STAR launches dual feeds for three of its major events

The network has acquired exclusive television broadcast rights of FIFA Confederations Cup Brazil 2013, which will be telecast on STAR Sports and ESPN (parallel matches).

STAR India's sports network that now has six channels has announced that it will telecast dual feeds for three of the major sporting events coming up in the month of June. The Wimbledon 2013 (considered as the oldest tennis championship in the world), FIFA Confederations Cup Brazil 2013 (recently acquired sporting event) and FIFA Asian Qualifiers; all these events have parallel events (read matches) going on. Owing to this, the network will telecast dual feeds on two matches.

Wimbledon will be telecast live and exclusive on STAR Sports 2 and ESPN, for its upcoming season (June 24 -July 7). Until the last season, the finale of the event was simulcast on Doordarshan. This year, however, the event remains an exclusive property of ESPN-STAR Sports. With the dual feed plans, the hours of content will be doubled (obviously depending on how long the matches get stretched), thereby doubling the airtime.

On an average, for a tennis match, there is about 10-12 minutes of airtime per hour, although the number of hours per match cannot be pre-decided. Through this dual offering, the network will showcase almost 150 hours of live coverage this year.

The ongoing tennis championship, French Open, is already being telecast on dual feeds on Nimbus sports network's Neo Sports and Neo Prime.

FIFA Confederations Cup Brazil 2013 will also be telecast on STAR Sports and ESPN, with dual feeds to accommodate the parallel matches. The event will start on June, 15 and will go on till June, 30. Apart from this, Asian Qualifiers for 2014 FIFA World Cup will be telecast in dual feed on STAR Sports and STAR Sports 2.

While the network is clearly pushing the newly launched channel, the media observers agree that the network has enough sport content to pump another channel.

The Canadian Grand Prix, as always, will be simulcast on STAR Sports and ESPN HD between June, 7 and June, 9. The network simulcasts many of its major properties on SD and HD channels. The network, like last year, is simulcasting ICC Champions Trophy Cricket 2013 (May 30 - June 23) on STAR Cricket, Star Cricket HD (with English commentary) and STAR Sports 2 (with Hindi Commentary).

MotoGP will be simulcast on STAR Sports and ESPN HD on June, 19. The second day of the race (June, 29) will be telecast only on ESPN. The US Open Golf Championship 2013 will be simulcast on ESPN and ESPN HD between June, 10 and June, 16. The British Grand Prix will be telecast on ESPN.

The line-up of countries in the newly acquired event, FIFA Confederations Cup Brazil 2013 includes hosts Brazil and Spain, along with Mexico, Uruguay, Japan, Nigeria, Italy and Tahiti.

In an official communiqué, Vijay Rajput, chief operating officer, ESPN Software India, says, "With such premium sporting action across sporting genres, our aim is to take the viewership of sports to a whole new level - be it through our quality of talent, look and feel of the presentation or through innovative production-led enhancements which help in creating an immersive experience for sports fans."

All these sports channels from the STAR network are available on leading DTH operators and MSOs like Airtel Digital TV, Videocon D2H, Reliance Digital TV, Tata Sky, Sun Direct, Hathway, Den, Digicable, Incable and GTPL, among others.