TV News South Africa

Every Rugby World Cup second live on SuperSport

SuperSport has revealed that its broadcast sponsor for the Rugby World Cup is Vodacom. This comes after SuperSport acquired the PAY TV rights to broadcast all 48 Rugby World Cup games live, from the 10th October until the 22nd November 2003.

SuperSport will also be the exclusive broadcaster of two quarter finals and one semi-final. Due to the national interest in the sport, the channel has sub-licensed the rights for Rugby World Cup to the SABC, which effectively allows them to air 50 percent of the games.

SuperSport will feature dual commentary on all the South African games with local experts such as Naas Botha Kobus Wiese, Joel Stransky and Chester Williams. International experts who will also offer their commentary include Zinzan Brooke and Jason Little.

In addition to the usual channel and programme offerings for advertisers on SuperSport, there will be a magazine programme offering every night, as well as an opportunity to 'own' Super Rugby on the SuperSport Zone channel (Channel 20) for the duration of the tournament.

SuperSport also launches a new rugby chat show, called 'Down Under', which will be broadcast live from the International Broadcast Centre in Sydney, Australia. It will feature behind- the-scenes action and be presented by high-profile former rugby players. There will also be a new magazine programme, which will be broadcast from an OB facility in Boktown, a village in Perth, consisting mainly of ex-pats.

These announcements were made public at a recent industry function hosted by Oracle Airtime Sales, at Melrose Arch. The event was televised on SuperSport the same evening, due to the support it received from the industry and the attendance of several rugby celebrities, like Breyten Paulse.

Oracle Airtime Sales SuperSport Manager, Fahmeeda Cassim-Surtee, confirms that there will be additional value for Rugby World Cup advertisers in the form of global coverage on BBC World's, Sport Today as well as Sky Sports News. "We will also broadcast Rugby World Cup editions of the SuperRugby magazine programme on kykNET and SuperSport 1 and we have also created a special programme for the Rugby World Cup on SuperSport 1, CSN and M-Net, which features the highlights and focuses on previews and reviews."

"Furthermore we have created a total magazine programme package, where advertisers can buy one spot for every magazine programme before and during the Rugby World Cup," says Cassim-Surtee. We also have a live games package which makes one spot available in every live game. That is a total of 48 spots."

Bookings for the competitive packages on TV and Internet are now open.



Editorial contact

Grapevine Communications
Linda Peigl
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