![]() The other problem for Amazon is that while Raducanu’s miraculous run at the US Open 14 months ago was fortuitous from their perspective, they arrived in the sport five years ago, just as Murray was starting his long and painful journey through hip surgery, and while Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal were also starting to battle injury in the later years of their career. But you’ve got to be quite dedicated to be getting up at six in the morning to watch the Australian Open find all and potentially up past midnight watch the US Open final.” Again, we can do it for two weeks a year in general terms. “It’s a week or two weeks, and it’s quite intensive in terms of the level of commitment that you’re asking for from an audience. ![]() Traditionally, when we’re all running out to a sale, Amazon want you stay at home browsing Amazon, which I don’t think we’re going to do while watching a tennis tournament. “I think it’s quite telling that they have the Premier League games at Christmas in the UK as well. ![]() “I think with something like F1 or something like that, you can concentrate that into a couple of hours of interest and it’s the same with a football game, it’s the same with the NFL,” Wiacek adds. Like almost all sports broadcasters, they were using tennis to try to leverage viewers into becoming customers. “Then the other majors I think you’ve got dedicated tennis fans who watch those, and something like the French Open when it was broadcast on ITV4 might pick up the odd casual viewer.”Īmazon though were relying on the fact that to watch the tennis, you effectively had to walk into their shop and sit on their sofa, surrounded by all of their products at the click of a button. For two weeks a year, we’re tennis experts, we’re all huge tennis fans,” says Wiacek. “Truth be told outside of Wimbledon tennis is not the most watched sport in the UK. Prime’s coverage has been popular with viewers in the UK (Photo: Getty) Even within the Amazon site or app, it was hard to stumble across the tennis coverage: you had to go looking for it, most likely a reflection that giving it greater prominence yielded less click-through than the latest fantasy drama or the ubiquitous Ted Lasso. ![]() The concerns were that a new broadcaster would be likely to cut much of that on the grounds of cost – but much of what Amazon were providing was as a result of their presence as a streaming service rather than a more linear TV channel.īut what some tennis figures call “the Amazon effect” was that by taking it off mainstream television, tennis was hidden away from casual channel-hoppers. The ad-free coverage, the opportunity to stream different courts from the ones being shown on main coverage, on-demand tennis and tactical analysis were all mentioned as factors that had impressed viewers of Amazon’s tennis coverage. ![]() i conducted a straw poll of readers for their feedback on watching on the sport through Amazon and it was overwhelmingly positive. The product evolved into a modern, professional sports broadcast.Īnd their tenure has generally been well-received among viewers. Tim Henman and Greg Rusedski, by far the most successful male British players of the 21st century before Andy Murray came along, joined up as pundits. GB's Billie Jean King Cup heroes are proving there is more to British tennis than Emma Raducanu 11 November, 2022 Andy Murray battles the ravages of time in race to be seeded for the Australian Open 25 October, 2022 How Wimbledon and the ECB saved millions with ‘pandemic insurance’ while other events face ruin 15 April, 2020Īmazon eventually picked up rights to ATP and WTA events in the UK too, and became practically the home of tennis outside the three non-American grand slams. ![]()
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