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viable. The South African pay-per-view sports channel has helped transform Super Diski, its flagship league, into the richest and most commercially viable top-flight league in Africa with massive financial rich pickings for its member clubs, their owners, their players and technical staff.
SuperSport have also changed the landscape in the domestic top-flight leagues in Kenya and Zambia, through strategic partnerships, and the two nations are beginning to reap benefits as the standard of their domestic game improves and spectators are wooed back to the stadiums.
While a glut of Zambian players played in the Zimbabwe Premiership, between the turn of the millennium and around 2006, given that it was paying better than the league north of the Zambezi, fewer players from that league are now coming to ply their trade here because the conditions of service in that top-flight league have improved significantly.
Zimbabwe has been losing a number of its finest crop of players to Super Diski, during every transfer window, and it’s now almost guaranteed that every player who is honoured as the Soccer Star of the Year in this country ends up crossing the Limpopo to play in South Africa.
The last two players to be crowned Soccer Star of the Year — Washington Arubi and Denver Mukamba — both of Dynamos were snapped by Super Diski clubs and the Harare giants, alone, have lost five star players, including Rodreck Mutuma, Takesure Chinyama and Simba Sithole, in the past year.
This has had a negative impact on the domestic Premiership, with falling attendance figures driven by fans who turn their back on the game because it lacks the star quality of its big-name players who end up being caught in the Super Diski net, and this has also hit the finances of clubs in a very big way. While it will certainly take years for the domestic Premiership to reach a stage where its clubs can compete with the Super Diski clubs, in terms of remunerating their players and coaching staff, big clubs like Dynamos, Highlanders and CAPS United should be in a position to compete with some of the smaller clubs in South Africa like Black Leopards.
SuperSport wants to help in turning the domestic Premiership into a commercially viable entity and is committed to leaving a great legacy, through live coverage of the top-flight league, and development of production crew personnel as they work in partnership with the Castle Lager Premier Soccer League.
Head of SuperSport Africa, Andre Venter, told stakeholders of the local game, at a ceremony to mark the sports channel’s five-year-deal with the Castle Lager Premier Soccer League yesterday, that the top-flight league will not only benefit from being broadcast live in the Sub-Saharan region but its production crew will undergo training to equip them with world-class television broadcasting skills.
Speaking at the Celebration of Zimbabwean Football function in Harare yesterday, Venter said the ball was in the PSL’s court to have more matches screened and explore ways of how they could benefit more from the deal.
“SuperSport is delighted to be part of the reawakening of one of the giants of football,” Venter said.
“This season SuperSport will air a minimum of 60 matches spread across 20 weekends. Actually more matches can be screened and pressure is on the Castle Lager Premier Soccer League to do the right things and then more games will be screened.
“As it is we have invested in an OB Van (Outside Broadcasting Van) which will be coming soon to Zimbabwe in a few weeks time and this will open more horizons for sport in this country.
“To achieve the goal of leaving a lasting legacy, we have already enlisted services of a local production crew and will soon start investigating the use of vernacular in our commentary.
“The local technical people will also benefit from a programme called GIFT which is meant to train these people so that the package assembled by SuperSport in Zimbabwe, is produced by Zimbabweans, for the Zimbabweans.
“We prefer to be partners wherever we go because we can easily broadcast games and leave but we want to work with the league, leave a legacy through lots of initiatives that we are making in outside broadcasting.”
SuperSport took the domestic Premiership leaders to Germany last week to learn how the Bundesliga was run and how it has transformed itself into one of the best leagues in the world.
“In Germany, where we went together with the PSL chairman and chief executive, we met with administrators from the Bundesliga and sat down with them to get to understand what makes their league successful, obviously taking into account that in a few weeks we might have an all-Germany Champions League final,” said Venter.
“As a result we want to offer the opportunity to learn to those who want to. We have launched a programme to train our camera crew to have world class experience and we will also have a brand new vehicle coming soon as the current one is loaned from Kenya.
“It has been a while until the coming of this partnership. After many discussions we now have a partnership, something that we can work on going forward.
“We are impressed by the quality of football coming on television. We will do more if the PSL is willing to do more and offer us opportunities to broadcast more games.
“If the PSL can give us the opportunity to do more then it will open new horizons which is what we can do to bring sport to all Zimbabweans. We are here for the long haul and we hope one day to look back with pride and say we have done so much.”
Venter said the budget was yet to be finalised but the production of matches in a single weekend coughs out R550 000. A minimum of 60 matches spread across 20 weekends are expected to be aired this season.
So far 11 PSL matches and three NetOne Charity Shield encounters have been televised live.
Zifa chief executive, Jonathan Mashingaidze, said the cementing of the SuperSport and Castle Lager Premier Soccer League relationship will go down as a new chapter to be written in the country’s football Golden Jubilee history books.
“The coming in of SuperSport will enable the beaming of the greatest moments in our game, not everyone can afford to be at Gibo, Dulibadzimu or Mandava and they will be able to watch from their homes,” said Mashingaidze.
“After all the negative things that have been said about our game this is the chance to re-christen our game and witness a change.
“The arrival of SuperSport also marks the opportunity for clubs to up their stakes and widen the interest of corporates. I would like to assure SuperSport that the FA wants to see more frontiers being opened.”
PSL chairman, Twine Phiri, said the onus was on them to listen to SuperSport’s concerns and immediately work on any weaknesses to maintain the deal that they clinched.
“A course for the 16 Premier League clubs is in the offing and the training of the production crew proves that everyone is benefiting,” said Phiri.
“I think there is a lot to be learnt, they have said they are impressed with our work and we should keep learning.”
PSL chief executive, Kennedy Ndebele, said they were committed to assembling a perfect football package that will change the face of Zimbabwe.
“It is important for clubs to improve on match organisation. We are committed to working together for the good of the game,” said Ndebele.
“With the support of our sponsors, partners, media and fans, the PSL is sure to grow by leaps and bounds.”
Multichoice Zimbabwe Chief executive, Lovemore Mangwende, said SS9 channel was now available on the family bouquet in addition to the Premium, Compact and Compact Plus bouquets making the local game accessible to more people.
In addition to live matches, a magazine show covering the history of the PSL, the clubs and players will also be broadcast.
Online Reporter