Record Audience for ESPN2's FIFA World Cup Draw

Last Friday's Final Draw for the 2014 FIFA World Cup on ESPN2 averaged 489,000 viewers and 353,000 households, based on a 0.3 U.S. household rating, making it the most-watched FIFA World Cup Draw on the ESPN networks, according to Nielsen Media.

The audience grew by 34 percent in viewers and 14 percent in households over the previous high for a World Cup Draw on ESPN's networks. The 1994 World Cup Draw held in Las Vegas on Sunday, Dec. 19, 1993 was seen by an average 364,000 viewers and 309,000 television households.

The Draw telecast for Brazil 2014 featured host Bob Ley and pundits Michael Ballack, Alexi Lalas, Steve McManaman and Santiago Solari analyzing the placement of the 32 World Cup finalists into eight groups of four teams for the round robin matches in the group stage. The U.S. Men's National Team drew Germany, Ghana and Portugal in Group G. The Mexican Men's National Team was placed in Group A with host nation Brazil, Cameroon and Croatia.

The top five markets were: Las Vegas (1.2), Baltimore (0.8), Miami (0.8), Cincinnati (0.8) and Orlando (0.7).

ESPN Digital Media:

On digital platforms (source: Adobe Analytics), the World Cup Draw generated a total of 10.9 million page views (up 49 percent compared to the 2009 Draw), 19.2 million minutes and 2.3 million video starts for the day across ESPNFC.com and the ESPN FC mobile Web, the latter of which accounted for 42 percent of total digital page views traffic (up from only 10 percent in 2009). Specifically, ESPNFC.com recorded its second biggest day for video starts since it launched in August 2012 and logged 1.6 million unique visitors (up 21 percent), while the ESPN FC mobile Web registered 875,000 unique visitors (up 425 percent).

Live ESPN2 coverage on WatchESPN and the world feed on ESPN3 collectively generated 189,500 unique viewers and 5.2 million live minutes, making it the most-watched live event on WatchESPN on Friday, Dec. 6.