ICC T20 World Cup 2021: India-Pakistan match spots not for sale

Star Sports is not selling any spots for the much-anticipated battle between India and Pakistan in the upcoming ICC Twenty20 World Cup match on 24 October in Dubai, according to sources in the know. This time, Star Sports has sold its ad inventory only in match packages and, in fact, has exhausted most of its inventory for the 45-match cricket bonanza a fortnight before it is due to kick off on October 17.   

In the 2019 ICC World Cup, the broadcaster had sold some inventory later on, including a 10-second spot in the India-Pakistan match for Rs 20 lakh.

Star Sports declined to comment on the matter.   

Says a senior executive of a leading MNC which is advertising in the T20 World Cup: “It (India-Pak match) is the hottest property on TV and will generate the highest number of viewers. So being there is very important for us.”

In the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL), a slot for 10 seconds costs around Rs 10 lakh, but in playoffs, it goes higher. The marquee tournament has notched up over 400 million viewers on TV up to the 35th match, which is 12 million higher than IPL 2020 at the same stage.  

Advertisers find a clash between India and Pakistan irresistible because emotions run so high during these matches that television viewership records are routinely broken. Besides, these matches are a rarity — the two countries do not tour each other and Pakistani players are not allowed to participate in the IPL.

Says Sandeep Goyal, managing director at Rediffusion: “In the IPL, there is no national pride at stake. Ad sales and rates are pretty much as per script. National pride is the driver, and India’s performance is the driver for ad rates.”  

For example, in the 2019 ICC World Cup, the India-Pakistan ODI match was the most-watched in the tournament, with 273 million unique viewers on linear TV.  Out of this, 233 million were from India. The match was also seen by 50 million digital-only viewers. To put it in perspective, the total reach of the tournament, both on TV and digital in India, was 545 million, a figure that underlines the importance of this one match for the broadcaster. 

Similarly, in the ICC T20 World Cup in 2016, the clash of the titans was rated the best in terms of viewership since the final of the T20 World Cup in 2007. It also helped in upping total home viewership to 730 million for the tournament, a rise of 114 per cent over its previous edition.

In the 2015 ICC ODI World Cup, the India-Pakistan match, which was a group match, was watched by over 288 million viewers, although it was behind India’s semi-final clash with Australia, which hit 309 million viewers.