Brazil 2014: 26.36m Germans watch Germany-Portugal (4-0), for 81.8% audience share

The German public broadcaster ARD had 26.36m viewers on average for the first match of the German team in the 2014 World Cup against Portugal (4-0, Salvador) on 16/06/2014, which represents an audience share of 81.8%, the channel reported on 17/06/2014.

The opening match of the 2014 World Cup (Brazil-Croatia, 3-1, on 12/06/2014) brought in 15.87m German viewers for ZDF (the World Cup is broadcast on both ARD and ZDF, the two public broadcasting groups).

The first match of the German team at the World Cup 2010 against Australia (4-0, 13/06/2010), brought in 28.03m viewers (74.4% audience share). The ratings record for ARD was established during the 2010 World Cup semi-final between Germany and Spain (0-1, 07/07/2014), which got 31.3m viewers (83.2% audience share).

The French team's first match of the 2014 World Cup against Honduras (3-0 in Porto Alegre, 15/06/2014) was watched by 15,841,000 viewers on average in France on the free privately owned channel TF1. These were the year's best ratings in 2014 for all channels by number of viewers.

• The final of the German Cup in 2014…