Rain-washed matches, lack of viewer and spectator interest has put the spotlight on the ongoing Asia Cup, which is being held jointly in Sri Lanka and Pakistan. The Sri Lankan leg has been marred by rains, leaving advertisers worried, according to media agency sources. The Asian Cricket Council (ACC), led by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) secretary Jay Shah, is likely to shift the venue of the Asia Cup Super 4 matches in Sri Lanka to Dambulla from Colombo.
While Asia Cup broadcaster Disney Star declined comment on the issue, the media network is said to be monitoring the situation closely. Disney had onboarded 18 sponsors across TV and digital, including Thums Up, Nerolac Paints, Hindustan Unilever (Glow & Lovely, Surf Excel), Samsung, Amul, Reliance Retail (Tira), Maruti and MRF for the Asia Cup.
Advertisers may seek to make good the lack of visibility in Asia Cup at the upcoming Cricket World Cup, media industry sources said. Sponsorships for the tournament, which concludes on September 17, have been sold for around Rs 25-30 crore on television and Rs 12-15 crore on digital.
Saturday’s key clash between India and Pakistan was washed out by rains, while Monday’s India-Nepal match was also halted due to rainfall. The number of overs of this match, however, were not slashed, coming as a relief to the broadcaster.
“The attention of viewers and cricket fans will be on the upcoming ODI Cricket World Cup rather than the Asia Cup,” says Ayaz Memon, a cricket expert and commentator. “The buzz has been missing in stadia at Sri Lanka as Indian fans are focused more on making it to the World Cup matches. The rain hasn’t helped either,” he says.
Ad rates for 10-second spots on TV for the Asia Cup have been pegged at Rs 3-4 lakh for non-India matches, while the rates for India matches are in the range of Rs 25-30 lakh per 10 seconds, industry sources said.
Disney Star has also taken a huge bet by streaming the Asia Cup and the upcoming Cricket World Cup for free on Disney+ Hotstar, its over-the-top (OTT) platform.
The strategy was designed to counter Reliance-backed Viacom18, which opted to free stream the Indian Premier League (IPL) in April-May, followed by the India-West Indies bilateral series in July-August. It may continue to free stream cricket tournaments for at least one more year to ensure it has a sticky base of subscribers. Viacom18 has also bagged the TV and digital rights of the Indian team’s international and domestic matches at home in an e-auction last week.
According to data from Data.ai, a mobile data and analytics platform, monthly active users (MAU) for JioCinema stood at 221 million for June 2023, compared to 232 million for MX Player and 716 million for YouTube. Daily active users stood at 35.2 million for JioCinema compared to 56.8 million for MX Player.
JioCinema has managed to maintain its MAU number in July and August due to non-sporting content such as Bigg Boss OTT, which notched up high viewership in its second season, media industry sources said.
In contrast, Disney+ Hotstar has slipped in terms of viewership as key properties such as the IPL have exited the platform. The paid subscriber base of Disney+ Hotstar fell to 40.4 million during the April-June quarter, marking a 24% reduction or 12.5 million decline from the previous quarter’s 52.9 million. The service had reached a peak of 61.3 million subscribers in the October-December period of 2022.