Semrush, the SaaS platform for online visibility management and content marketing, has carried out an analysis to understand the main trends in the world of football. However, as fans and casual viewers prepare for one of the biggest sporting events in the world, brands, streamers and the media are bidding for the audience’s attention.
Last dance of Cristiano Ronaldo and Messi?
The expectation is maximum before what could be the last World Cup of the two footballers who have marked an era. Even in the final stretch of their career, Cristiano Ronaldo and Leo Messi (13 and 8 million online searches on average in 2022 worldwide) stand out widely in online popularity globally, more than in the last World Cup in Russia 2018, and above other footballers who have starred in more recent successes.
Neymar (6M), leader of Brazil, closes the podium of the three most sought-after players in the world, followed by Kylian Mbappé (2.7M), a classic figure on the networks in 2022 after the soap opera of his failed transfer to Real Madrid and his renewal with PSG last May.
Not far from the striker is his compatriot and recent Ballon d’Or winner, Karim Benzema (1.9M)who on his return to the French team aspires to help his country revalidate the title of world champion, something that has not happened since Brazil He did it in 1962. Among the French couple is the Polish forward of FC Barcelona, Robert Lewandowski (2.5M), whose signing this summer for the Catalan club has made him one of the names of the year.
Last-minute injuries and well-known absences such as those of Erling Haaland, Mohamed Salah or the Italian team, fosters a ranking full of old acquaintances. Luis Suárez (1.6M), Casemiro (1.5M), Frenkie de Jong (1.4M), the only player under thirty on the list along with Mbappé, and Gareth Bale (1.3M) close the top 10 of The most followed soccer players in the World Cup.
Pedri, the most wanted Spaniard
Regarding the players that have generated the most interest since the last edition of the World Cup, Semrush has detected that Pedri, the young Barça player from the Canary Islands, He is the most sought after Spanish footballer for the World Cup. The Spanish is followed by three Manchester United players; the Brazilian Antony, signed last summer, Harry Maguire, the questioned captain of the English club, and the Brazilian Casemiro, who changed Madrid for Manchester in August. The data, however, indicates that both Pedri and Antony were unknown four years ago, which explains their significant growth.
Semrush data shows that interest in the World Cup in Qatar is not even between genders. According to the web domains analyzed by Semrush Trends, those interested in this type of research are mainly men (67%), aged between 25 and 34 (30%) and 35 and 44 (21%). However, according to Nielsen, women are more interested in the World Cup than in any other soccer competition.
In the United States, according to the Semrush Keyword Magic tool, searches related to “women’s national soccer team” eclipse the equivalent in searches of the men’s team, a trend that has been going strong for several years. Even more notable is that, with 2022 a year without a Women’s World Cup, Alex Morgan, star of the US women’s soccer team, surpasses his potential male counterpart, Chelsea star Christian Pulisic, in online popularity.
Although the 2022 World Cup is an anomaly in the calendar, interest in traveling to the emirate has been increasing in the last year. The Semrush study points to a 70% increase in searches for “flights to Qatar”, and more than 137% in those related to “cheap flights to Qatar”, although they could well be private queries after the great tourist promotion that the country has done in recent years.
Real Madrid and the Premier League, the most sought after club and competition
To get a complete picture of the state of soccer in the world, Semrush has also analyzed the clubs and competitions that generate the most traffic online. The Premier League (58 million average searches per month in 2022) is the most popular tournament, followed by Serie A (52M), and the Champions League (37.5M). Outside the podium appear LaLiga (28M), the Bundesliga (19M), and Ligue 1 (16.5M).
Regarding the most popular soccer clubs in the world, Real Madrid is the team most searched for on the Internet globally, with an average of 37.5 million searches in 2022. The top 5 are completed by Brazilian Flamengo (37.2M ), Manchester United (36M), Liverpool (35M), and FC Barcelona (34M). The list of the ten most sought-after clubs is closed by PSG (33M), Palmeiras from Brazil (26M), Corinthians, also Brazilian (21M), Arsenal (17M) and Juventus (13M), making a total of two teams. Spaniards, three Brazilians, three English, one French and one Italian among the clubs with the most Internet searches in the world.
