As further proof of SuperSport’s commitment to Kenyan football, its popular magazine programme Soccer Africa will be broadcast from Nairobi on Thursday, September 25.
The programme will be screened to DStv audiences in over 40 African countries on SuperSport 3 at 21:00 CAT and will be filmed on location at the SuperSport stand at the AITEC African Broadcast and Film Conference.
This latest development follows on the recent signing of an agreement between SuperSport and the Kenyan Premier League and the subsequent live broadcast by SuperSport of the Kenya-Namibia World Cup qualifying match.
Soccer Africa will include interviews with officials from SuperSport’s African league partners in Kenya, Nigeria, Zambia and Angola, offering insights into how the sponsorship has improved football in these territories. There will also be in-depth feedback about the status of each of the leagues in these regions and footage of a recent visit by SuperSport to a school in Nairobi.
SuperSport’s commitment to the African cause
Not just a world class sports broadcaster and the leading sports broadcaster in Africa, SuperSport is also committed to the development of sport across the continent.
SuperSport’s involvement in a number of areas across the continent, from substantial sponsorship deals of major leagues to the development of players’ skills, coaching and staff development, will be highlighted at next week’s African Broadcast and Film Conference in Kenya.
SuperSport had already formed partnerships with the Kenyan, Nigerian, Zambian and Angolan leagues. Besides live broadcasts of matches, the most pressing issue is the expansion of the broadcasting infrastructure in these regions.
To this end, SuperSport has invested in five fully-equipped, state-of-the-art Outside Broadcast vehicles (two in Nigeria and one in each of Kenya, Zambia and Angola) at a total cost of US$ 12.5 million. These will all be fully operational by the end of October this year.
SuperSport has also introduced training programmes for production crew in Nigeria and will roll out similar initiatives in the remaining territories in the near future. After two seasons in Nigerian football, SuperSport now has a full complement of Nigerian crew to take control of live match broadcasts. The recent Nigerian FA Cup was broadcast live, to great acclaim, using a Nigerian crew.
Apart from covering live football in these territories, SuperSport is also developing related television programming for football in these countries. Each of the sponsored leagues has magazine shows dedicated to local football – NFL Highlights in Nigeria; Simba Super Soccer in Kenya; Mpila Zambia and magazine shows for the top three clubs in Angola, Petro Atletico, Interclube and Primeiro Augusto.
The next step for SuperSport in terms of production will be the building of local studios to further customize SuperSport’s coverage in these territories. The studio in Nigeria is complete and operational and already hosts studio build-up for Nigerian League and Italian Serie A football as well as their weekly league round-up.
The sharing of resources across the continent is also vitally important to SuperSport. Part of the company’s sporting development in South Africa is the partnership with Wits Business School in the running of the Sports Management Programme. Invitations to attend this course have been extended to sports administrators in both Kenya and Zambia.
Also at development level, the players are benefitting as well. During the recent SuperSport Under-19 Cup held in South Africa, for the first time, teams from Zambia and Nigeria were invited to take part.
These SuperSport initiatives will unearth the talent on the continent and bring to the world “the beautiful game in Africa”. All the SuperSport channels are available exclusively on DStv to audiences continent-wide.
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