updated 5:38 p.m. ET July 7, 2006

BERLIN - Sunday’s World Cup final is expected to draw a worldwide audience of more than a billion, organizers said Friday.

“The TV rights have been sold to 200 countries,” said Wolfgang Niersbach, vice president of the local organizing committee. “I think 207 contracts have been signed. That’s more than the U.N. has countries.”

The U.S. Census Bureau estimates the current world population at 6.5 billion. The United Nations, meanwhile, has 191 member countries.

The 2002 tournament in Japan and South Korea drew a cumulative TV audience of 28.8 billion in 213 countries with 1.1 billion watching the final, according to FIFA. That was down from 33.4 billion at France ’98, no doubt due to the time difference in the Far East. The cumulative audience is expected to exceed 30 billion this time.

FIFA sold the TV rights for the tournament for $1.22 billion.

Niersbach said there will be more than 3,000 journalists at Olympic Stadium to see the final between France and Italy: 1,800 print, 1,000 TV and radio, and 300 photographers. There will also be 66,000 fans at the game.

In the United States, ESPN is drawing a 1.9 rating, or 2,287,000 viewers and 1,735,000 households per match.

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Tuesday’s Germany-Italy semifinal delivered a 4.1 rating (3.74 million households), making it the highest-rated non-U.S. game ever on ESPN and the third highest-rated World Cup game ever on the network. The Portugal-France semifinal on Wednesday got a 2.6 rating (2.38 million households).

ABC is averaging 3,845,000 viewers and a 2.6 rating, while ESPN2 has averaged 1,147,000 viewers and a 1.0 rating. Overall, 90 million people have tuned into the World Cup on ABC, ESPN, or ESPN2, up 15% from the 78 million people who watched the World Cup on the three networks through the same point in 2002.

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