Swedish fans glued to their screens as EHF EURO final is watched by millions

There was no surprise that the Men’s EHF EURO 2022 was a huge hit in Sweden with millions glued to their screens to celebrate their national team’s success.

Swedish broadcaster TV6 recorded outstanding television audience figures which peaked at 2.1 million viewers watching their dramatic last-gasp 24:23 victory over Spain.

The figures were the second highest ever recorded in TV6’s history with the final ranking in the top five list of the most-watched sports events ever on streaming service Viaplay as Sweden toasted a first Men’s EHF EURO title in 20 years.

The final also captured the imagination of fans in Spain, with over 1.7 million watching on Televisión Española (TVE), with those figures equating to a 13.6 per cent market share.

As ever the interest during the championship attracted big numbers of viewers in two handball-loving nations, Denmark and Croatia.

Denmark’s run to winning a bronze medal – their first medal of any colour since 2014 – was followed with massive interest from the Danish public. Almost 1.5m tuned in to witness their semi-final defeat to Spain, while a market share more than 80 per cent was recorded to witness their win over France in the third-place match.

The big Balkan derby between Croatia and Serbia – that saw Croatia come out on top in the preliminary round match – was seen by almost one million viewers which was a market share of more than 50 per cent.

Millions of pairs of eyes also watched the action unfold in Germany – the destination of the next Men’s EHF EURO in 2024. On average almost five million fans in the country viewed the games as the national team reached the main round.

Co-hosts Hungary also recorded encouraging viewership numbers with total broadcasts on television in the country reaching 2.7m – one third (31.5%) of the Hungarian population.

During the 18 days of the championship, M4 Sport and M4 Sport + live broadcasts or repeated matches accounted for 195 hours of handball coverage, with almost half a million tuning in to watch the Hungarians’ match against Iceland – the most-watched match of the competition in Hungary.

The competition was screened in 114 countries and territories around the world and EHFTV, the EHF’s OTT platform, saw over 500,000 unique users visit the channel throughout January with over 63,000 users watching the final.