Cricket World Cup drives Indians Down Under
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The impact of the Cricket World Cup on Indian travel plans has been revealed by Wego.com.
The travel search site has released data showing a spike in Indian searches for trips to Australia and New Zealand prior to and during the tournament, as the country’s fans started planning to watch their team, who were 2011 world champions, defend their crown.
“Australia and New Zealand have risen in popularity as a destination with Indian travellers over the past couple of years, thanks to effective marketing drives from tourism bodies, as well as greater airline connectivity,” said Jackson Fernandez, Wego’s managing director for India.
“Add to that the allure of attending the Cricket World Cup in some of the most atmospheric cricket grounds in the world, and Indian travel interest was bound to be ignited,” he added.
According to Wego’s data, Indian searches for Australia and New Zealand started rising between October and December 2014, for travel between early to mid-March, which was the timing of the initial group matches.
“The big jump in searches however, almost tripled for the final couple of weeks of the finals, from March 18 to 29,” Fernandez revealed. “With India at the top of Pool B, alongside New Zealand who top Pool A, Indian fans in attendance are in for some highly exciting final matches.
“It appears that, similarly to the World Cup in Brazil, Indians searched rather close to their selected dates with the majority of searches taking place for the final period from early January until now,” he added.
The most popular destinations among Indian travellers in the southern hemisphere were Melbourne, Sydney and Auckland, with a search spike of 250%. The majority of searches originated in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Bengaluru.
Delhi-Melbourne was the most searched route, followed by Delhi-Sydney and Mumbai-Sydney, while the highest number of searches for Auckland were from Mumbai.
Wego also noted that Indians prefer “four- or five-star accommodation”.
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