The return of the Budesliga drew record ratings for Sky in Germany with more than six million viewers tuning in on Saturday to watch top flight European soccer for the first time since March.
Six games kicked off on Saturday behind closed doors due to the pandemic with a further two matches played yesterday, though we’re still waiting for ratings news on Sunday’s games.
According to specialist website DWDL.de, Sky Germany had 3.68M viewers watching the matches on its local subscription TV channels while an additional 2.45M viewers watched the ‘Konferenz’ – a simultaneous live broadcast of the five afternoon games – on Sky’s free to view news channel.
The big game on Saturday was Borussia Dortmund’s 4-0 thrashing of local rivals Schalke.
Sky Germany had a market share of 27.4 percent on their pay-to-view channels and 18.2 percent on their free channel.
The domestic figure is more than double the typical audience for a round of Saturday matches. The games were broadcast by more than 70 broadcasters worldwide, according to AFP.
The Bundesliga games also drew record numbers in the U.S.
UK, Italy and Spain are hoping to re-start their top flight soccer leagues next month.
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