Tennis is the sport in which most Australians are interested, according to a new report by sports research consultants, Sweeny Sports.
The tenth winter edition of the Sweeny Sports Report found that despite no Australian player being ranked in the top 50 of the world’s tennis players, almost six of every ten people (58%) are interested in tennis. Swimming, the most popular sport from 2000 to 2004, is the second most popular, with more than half the population (54%) interested in it while football, ftfh on the list of favourite sports with 50 per cent interest, was the only sport in the top seven to post an increase in interest, although it was marginal.
The Report calculates ‘interest’ by combining data about the proportions of adult Australians in capital cities who participate in, attend, watch television programs, listen to radio broadcasts, read print media reports and use the internet for information about each sport.
Football's gains were primarily the result of growth in attendance – a four percentage point increase to 18 per cent of the population, making it the third most attended sport behind AFL and cricket. It was also the only sport to post gains, although very slight, for all media – television, radio, newspapers, and Internet.
Swimming, the second most popular sport, posted the biggest loss in interest during the winter, mainly because of a fall in television viewing compared with the winter of 2007 when Melbourne hosted the FINA world swimming championships. A decline in participation of seven percentage points to less than one of every five people (18%) also contributed to the negative result.
The Report also found that contrary to the trend of decreasing newspaper circulations as internet news services become more popular, print media readership about sports has reached record levels for most sports: almost one of every five people (19%) sources print media for Australian Rules football information, more than one of every six (16%) for cricket information and one of every ten (10%) for Rugby League information.
Internet usage for sporting information has continued to increase but only marginally during the past year, Australian Rules (12%) being the favourite sport followed by Rugby League and football (10% each).
