Why some people hate football is still a mystery to me. Why would anyone not love something as exciting, suspenseful, and intriguing as football? You may wonder.
But the haters continually say things like, "it's a sport for the weak," "it takes too long, and it's too boring," "there's nothing spectacular about it, and it's just a bunch of weak men running around."
Well, at the end of the day, everyone is entitled to their opinions. But regardless of what either I or any football hater thinks about the beautiful game of soccer, there's no denying the fact that football is the most-watched sport in the world.
Take the 2018 FIFA World Cup finals in Russia, for instance. That event was watched by almost half of the world population, with FIFA claiming that they recorded over 3.5 billion TV viewers.
If you also need to easily find out the calendar of the next football games on TV you can head to TVsportguide and find the TV channel that broadcasts that match.
With such figures, it is always going to be hard for anyone to argue against the popularity and superiority of football as compared with other sports. Sorry football haters, but facts don't lie!
And we are not here to argue about whether or not football is more popular than other sports because that's a stale argument, one that has already been won by football a thousand times. But instead, we're here to look at a number of reasons why this sport is the most-watched across the globe. For more updates, You can browse www.lines.com
#7 Soccer video games
Football is the most-watched sport in the world because of the excitement people get from its gaming experience. About 90 percent of young soccer fans today play soccer video games like Pro Evolution Soccer and FIFA. Now, while these games are quite exciting on their own, they tend to imbibe a certain degree of love for the sport in players.
In an attempt to know more players, the best teams, and learn better strategies to beat their friends, young soccer video game players make themselves acquainted with the sport.
"FIFA is a major reason why I began to watch soccer more frequently as a young boy. And I'm sure there are so many boys out there like me too," said Ricardo Alvarez, a young Spanish football fan. He continued, "I wanted to be better than my friends so badly that I just had to watch the sport more often so as to learn new tricks, get updates on formations like the 4-3-3, 4-4-2, etc."
#6 Lifestyle of its athletes
Football is home to some of the finest people on the globe as athletes. And I'm not talking about people with pretty faces or handsome smiles, but the crème de la crème of the sporting world. Talk of players like Neymar Jr, Lionel Messi, and the ever-impressive Portuguese, Cristiano Ronaldo. When you go on social media, these guys are the most followed; talk of the richest athletes, these guys are amongst the wealthiest; and of course, their lifestyles are often a model upon which many people live their lives.
#5 More entertaining than a telenovela
If football was a storyline, trust me, it would be more exciting than any telenovela series, if not even the greatest work of all time.
Drenched in intrigues and plot lines that would be considered too outrageous by the writing team of a Netflix miniseries, soccer features every bit of plot you would have expected to find in a perfect TV series.
Football features betrayal (footballers leaving their club to go to a rival club crosstown) and heartbreaks (teams losing matches at the death after appearing for so long like the favorite to win). It also features celebration, jubilation, love, tragedy, comedy, transactional deals, politics, hate, love, and of course, relationships.
What makes these plots even more exciting is that they're happening in real life, so there's always a shred of true emotion that goes with everything you feel.
#4 It's a working man's sport
Almost everybody alive today gets their hands all tied up from Monday to Friday and from morning till night. As a result, we are always in search of any form of entertainment at the end of the day or week that will entertain us while we relax and cool off after the long day or week that we've had.
This is the theme of the existence of almost every man alive today! According to former England international and Chelsea midfielder Alan Hudson, football was the "working man's bullet," where people went to be entertained after a hard week.
But, these days, the game is even available on TV, social media platforms, and everywhere. Just open a browser on your smartphone or visit a social media platform, and a football game or news will be the first thing to greet you. Now, you can watch while on break at work, back at home in the evening or at the end of the week. There's always a match happening somewhere to entertain you.
#3 Everybody is watching it
Perhaps this is the psychology of the game. It is a well-established fact people tend to do this when they see others doing it. They want to join the bandwagon, keep up with the Joneses and feel among. As a result, everyone wants to watch what everyone is watching, which in this case is football. Due to this, even those that weren't really attracted to the sport at first are now beginning to join the moving train.
#2 The matchups
Big games are one of the reasons why people die over soccer, why siblings argue till daybreak, and why so many can't just get enough of the sport. The excitement that comes with football matchups can never be matched in any other sport.
For all the fuss about the Tyson Fury vs. Deontay Wilder fight or the Roger Federer vs. Novak Djokovic game, matchups like El Clasico (Real Madrid vs. Barcelona), UEFA Champions League Finals, etc. will always be considered as being more exciting because of the drama that encapsulates these types of games pre-match and post-match.
Football is the most-watched sports because of the kind of matches it produces. The rivalry, the history, the players, and the results are enough to blow anyone away.
#1 TV rights deals
This is, by far, the biggest reason why football is the most-watched sport in the world. For a fact, we know that there's barely any home in the world today without a TV set. And on these TVs are sports broadcasting stations and media houses, such as ESPN, BT, SKY, Digi, Nova Sports, BeIN Sports, and lots more.
Now, whenever there is a major football event happening, these TV stations will most likely push aside every other sporting event and focus on football. Not because they rate football over other sports but because of the huge TV deals that come with football events.
As a result, even if you don't plan to watch a football match, you may be left with no choice but to watch it because that's what sports TVs are showing.
