About 10 days into the 2024 Summer Olympics, known officially the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad and branded as Paris 2024, we are witnessing what could be the highest attended sporting event ever on the planet. So far, based on attendance, Tour de France has been known to bring in about 12mn-15mn spectators each year. We could see this eclipsed by Paris 2024 as the city prepares to welcome 15+ mn people
In terms of viewership, Paris 2024 has already begun to break records. As per reports from SportsPro Media
- On WBD’s platforms, total unique streaming viewers for Paris 2024 has already exceeded the entirety of those who watched Tokyo 2020
- The average minutes consumed per viewer for watching this year’s Olympics is up 63 per cent compared to the previous edition. Viewers across Europe have consumed almost one billion minutes of Paris 2024 coverage across WBD’s direct-to-consumer (DTC) platforms Max and Discovery+.
- Five times more streaming viewers have watched Paris 2024 compared to the same period of the 2020 Games
Can we safely say Summer Olympics is the biggest sporting event on the planet? By many estimations, yes!
While the games are getting in full flow, we will concentrate on football in this blog. Football has been included in every Summer Olympic Games as a men’s competition sport, except 1896 (the inaugural Games) and 1932 (in an attempt to promote the new FIFA World Cup tournament). Women’s football, however, was added to the official program only at the Atlanta 1996 Games
The men’s quarter-finals are being played today, 2nd August, while women’s quarter-finals will be tomorrow, 3rd August
In the men’s football, it’s important thing to note that the squad composition is to be restricted to players under 23 years of age, with three permitted exceptions. The rule came to be in force from the 1992 Barcelona Olympics as FIFA put various barriers in place for players competing, one of which is the age restriction, because it didn’t want any event to possibly usurp the World Cup as the premier international football showcase. Since Olympics isn’t really a FIFA-sanctioned tournament, clubs are not entitled to release the players
Nevertheless, we still expect to see some fascinating football from the qualifying sides. Below given are the squad market values of the quarter-finalists
By comparison, the women’s football tournament is a full senior-level international tournament, second in prestige only to the FIFA Women’s World Cup. As we mentioned in our earlier blogs, women’s football is still in the developing stage. As a result, a complete listing for squad market values of all women’s teams are still not listed
To conclude, representing the country in any event is a matter of immense pride. We wish the young guns at the men’s football and the women all the very best
May the best teams win!
