Football's UEFA Champions League final has for the first time replaced the NFL's Super Bowl as the most-watched annual sports event.
The yearly report from London-based Initiative Futures Sports and Entertainment, found that both events continue to grow but the European football final is growing faster.
With 2009 not including a 'mega event' -- a Summer Olympic Games or a football World Cup or European championship -- it offered a chance to measure the two biggest annual sporting events.
The Champions League final between Barcelona and Manchester United, in May, drew an average audience of 109 million while the Super Bowl between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Arizona Cardinals in February, attracted three million less.
In terms of 'total audience', the amount of people who watched part of the event, the difference was larger with the Champions League pulling in 206 million throughout the game while the Super Bowl managed 162 million.
While the Super Bowl's audience was overwhelmingly domestic, UEFA's product appeared to be doing better in the battle for viewers globally -- in non-World Cup and non-Olympic Games year.
However, the good news for the NFL was that the 2009 figures were the most-watched Super Bowl.
The report also showed a much larger percentage of fans watched all of the Super Bowl than all of the Champions League final -- a key factor behind the American event's huge appeal to advertisers.
But European football was clearly outpacing the NFL in the key growth markets particularly in the key Asia-Pacific region.
Formula One's season-ending Bahrain Grand Prix was in third place with an average of 54 million, while the men's 100 metres final from the Athletics world championships was fourth with 33 million.
