MUMBAI: Off late the ICC Cricket World Cup has been the most talked about event on digital platforms, with most official broadcasters providing live online and mobile streaming and users consuming digital content on the go.
For millennial population, who have been born in 21st century, social media has emerged as the most preferred channel to consume cricket content.
According to TO THE NEW Digital’s holistic metric called Social Impact Index, the top five batsmen on social media have been Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers, MS Dhoni, Chris Gayle and Brendan McCullum.
Kohli got 44 per cent of his positive mentions for his century against Pakistan on 15 February, 2015. His negative mentions saw another spike around 3 March, 2015 on his abusive remarks to the journalist. His Net Sentiment Score is +6 per cent, which would have been better if not for this incident. Kohli has lost his mentions mostly to the other performers in the batting lineup namely Shikhar Dhawan, who has won some hearts on social media with his mentions increasing 1,224 times on 22 February, 2015.
About 56 per cent of the mentions can be owed to AB De Villiers’ fiery innings of 162 against West Indies on 27 February, 2015. De Villiers has the Highest Net Sentiment Score of +42 per cent amongst all the players till now in CWC15.
Gayle’s stand out performance of the first ever Double ton in CWC15 was very well greeted by the social media audience. Gaylestorm received a whopping 78.56 per cent of his positive mentions for the innings on 24 February, 2015. Gayle has continued to impress his followers with his witty tweets and fierce batting attributing to a Net Sentiment score of +37 per cent.
Dhoni has been Social Media's favorite throughout CWC 15 and unlike others who received mentions basis their performances, Dhoni was the most talked about captain on the day of Cricket World Cup 2015 opening ceremony. Dhoni has also received good mentions during all the India matches and a Net Sentiment score of +8 per cent that can be attributed to his excellent captaincy throughout CWC15.
McCullum has been the most impactful player in the tournament for New Zealand with his brief but thunderous contributions with the bat which is quite evident from his Net Sentiment score of +12 per cent.
