El Clásico between Futbol Club Barcelona and Real Madrid is now the match between two Liga teams that has been played the most times.
It is not only the most watched game in Spain but, with an average audience of over 500 million viewers, is also the domestic football match with the biggest audience worldwide.
In recent years, the only other sporting events that have superceded this figure are the Football World Cup Final in South Africa in 2010 and the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, which reached 700 and 600 million viewers respectively.
Not suprisingly, the magazine rated El Clásico Number One in “World Soccer’s 50 Greatest Derbies”.
Apparently, the term El Clásico didn’t come into general use until the beginning of the 21st century, when it became increasingly clear that this match between two of the biggest and most successful football clubs in the world transcended mere sporting rivalry.