MORE than five million people tuned in to watch Emma Raducanu’s incredible Wimbledon battle with Aryna Sabalenka on Friday night.
Located in a prime time slot on BBC One, the match received the Beeb’s third-highest ratings for any non-final contest in the last three years, and the most of the this tournament so far.
The enthralling contest, which saw world No1 Sabalenka narrowly beat British favourite Raducanu 7-6 6-4, was watched by a peak audience of 5.32 million.
Raducanu’s brilliant third round effort also received more than 1.2 million streaming requests on BBC iPlayer.
The most watched non-final match of the last four years at Wimbledon was Raducanu’s fourth round with Lulu Sun last year, which peaked at 5.47 million viewers.
Second was Andy Murray’s battle with John Isner back in 2022, which peaked at 5.34 million.
This year’s tournament has already been a smash hit with viewers watching at home.
Across the first five days of the tournament, the BBC received more than 31 million online streaming requests.
This was a more than 50 per cent increase on last year’s numbers.
Raducanu’s three matches drew incredible interest from British fans, with Friday night in particular played in front of a raucous Centre Court crowd.
Fans have also been enamoured by matches involving fellow Brits Sonay Kartal and Cameron Norrie – as well as former champions Carlos Alcaraz and of course, Novak Djokovic.
Raducanu took the positives from her defeat on Friday night, even though she was naturally disappointed.
The British No1 said: “It does give me confidence because I think the problem before was that I felt like I was gulfs away from the very top.
“Having a match like that where I had chances in both sets, it does give me confidence.
“At the same time, it’s very difficult to take right now.”
After the match, Sabalenka tipped Raducanu to return to the top 10.
Expanding on that assessment during her press conference, the Belarusian added: “I cannot predict anything, but I’m definitely sure that, maybe not in a month, but maybe a bit longer period, she’s definitely going to get back to the top.
“She’s fighting. She’s playing much better. She’s more consistent. I can see that mentally she’s healthy. I think that’s really important. I’m pretty sure she’s getting there.
“About the atmosphere… sometimes my ears were really blocked from how loud it was, but I really enjoyed it.
“I was trying to trick my brain, and I was pretending that people were cheering for me. Sometimes when they were screaming ‘Emma’, it sounded like Aryna.”
Read the full article here