MUMBAI: Anything featuring the Indian cricket team faring well is going to do well in the ratings sweepstakes. When India won a test match in Australia after over two decades Star Sports expectedly reaped the benefits.
The broadcaster's live coverage of the final day of the second test match on 16 December averaged 6.1 TRPs, reaching a maximum of 8.9 TRPs at an all India level. The TAM data is for males 15+ SEC ABC, C&S homes. This is the highest rating for any test match on a given day in the last two years.
Overall the test match recorded a high 3.6 TVRs across five days. On the final day centres like Kolkata and Hyderabad registered TRP levels of 19 and 12 respectively, setting a new high for test matches telecast by ESS. Advertisers suddenly got on the bandwagon. Five companies got on to the broadcaster for the last day of the test. They were Pidilite, Shaw Wallace, ICICI Pru, VIP and BPCL.
With Australia hitting back in Melbourne everything has been set up for the final showdown at Sydney. The test match starts from 2 January 2004. Samsung is the presenting sponsor of the current away tour to Australia. DHL, Perfetti, Rajasthan Spinning, Asian Paints, TVS, Gillette, Hutch and Coke are the associate sponsors. Should India even look like winning on a pitch expected to turn expect ratings to go through the roof along with ad rates.