With a stunning World Cup victory for Mexico over Germany, Sunday was a big day for Fox Sports — though the ratings highlight didn’t actually come out of Russia.
Fox Sports’ coverage of the PGA’s U.S. Open final round outperformed its coverage of soccer, earning a 3.6 overnight rating among metered market households. That score, for coverage that aired on the broadcast network and not the cable channel, was a shade better than in 2017 — and, compared to English-language soccer coverage, performed 13 percent better in early returns. Fox Sports’ cable high of the day indeed came with the Mexico-Germany game, fetching a World Cup best thus far with an average 3.2 rating among metered market households.
But was golf really Sunday’s big winner? Not by a long shot. Telemundo scored the single best telecast of the day with the Spanish-language coverage of Mexico-Germany, netting a substantial 4.3 overnight rating. It is sure to rank as a Sunday best for the network, airing its first World Cup as part of a three-series deal that will take it through 2026.
Combined, the Mexico win earned an average 7.5 rating among metered market households on Sunday. It easily ranked as the biggest event of the TV day, the weekend and stateside coverage of the World Cup thus far. (Meanwhile, down in Mexico, coverage scored an estimated 26 million viewers.)
As for golf, coverage did peak with 6.1 rating. The 3.6 average was for sustained coverage over nearly 9 hours.
