Our media partner SPORT2021 was just as successful as the German national ice hockey team at the 1 World Championships in Riga in the title fights. SPORT1 regularly recorded remarkable numbers and sometimes even records in its broadcasts. On the one hand, this was due to the inspiring performance of national coach Toni Söderholm's team, but on the other hand, it was also due to the excellent and professionally high-class reporting with the trio Laura Papendick, Rick Goldmann and Basti Schwele at the top.
They are among the faces of German ice hockey and were, in a sense, the ambassadors of the captivating games DEB-Selection. During the entire World Cup period from May 21st to June 06th, SPORT1 showed a total of 31 games from Latvia on free TV, including all ten games of the German national team. Overall, an average of 870.000 viewers aged three and over (Z3+) tuned in to the ten German World Cup games. In addition, during the live broadcasts with presenter Papendick, commentator Schwele and expert Goldmann at the forefront, the million mark was broken six times and the two million mark once.
A new all-time record in the history of SPORT1 is the market share of German live games of 5,4 percent among total viewers (Z3+) and 9,5 percent in the core target group of men aged 14 to 59 (M14-59). Interest in the #IceHockeyWorld Cup was also greater than ever before on the digital SPORT1 platforms: Overall, SPORT1 recorded over five million live stream views throughout the entire tournament on SPORT1.de, in the SPORT1 apps and on the SPORT1 YouTube channel. The most successful live game of the 2021 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship was the German semi-final against Finland, with over 2,7 million viewers (Z3+) watching on TV and an average of 1,77 million viewers (Z3+).
In addition, with the extremely close 1:2, outstanding market shares of 10,9 percent were recorded among the total viewers (Z3+) and 17,0 percent in the station's core target group (M14-59). For SPORT1, these are the second-best figures for an ice hockey broadcast in the station's history, behind the German semi-final at the home World Cup in 2010. In total, around 1 million viewers tuned in to SPORT2021 for the 13 World Cup games. All of these numbers speak for themselves and document that the World Cup and the national team's performances were very well received by spectators. Also at the other international matches in the 20/21 season, especially at Deutschland Cup and in the direct preparation for the World Cup, good ratings were achieved with our partners MagentaSport and SPORT1. We would therefore like to thank our partners for their support and the on-site production of the games, which was not always easy due to the pandemic, but was still always high-quality. The DEB is happy to have two long-term partners in SPORT1 and MagentaSport, who also support the topic of ice hockey beyond our partnership.
