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The launch of the new Premier League season next weekend will mark not only an important milestone for Spark Sport, but will also bring a boon to football fans in New Zealand.
Until now, Spark Sport was home to quite specialized sports, such as hockey, Formula 1 and World Rally Championships, as well as other little details.
All of this is fine if you are pbadionate about these sports, but maybe not enough to entice average sports fans to shell out $ 20 a month.
However, the arrival of Premiership football and WTA tennis this month, followed by the Rugby World Cup in September, marks the beginning of the maturity of the new sports broadcaster.
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"Our plan was that we needed three big blocks of content to launch 2019 for Spark Sport," said Jeff Latch, head of Spark Sport.
"One was Formula 1, the second was the English Premier League and the third was the World Cup.
David White / Stuff
Jeff Latch, Director of Spark Sport, explains that people tend to follow five to seven sports.
"It was our three targets and we were really excited to have all three of them.
"The Premier League is a huge opportunity for us, and what's exciting is that outside of the 380 live games, it's all the support content that New Zealanders have never seen before. that we will create available.
"There is also a time difference with the Premier League this year, so there will be more Friday night games, which is fantastic because we are Saturday morning, which is more convenient for people. "
The Premier League was previously available via BeIN Sport in New Zealand and could be viewed online or via the Sky TV decoder.
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Top players such as Wimbledon champion Simona Halep will play the games featured on Spark Sport starting next week.
He has also shown a number of other high level leagues, including La Liga of Spain, Bundesliga of Germany, Ligue 1 of France as well as the English Football League.
These will all go to Sky Sport 7 and will be available as part of the usual subscription to Sky Sport, joining the Champions League, Italian Serie A and Australian A League, which were already on Sky.
It certainly helps to make this season the best New Zealanders follow after football.
But it will also be a great year for tennis fans, with Spark Sport taking over WTA tennis.
Starting next week's tournament in Toronto, Spark Sport will host 15 women's tournaments for the rest of the year, followed by the world circuit final in Shenzhen.
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Aleksandar Mitrovic of Fulham will play championship games on Sky Sport 7 this season.
Curiously, Sky Sport was unaware of women's tennis and the only time New Zealanders could see bands like Simona Halep, Serena Williams and Naomi Osaka played in the four grand slams.
"We believe that women's sport in New Zealand did not have as much visibility as men's sport, so we identified this as an opportunity for us," Latch said.
"We really wanted to play women's tennis, and if you look at the best players in women's tennis, there is a good group with the same talent, so you get a lot of fantastic matches.
"With men's tennis, it's great to go to the semifinals and finals, but the gap between the best players and the next group is still big, so you have a lot of games tied.
"Women's tennis does not have a lot of visibility and we think we can change that.
"The first tournament will be held on August 9 (in Toronto), the day before the launch of the Premier League, so everything will be played."
The contract with the WTA only concerns international tournaments. The clbadic ASB will continue to be broadcast on Sky Sport.
However, next year is the last of the current contract between Auckland Tennis and Sky Sport and it would not be surprising that Spark Sport is launching after the two major tennis tournaments in the country.
Latch refutes Sky TV's recent Martin Stewart comment that anyone who bids them out for sports rights will go bankrupt, but even ignoring the Rugby World Cup, Spark Sport will change position next week. considering any sports enthusiast.
"You can choose individual fan bases for Formula 1, Premier League, women's tennis, WRC or hockey," Latch said.
"But when you start riding them, you suddenly get a proposition that has real value for a much larger group of people.
"All our research has shown that most sports fans watch five to seven different sports," he added.
"So, if you want a service that interests them, you need to make sure the platform's sports content is complete, which we are providing now."
It has become evident over the past two months that Sky Sport has taken up the challenge to tackle Spark Sport. Although some feared that New Zealanders would end up paying twice for what they had already done, the real winners in this area seem to be sports fans.
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