The Premier Soccer League (PSL) on Friday announced that SuperSport International won the five year broadcast rights of the local soccer competition starting from the 2012/13 season.
This is a renewal of the PSL’s deal with SuperSport which was signed in 2007 and was set to end when the current 2011/12 season concluded.
The PSL sent out notices to tender for the rights at the start of July.
The new deal, the PSL said, would be worth well over R2-billion over five years, to improve on the current deal of R1.6-billion.
SuperSport will also receive internet and mobile rights as part of the package to take advantage of the increasing new media, said PSL chairperson Irvin Khoza.
“We have finalised the adjudication of these rights with the adjudication committee that included myself, Kaizer Motaung [Kaizer Chiefs executive chairperson], Goolam Allie [Santos chairperson], John Comitis [Ajax Cape Town shareholder], Mato Madlala [Golden Arrows chairperson] and Zola Majavu [PSL chief executive],” said Khoza.
“We need to be clear that it wasn’t just the money that influenced us but we looked at the growth and enhancement of our product on our current deal where we moved from being 30th ranked league in the world to the top ten.”
Khoza and his ‘clever’ board
Imtiaaz Patel, who is the group chief executive of SuperSport’s parent company MultiChoice, said he was delighted with the renewed partnership.
The station, however, still has to provide some matches to free-to-air channels.
“Unfortunately because of the private clause that we signed, and for other broadcasters that also submitted tenders, we cannot give the exact amounts,” said Patel.
“But it’s a vote of confidence on the PSL and a clear sign of the responsive relationship that we have with each other.
“I’ll also say that it was Khoza and his very clever board who managed to extract the maximum deal possible from their partners.”
Recession fears
The PSL board of governors still have to sit down in order to map the way forward in terms of possible monthly club grant increases and where it can also benefit the national first division.
Though, there will need to be some considerations done on ensuring that there is no money lost with another recession been forecast for the next year or so, said Khoza.
“We are planning on sitting down with the rest of board to discuss the budgets for 2012 going forward that will also include the first division,” he said.
“But we have to draw something with some considerations and have to be careful with the recession that might hit.” — Sapa