On July 20, the Women’s Football World Cup begins, one of the main sports events of the summer on television, between the Tour de France, the basketball and rugby world championships, those of swimming and athletics or, less prominent, the fencing world championships and the volleyball Euro.
If sport is so acclaimed by the channels, it is because it is one of the rare television genres that is resisting the erosion of audiences. But there is no place for all disciplines, and sports competitions find themselves in competition.
In this little game, the most practiced sports are not the most majestic, reveals an analysis of the Decoders.
Summary :
Football, king of TV From rugby to cycling, bonus to conservatism From judo to ping-pong, these underexposed popular sports Biathlon, American football, pétanque… the surprises of the PAF From padel to golf, bonus to premium Mechanical sports, shows without practitioners Gym, twirling, skating… These hidden feminine practices
Football, king of TV
Let us immediately dismiss the extraordinary case of football with its unparalleled practice, exposure and attention. It’s simple, apart from the presidential deconfinement address, no program has ever done better than the 24 million viewers of the Argentina-France final on December 18, 2022 in Qatar. “If you ask all the channel bosses, they will all tell you that they want to broadcast the World Cup final,” says Jérôme Saporito, director of the television division of L’Equipe.
“There is no other genre where you have more than 15 million viewers”, abounds Frédéric de Vincelles, director of sports programming at M6. Among its many assets, a feminized audience since the victory of the Blues in 1998, which attracts advertisers; a one hour and forty-five hour format convenient to insert into a program schedule; and, finally, an ability to attract the younger generation, reputed to be low on the couch. Hence the high prices. For the 2023 Women’s World Cup, despite matches at staggered times, France 2 and M6 paid around 10 million euros.
But at such an amount the broadcaster is “almost never profitable”, assures Frédéric de Vincelles. Channels are paid through direct (subscriptions, advertising) and indirect (increase in average annual audiences, renegotiation of advertising rates, audience rejuvenation, self-promotion, etc.) benefits. In 2016, the France-Portugal Euro football final on M6 attracted 21 million viewers, 5 million of whom followed the Quantico series the next day, the trailer of which was broadcast at halftime.
From rugby to cycling, a bonus for conservatism
Far behind, rugby is the second most exposed sport. A World Cup final with the XV of France can bring together 15 million viewers. “But in terms of the practitioner-visibility ratio, it is clearly overrepresented,” notes Marine Lallement, president of the Fast Sport agency, which publishes a report on the most popular sports every year. “It’s a sport that has a premium image, plays on its values ??and has always been a pioneer in terms of TV exposure” thanks to the Six Nations Tournament, continues Ms. Lallement.
Well helped by its languid tempo, cycling comes third. A stage of the Tour de France can attract up to 8 million viewers. Above all, “it has a heritage dimension, notes Christophe Lepetit, head of economic studies at the Center for Sports Law and Economics (CDES) in Limoges. It’s the Tour de France before it’s the Tour de France, and it comes at a time when people have time.”
A similar phenomenon explains the exposure of Roland-Garros, with 6.5 million viewers on the match point in 2023. our veins”, judge Jérôme Saporito. Football, rugby and cycling have, in fact, in common to be regulars of the small skylight, and safe bets for broadcasters. Even if it means, sometimes, making other sports, which are nevertheless very popular, invisible.
From judo to ping-pong, popular underexposed sports
They have many practitioners, but their airtime remains marginal. “Other sports [than football or rugby] could be profitable but we don’t give them a chance”, regrets Natacha Lapeyroux, doctor of the Sorbonne-Nouvelle University in information and communication sciences. On the one hand, rather chilly chains. On the other, federations that are struggling to make these sports attractive.
Small screen professionals qualify: the popularity of a sport is not enough to make it telegenic. Like judo which, outside the Olympic Games (JO), has never convinced on the air. “It’s full of different takes with Japanese names, with differences that are not very obvious, and even with four slow motions we don’t always understand well”, regrets Jérôme Saporito. “A game can last twelve seconds. On TV, it’s not great,” adds Frédéric de Vincelles.
“Some sports do not have the assets to seduce,” says Arnaud Simon, former director of Eurosport, now a consultant. Fencing has to deal with cold and impersonal equipment, table tennis and badminton with supersonic exchanges, etc.
While some disciplines are inherently conservative, others nevertheless try to innovate. Fencing thus develops the lightsaber, which is more pop and telegenic. As for table tennis, in full modernization of its image, it hopes to surf on the media explosion of the brothers Félix and Alexis Lebrun, prodigies of 16 and 19 years old. They bring “storytelling, a boost!” enthuses Saporito.
At the height of the final, L’Equipe channel was close to reaching the 500,000 viewers it had hoped for when Félix Lebrun won the European Games at the end of June. The start of a revival? “One year from the Olympics in Paris, there is an alignment of the planets,” wants to believe Gilles Erb, president of the French Table Tennis Federation.
Biathlon, American football, pétanque… the surprises of the PAF
Other unexpected sports have done well to break through. A pair of skis, a rifle, and a French world champion: this is the recipe for the “fairy tale” of biathlon, as Arnaud Simon calls it. Eurosport was one of the first channels to smell it in the 2000s. a strength of audience,” he recalls.
Biathlon has been around since the heyday of The L’Equipe channel, with an average of 700,000 viewers in 2021. In view of its less than 1,000 licensees, it is the TV sport par excellence. “It’s still a show, we must be able to understand the issues in a simple way”, demystifies Jérôme Saporito. “Biathlon, we all start from a line, it’s simple; in the rifle there is a target, it is very visual. »
The sense of spectacle is also what explains the overexposure of American football. It’s a sport “very televisual, very well filmed, hyper-energetic and modern”, argues Olivier Moret, national technical director of the French American Football Federation, “an ultra-qualitative production”, confirms Jérôme Saporito, whose channel broadcasts 17 matches of regular season. He takes advantage of the aura of the Super Bowl, 380,000 night viewers, peak, in France, in 2023.
But it is also possible to shine inexpensively, without stars. Petanque, despite a very Provençal rhythm, accumulates nearly a hundred hours of exposure. “It’s not very expensive to broadcast,” says Marine Lallement – some federations, such as Basque pelota, even offer image rights for visibility. Petanque is however able to bring together 490,000 viewers in total for its flagship tournament. His secret? A very “franchouillard” aspect, assumes Jérôme Saporito, in practice as in the prize list. Ideal for a free channel.
From padel to golf, premium to premium
In the case of pay channels, the number of practitioners of a sport is less important than its standing. And for good reason: they target a more affluent clientele, likely to spend ten to forty euros each month on leisure. A more recent example, padel, which has become “the fashionable sport”, notes Marine Lallement. This young Mexican variant of tennis has joined the Canal grid, with a pool of practitioners estimated at 366,000 people, in full swing. “It’s an urban sport, rather CSP, the chains are sensitive to it. For Canal, it’s a reservoir of subscribers, ”confirms Ms. Lallemant.
It is added to other sports reputed to be reserved for well-to-do, even bourgeois people. “Horse riding is typically the kind of sport that triggers subscriptions with fans,” notes Christophe Lepetit. Similarly, golf was broadcast as much as pétanque, but being a sport deemed “rich”, it was only on pay channels. Ditto for tennis, excluding Roland-Garros.
Another problem common to Canal, BeIN Sports and others: the need to be part of the long term rather than one-off events, hence their appetite for long championships. “These are loss leaders, for which we are looking for a soap opera aspect” to avoid unsubscriptions, explains Christope Lepetit.
Mechanical sports, shows without practicing
Sometimes television exposure and actual practice are completely unrelated. “Some sports are almost exclusively entertainment, like Formula 1 [F1]; others almost exclusively practices, such as hiking, “says Sabine Chavinier-Rela, sports sociologist at CDES. Thus, motor sports fill the program schedules despite a number of licensees almost nil.
The reasons are pragmatic. F1 is a fashionable spectacle: its audience, of 1.21 million viewers on average in 2021, has doubled in seven years, driven by the success of the documentary series Formula 1. Pilots of their destiny, on Netflix. “The effect was enormous, it fell during confinement, the audiences were very rejuvenated and feminized”, analyzes Christophe Lepetit.
Motor sports could have seemed out of time. “The success of F1 goes against everything in terms of ecology,” admits Jérôme Saporito. But the organizers play it. Thus the young formula E, showcase of electronic cars; or even the Extreme E, a mixed SUV rally through lands disrupted by climate change, broadcast by the M6 ??group. “There is an eco-responsible dimension which seemed interesting to us”, testifies Frédéric de Vincelles.
Gym, twirling, skating, hidden feminine practices
Finally, one last observation: the progression of women’s sport is deceptive. Certainly, football and rugby have developed, as shown by the Women’s Football World Cup. “It does not cost very much in broadcasting rights compared to men, with real returns on investment”, recontextualizes Natacha Lapeyroux. “When there is the female counterpart of a broadcast, now we broadcast it”, commits Jérôme Saporito, example of the female Tour de France in support. But at the same time, disciplines historically practiced by women have become marginal on the channels.
Gymnastics is thus content with crumbs, twirling has never been broadcast in 2022 and figure skating only owes its exposure to the Beijing Winter Olympics. They pay a dip in terms of French performance, competition formats that have not been modernized much, or even a lack of flagship events, outside the Olympics. “Today these images are often lost in the background of the grid, we have the impression of no longer seeing them”, admits Christophe Lepetit. Joining the forgotten sports of TV.