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Euro 2016: The Players, Brands and Fans Winning the Euros on Social

After almost a month of non-stop football (or soccer if you prefer!) Euro 2016 is drawing to a close with the final to be played this weekend. Throughout the tournament, we’ve been tracking social media discussions with our live Euro 2016 dashboard. We’ve seen people from around the world post close to 100 million tweets supporting their teams and brands trying to muscle in on the incredible global exposure major sports events can provide. In this blog we’re going to highlight some of the players, brands and fans who made this year’s Euros come to life, based on Talkwalker’s social media analytics.

*Note: As Euro 2016 has now finished our tournament tracker is no longer live. You'll find here some live social media insights on the 2018 World Cup

Ronaldo, Payet and Bale Star on Social

Appropriately, the three most mentioned players at the tournament were from 3 teams that made it to the semi-finals – Cristiano Ronaldo of Portugal, Dimitri Payet of France and Gareth Bale of Wales. All three have scored key goals to help their respective teams reach the final stages and it’s Ronaldo who comes out on top with over 240,000 mentions over the course of the tournament so far.

talkwalker statistics

Outside of players, one of the key people discussed at this year’s tournament was England manager Roy Hodgson who resigned after England’s 2-1 loss to Iceland.

Coca-Cola and Adidas Win Battle of the Brands

While the teams battle it out on the pitch, around the stadium, on TV and of course on social media, the world’s biggest brands are battling it out to catch the attention of the millions tuning in on every media channel. This year’s winners (so far) on the visual side is Coca-Cola with their logo featuring in double the number of posts of second place Continental.

most visible sponsors at euro 2016

Coca-Cola’s player-themed products made an especially big impact, inspiring fans to post photos on social

Adidas, by contrast, had relatively little logo visibility but made up for it with their sponsorship of major teams like Germany making them the sponsors most associated to Euro 2016 in text . Posts like the one below from Germany Star Mesut Ozil, are what helped Adidas get top spot.

most mentioned sponsors at euro 2016

Read our case study to find out more about the top brands at Euro 2016

#TUR Fans Light Up The Euros

Team hashtags are always a great way for fans to support their team on social media and at the Euros it was the Turkey fans who made the most noise. In fact there was a gap of almost 2 million mentions between #TUR and second place #POR for Portugal. At Euro 2016, fans were given extra encouragement by a great sponsorship campaign by Telecoms giant Orange who decided to light up the Eiffel Tower in the colours of the team who’s fans used their team hashtag the most each day.

The Moment of the Tournament: Iceland Beats England

Close your eyes England fans. The biggest moment of the tournament so far (excluding the opening day of the tournament) came when tournament minnows Iceland overcame England 2-1. It was one of the biggest upsets in Euros history and social media caught fire delivering some memorable tweets like the one below.

talkwalker statistics

That’s our quick round up of the tournament so far based on social media data with just two games left to play. If there are any social media moments that caught you eye at Euro 2016, let us know in the comments below! For more insights on how brands like Adidas. Nike, Carlsberg and more made the most of Euro 2016, download our case study “Euro 2016 Sponsor Showdown – Ranking the Top Brands at Euro 2016 Using Social Listening”

read the full case

Banner Image made using images from Flickr: Robin Mansson

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