Tennis on Social: Game Over For Nadal

Have you been watching the French Open last week? Using social listening, we have analyzed over 729,000 social results to retrace this first few days of the tournament from a social media perspective.

The Top Stories Of The French Open 2016 On Social Media

The French Open would not be a Grand Slam tournament if it did not come with its share of drama. Here are the top three moments that got people talking on social during the first week of the French Open:

  1. Rafael Nadal retires from the French Open: the Spanish player took the tennis world by surprise when he announced that he had to withdraw from health reasons in an impromptu press conference on May 27th.
  2. Rafael Nadal defeats Sam Groth to get to the second round: the Spaniard had started the week well, breezing past his first opponent with spectacular shots that generated much comments and shares on social media.
  3. Richard Gasquet reaches the quaterfinals after defeating Kei Nishikori: one of the dreams of the French tennis nation is to see a countryman win the tournament, a feat that has not happen since 1983!

talkwalker statistics roland garros results over time

The top three moments from the first week of the 2016 French Open, according to Talkwalker’s social media analytics.

Video Content Catches Fire on Twitter

As marketers, we always try to figure out what works and what doesn’t on social. 2016 is without doubt the year where visual content is king, and this trend is obvious at the French Open. The most engaging tweet of this first week was a short video featuring an amazing passing shot by Rafael Nadal during his short encounter with Sam Groth (over 8460 retweets!).

roland garros tennis

With the help of Talkwalker’s virality map, you will be able to retrace the buzz generated over time by this single tweet:

roland garros tennis virality map

Virality Map Talkwalker Social Listening French Open Small shout out to the managers of the official Roland Garros Twitter account, who managed to get three of their tweets in our top 5 most trending posts on Twitter over the last week. Aside from the news breaking “Rafa retires from the French Open” tweet, tennis fans loved the videos of jaw-dropping points, such as this crazy exchange between Agnieszka Radwańska and Barbora Strycova during their third-round match!

tennis Agnieszka Radwańska and Barbora Strycova

Three Influencers To Follow on Twitter If you’re like me, you’re probably always looking for good people to follow during important events. Based on our influencer table, here are three Twitter accounts that might be interesting to follow for the newt few days:

Ben Rothenberg

Ben Rothenberg (@BenRothenberg)

Type of influencer: journalist

Number of Twitter followers: 44,985

Why: lots of tweets about the tournament, and a good average of engagement per mention

Kristina Mladenovic

Kristina Mladenovic (@KikiMladenovic)

Type of influencer: tennis player

Number of Twitter followers: 76,590

Why: a view from the inside – the talented French player just got ousted from the singles by the legendary Serena Williams, but is still playing in the doubles tournament

Nick McCarvel

Nick McCarvel (@NickMcCarvel)

Type of influencer: journalist

Number of Twitter followers: 10,282

Why: high quality tweets, you’ll feel like you’re sitting next to him at the French Open

Do you need more social insights from the French Open? Or do you wonder how much a brand benefits from sponsoring a sports event such as Roland Garros? Contact us now to talk to one of our social media experts.

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Banner image: CC/Flickr/Yann Caradec

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