Astonishing Scotland vs Portugal YouTube viewing figures revealed

IT was the first Scotland home match in 30 years to not be broadcast on linear television.

But that didn’t stop a staggering number of people tuning in on YouTube to watch Scotland vs Portugal.

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With neither Sky, Premier Sports, the BBC or ITV/STV picking up the rights to the Nations League games against Croatia and Portugal, there were fears it could lead to a total blackout.

But Viaplay stepped up – if only to stream the match live on their YouTube channel.

That feed was also provided to the SFA who used their own channel to beam the crucial Hampden clash.

The final viewing figures are startling and offer food for thought going forward on the consumption of Scotland games and could convince a broadcaster to acquire the rights outright.

On Viaplay’s channel a total of 516,000 watched the match.

Whilst over on the Scotland channel a whopping 870,000 tuned in, bringing the total to just shy of 1.4MILLION.

That dwarfs the viewing figures for both of the matches shown by ITV4 in the last round of fixtures.

Of course, this time round there was a certain Cristiano Ronaldo in town to help boost interest.

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Scotland vs Poland at Hampden last month brought in 600,000 whilst Portugal vs Scotland attracted 900,000 viewers.

It’s also over a million more people than watched the historic victory over Spain in 2023, which was broadcast on Viaplay’s man channel to 323,000 people.

And when Scotland beat Israel in a 3-2 thriller at Hampden in a World Cup qualifier, 500,000 watched that live on Sky Sports.

Scotand and Portugal drew 0-0 with Portuguese skipper Ronaldo storming off the pitch in a huff.

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