Following the demise of the British Basketball League (BBL) in the summer, the all-new Super League Basketball (SLB) tipped off last week (27 September) with the aim of being a more sustainable league that will help the sport to develop in the UK.
Nine clubs are competing in the inaugural season – the Bristol Flyers, Caledonia Gladiators, Cheshire Phoenix, Leicester Riders, London Lions, Manchester Basketball, Newcastle Eagles, Sheffield Sharks, and the Surrey 89ers – which culminates in the Play-offs in May next year. These clubs wholly own the league and, after the BBL, whose largest shareholder was an external investor, had its licence terminated over concerns around its financial position, the focus is very much on ensuring they are financially stable and able to help grow the sport.
Speaking ahead of the first Trophy games on Friday 27 September, Lisa Knights, CEO, Bristol Flyers, explains: “At the end of the day, an elite pro league is nothing without the clubs and if you don’t have a licence to play, then you can’t do your business. That was the starting point for the league, and what I’ve been most impressed by and what I’ve witnessed since I’ve been part of SLB, is how united all the clubs are. They all came together and said, ‘right, how do we work?’”
The BBL’s licence was revoked at the conclusion of last season, meaning clubs had a matter of weeks to form a new league to be ready in time for a September start.
“We officially started the league when we won the interim licence from the British Basketball Federation, and [BBF chair] Chris Grant did a sterling job in terms of making that decision; he acted swiftly and always said that without the clubs there is no league. The fact that all the clubs pulled together emphasised that. I think his main driver was, there’s X number of weeks before the start of a season, and clubs are going to need time to get a new season up and running. So the starting point was winning the interim licence and then the next thing was ‘right, what are we going to call ourselves’ and Super League Basketball came about. We launched the logo, and everyone seemed to like it. It is a new dawn, a new era, and the choice and the colourways reflect that.”
From commercial partnerships and fixtures to new club ownerships and production planning, there’s been a lot to work though for the SLB team in the past few months.
Knights adds: “One of the things that everyone was keen on was growing a financially sustainable league and what has been really interesting is the new ownerships that have come into the league as well. There have been some big changes with teams like Sheffield, Cheshire, Manchester and London all having new ownership. Three of those with US principal owners, and London with European, all coming from very credible, strong and sustainably financial backgrounds. It’s been great for the new league to have this kind of investment into clubs and have them sit alongside the likes of the Lansdown family [who own Bristol Flyers], and the Timoney’s at Caledonia Gladiators – both of whom were, prior to that, the most significant investors into the professional league.”
“We wanted to deliver a consistent level of good coverage, but to also do it in a sustainable way, because we all know broadcast isn’t cheap. Being able to announce DAZN as our partner was a massive part of that”
In terms of partnerships, the big news recently was DAZN acquiring exclusive global broadcasting rights to the league, meaning all men’s games will be aired for free to audiences worldwide. In total more than 200 games across the Trophy, League, Cup and Play-offs will be broadcast live.
“The broadcast deal that we’ve done is important because sitting on DAZN you’ve got the American audience, because they’ve got the NFL rights, they’ve got the boxing rights, that’s great, but we’ve signed just as France’s National Basketball League (LNB) Élite announced that it is also partnering with DAZN. So you’ve got the Italian and the French elite men’s basketball leagues, plus DAZN being the home of FIBA live streaming with its Courtside 1891 offering and us all sitting alongside each other with this great basketball content all in one place. It’s about building that centralised home for basketball and being able to talk to an already bought-in audience. It’s tapping into that wider audience of basketball fans in Europe as well as globally.”
SLB has also announced a production partnership with EMG / Gravity Media and Brandvox. While Brandvox will handle the majority of the live game coverage, EMG / Gravity Media will look after around a quarter of the games and the league’s video on-demand content.
“Brandvox were looking after the league from a streaming perspective a few years ago and they’re really well respected in that space in terms of being really nimble and agile. They’re one of the smaller OBs and it helps that they’re all basketball fans. They really wanted to work with us and develop the best offering for fans,” Knights adds.
“I’m also really pleased SLB is going to have its own half-hour highlights show, produced by EMG / Gravity Media, which will launch towards the end of the month, as the Trophy competition finishes and we go into the league proper. I’ve worked with EMG / Gravity Media through my connection with Bristol City, and was familiar with how they’ve approached that, in terms of producing the Women’s Football Show for the Barclays Women’s Super League. I’m excited to see this be developed and for fans to be able to watch an SLB show in one consistent place on DAZN.”
The TV production setup itself is going to be somewhat paired back compared with the BBL offering, with a focus on delivering consistent programming that viewers can access easily.
“What was really clear when all of the clubs came together was that we wanted a unified and consistent offering. Coming from the broadcast world, I know what you can produce off a four-camera setup and the difference between a four camera and a 12 camera, but I would defy any casual fan to notice a difference between a four and a six or seven camera. If you’ve got skilled directors and skilled camera ops that know the sport, you can get a really high standard of broadcast. We wanted to deliver a consistent level of good coverage, but to also do it in a sustainable way, because we all know broadcast isn’t cheap. Being able to announce DAZN as our partner was a massive part of that.”
In collaboration with DAZN a minimum four-camera setup has been agreed and every game will be live and shown in its entirety for free. “There’ll ultimately be a 15-minute build up show with commentary and co-commentary done in venue. I’ve been really fortunate to work on Olympic Games, Commonwealth Games, World Champs, FIFA World Cups for broadcasters, the difference between having commentators in venue versus off-tube is really noticeable. I think you hand the commentators a really impossible task. It’s hard for them, they struggle because very often they haven’t got the right camera or they can’t quite see the shot, whereas, if you are sat in venue, you know exactly what’s going on and you can gauge the appetite of the fans, or the emotion, the twist. Sport is all about passion, and when you do stuff off-tube, even if you’re the best commentator in the world, you lose some of that passion.
“The fact that every fan globally will be able to watch their team from across the world on one consistent platform, I think, is a real benchmark for us to start something really special”
“The other piece that we’ve now got is with the 15-minute build-up, there’s a commitment that you will hear from the coaches of the respective teams in the build-up, you’ll get the player arrivals and so on.”
In addition, WSC Sport is providing the league’s highlights for turnaround of clips and Genius Sports is handling data. Again, the intention in the beginning is to keep things simple.
“I think being able to explain some of the stats and keeping it fairly clean and simple initially is important because, at the end of the day, on screen, fans really just want to watch the action. I think the innovation will come as we grow the league in terms of interactive stats, or interactive betting and all of that. We just want to make sure that we provide the best coverage for fans to watch their club and all of that will come.”
Given that the broadcast contract was only announced a few days before the first games, there’s also some realism in terms of what can be achieved in such a short space of time.
“It’s not all going to be perfect in the opening weekend,” says Knights. “We’ve got the Trophy series first, then we go into the league, and then the Cup starts in January. I hope we get a little bit of buy-in from fans about what we’re actually pulling off in a very short space of time. It is hell for leather, but what has been amazing is the support from everyone to work with us and try and make this the best possible product. It won’t be perfect on the opening weekend, I hope it will be, but it won’t be perfect. There will be bits that we’re not happy with, but the fact that every fan globally will be able to watch their team from across the world on one consistent platform, I think, is a real benchmark for us to start something really special.”