ICC Women’s World Cup Final Creates a New Record on Hotstar

India's leading video on demand platform, Hotstar today announced record viewership for the ICC Women's World Cup 2017 final match played between host England and India. For some it may be surprising to hear this news but for me it is something which was expected and I have my reasons for that. Let me take you 12 years back  to 2005 when India was in Finals, Mithali Raj led the team and lost to Australia in the pen ultimate match. Next day we woke up to the news, not covered with great depth but many of  us came to know that India is represented in Women Cricket as well and not only that we have reached till finals. May be that was the only peak point of popularity at that stage. But 2017 is different, its different in many ways, the advertisements are  at the par of the men tournaments, the internet penetration is way too high and the accessibility is again one another factor. Thanks to apps like Hotstar which have made it possible to seamlessly stream live matches on the go.

Indian Women Cricket Team posing for cameras

From the very first match when India beat England by 35 runs, it was part of the discussion even though the Indian fans were just coming out the shocker of Champions Trophy defeat in Finals. The players were now being called by name, they were no longer discussed as statistics. Smriti Mandhana became national crush and Harmanpreet Kaur's 171 run made her a household name. Mithali Raj became the highest ODI scorer in women's cricket. India defeated the defending champions Australia in Semi-Finals. All this was not going to go un-noticed. 

The match peaked in the contentious 48^th over with India needing 11 runs to win off 12 balls, recording a peak concurrency of 1.9 million simultaneous viewers. This was higher than the average concurrency of many of the marquee men’s cricket tournaments on Hotstar in the last year, a feat in its own right and an inflection point in women’s sports. While Vivo IPL 2017 saw a predictable list of state-wise tune-ins, consistent with team loyalties, the Women’s World Cup saw a surprise entrant in UP, which along with Maharashtra, contributed to 25% of total viewership.

This is just the beginning, the sports has already garnered much support and recognition from local audience with this tournament we believe and wish there is more to this success story.