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The absence of Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in the coming Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket season may be a big disappointment for fans here but will not put them off from watching IPL matches, according to Prasana Krishnan, Executive Vice-President and Business Head, Sports Cluster, Sony Pictures Networks India (SPN), which has exclusive television broadcast of VIVO IPL.
CSK was one of the most popular teams in IPL, and whenever the team played, the television rating was high. However, IPL as a brand and its popularity is extremely high in the State.
“We are fairly confident that we will have good response from the State in the coming season,” he told newspersons on unveiling the regional plans for VIVO IPL 2016.
When CSK matches were played last year, the television rating was 10-15 per cent higher than an average non-CSK team match. However, this season there may not be such occasional spikes in rating from Tamil Nadu due to absence of CSK, he said. This year, revenue for IPL will be 15-20 per cent higher than last year, he said without giving any number. In fact, this year, well before the start of the tournament, Sony Pictures announced that all sponsorship slots were closed.
Krishnan said that SPN’s regional campaign for the IPL season, which starts on April 9, will strengthen the game’s reach through localisation of content.
The network maintained its commitment to its viewers by continuing the language feeds in Tamil, Telugu and Bengali for IPL season.
SPN started with the trend of regional language commentary last year. In Tamil Nadu, giving English and Hindi as the only commentary options will not do justice to fans. A lot of people want to watch the match with commentary in local language, he said.
The English feed will be available on Sony ESPN and Sony ESPN HD channels. The Hindi feed on Sony Max, Sony Six and Sony Six HD. The Tamil, Telugu and Bengali language feeds in Sony Six, he said.
The first match of Vivo IPL 2012 will be between Mumbai Indians and Rising Pune Supergiants at 7 pm on April 9.
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