| MUMBAI:
"Sport by itself is probably bigger than all other entertainment put together."
This was one of the points emphasised on Day Three of Frames during the session
"Sports as a genre of entertainment", which highlighted the enormous
possibilities that the sports business as a whole offered. And not surprisingly,
considering India's disaster of a World Cup, it was also a platform for the panelists
to address the need for looking beyond cricket, to games like tennis, golf, among
others. Among the threads that came out of the discussions was that while the
potential was there, it was pointless expecting the respective sports federations
and government.
O&M Advertising CEO
Pratap Bose says that India is a more a nation of spectators as opposed to sportspeople.
The key for corporates who want to get the best brand mileage out of the genre
is to make it participative and interactive. For instance Standard Chartered Bank
and Hutch organise marathons. He also spoke about the danger of over commercializing
a sport which can reduce it to the level of a circus in the eyes of the viewer. Hattrick director Milan
Luthria says that the genre of sports movies is new to India. People have to weaned
to this format. Filmmakers who want to make movies that have a sport as the backdrop
should remember that the rules of strong characters, a resonant story apply here
as well. Since sport has connection it is easy to create euphoria around an underdog
winning. Lagaan was a David versus Goliath story. Globosport VP Anirban Das Blah
says that sporting events like the Olympics, the Fifa soccer World Cup are entertainment
spectacles. Sports he notes is driving the consumption of digital entertainment
in India like SMS of cricket scores and match updates. Sports is allowing for
the walls between different forms of entertainment to come down. The sports infrastructure
business he says, is worth Rs 300 billion. Blah says that tennis and golf
can also walk down this road. Already in tennis the infrastructure is being created
with companies like Mittal coming in. He said that one cannot rely on the sports
federations and government for anything. It is upto corporates to take
the initiative. Brands will also be better served by building themselves around
a smaller sporting event like the Sunfeast Tennis Open as opposed to rushing to
sponsor a cricket event that nobody remembers the names of who sponsored the event.
Of course cricket has a lot of sponsors. So there is the danger of clutter. | 
