reported that this figure was equivalent to the average audience that watched the popular Premier League’s Sunday afternoon matches, according to data from BARC India.