Rapid TV News
ESPN Star Sports promises cricket in HD
Rose Major ©RapidTVNews | 18-11-2008
ESPN Star Sports will broadcast the Champions League Twenty20 cricket event in high definition in India, the first broadcaster to unveil HDTV coverage of an event.
The tournament starts on December 3 and ESPN Star Sports, a joint
venture between ESPN and News Corp’s Star TV, has 10-year global rights
for the event, as well as now being the preferred bidder to be the
long-term global producer for the event.
A high definition feed of the tournament will make it the first HD
telecast for any sporting event in the Indian subcontinent. Quite how
viewers will access the feed is unclear as there are as yet no HD
subscriptions being sold by pay-TV platforms. But the HD coverage may
hurry plans operators have to offer HD services to their subscribers.
ESPN Star is also promising as many as 34 cameras at each venue to
cover all the matches, including Super Slo Motion cameras, aerial
cameras, a boundary-side field camera and a new mid-wicket camera to
highlight running between the wickets.
Manu Sawhney, Managing Director, ESPN STAR Sports, said: “With the
phenomenal success that we have had with inaugural ICC Twenty20 World
Cup last year, we are confident that we will be able to take this
exciting Champions League Twenty20 to new heights as well. This
world-class event will further reinforce ESS' position as the number
one choice for cricket fans for years to come."
Broadcasting the event further cements ESPN Star Sports’ growing
importance in cricket coverage in Asia, a key sport in the region. The
broadcaster already holds exclusive telecast rights to International
Cricket Council events until 2015 and has deals with Cricket Australia
and the England and Wales Cricket Board. However, it missed out on
rights to the hugely-popular Indian Premier League (IPL), which the
Champions’ League Twenty20 event is competing against.
And the news came just a day after ESPN Star Sports celebrated another
rights win, renewing soccer’s UEFA Champions’ League rights in Malaysia
and Brunei and agreeing a new deal for Chinese overage of the league.
The Chinese deal covers English-language pay-TV rights for three years
from next season and includes rights to the UEFA Europa League, a total
of over 350 matches should ESPN Star Sports broadcast them all.
In Malaysia and Brunei, ESPN Star Sports maintains exclusive pay-TV,
broadband and mobile rights for all matches in the Champions’League, a
total of 146 games and including UEFA-produced magazine shows.
© Rapid TV News 2008
