As Imran Yusuf of sportbusiness.com reports, it’s a long-standing relationship and one that looks set to continue for some time.
The IMG agency has renewed its international media rights distribution agreement with Cricket South Africa, extending the decades-long relationship.
IMG will continue to sell rights to South Africa’s home international matches in all territories outside sub-Saharan Africa over a seven-season period, from 2024-25 to 2030-31. In addition, it is responsible for selling rights to the new SA20 T20 competition in the Indian subcontinent over the next 10 years, from 2023 to 2032.
Speaking exclusively to SportBusiness, Chris Guinness, Executive Vice-President at IMG Media, said the deal demonstrated CSA saw high value in continuing to work with the agency.
“In an evolving world, rights-holders who have taken rights in-house have been restricted in terms of market knowledge,” he said. “We’ve had a relationship with CSA for over 30 years, and in that time we have very much evolved as a business and an agency.”
The agency recently oversaw, in collaboration with CSA, a media rights sales process in India for the next cycle of CSA media rights, including SA20, which saw media group Viacom18 secure the rights.
Viacom18 will broadcast the inaugural SA20 tournament in January in a deal which spans from 2023 to 2032. It will take over rights to all of South Africa’s home men’s, women’s and youth matches from media group Disney Star, which holds the rights in the Indian subcontinent until the end of 2023-24. Viacom18’s deal for rights in India runs from 2024-25 to 2030-31.
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Looking forward, Guinness sees CSA making greater use of IMG’s broader resources, citing analytics, streaming and other digital expertise as areas from the wider Endeavor business which could be utilised to maximise CSA’s commercial potential.
“In the old days we were a transactional agency, and because of our global network, CSA saw value in appointing us to sell their media rights around the world,” he said. “We had our finger on the pulse and that network remains very much in place. But as times change, we’ve had to evolve as a business, and to impress upon all rights-holders that we have the value we’ve always had, but also increasing value. With the strength of the Endeavor network behind us, we can offer expertise in a whole range of areas.”
IMG was sidelined during CSA’s first two attempts to form a major T20 franchise competition. The T20 Global League was created in 2017 before being quickly aborted. The next year, CSA created the Mzansi Super League, which was broadcast by public broadcaster the SABC. The league suffered from financial and governance difficulties and did not go ahead in 2020-21 or 2021-22.
Guinness, however, rejects the notion that there was a significant hiatus in IMG’s relationship with CSA.
“Every relationship has its bumps in the road,” he told SportBusiness. “We’ve had moments of misunderstanding, but broadly they shouldn’t be overplayed.”
Guinness sees the new T20 league as an important foundation for long-term growth for CSA. All six teams in the competition have been acquired by Indian Premier League franchise owners. The format will involve six privately-owned franchises competing in a league system before play-offs and a final, with 33 matches in total.
