MUMBAI: In the absence of live sporting events across the globe due to the Covid2019 pandemic, the Sony Pictures Sports Network (SPSN) has come up with a new digital miniseries: ‘Sony Ten presents The Medal of Glory’, aimed at engaging sporting communities across the social media landscape.

“We felt this was the perfect time to bring Indians closer to India’s Olympic champions and get to know our athletes up close and personal through this show,” says Sony Pictures Sports Network head - marketing & on-air promotions Neville Bastawalla.

Bastawalla further says: “Given the environment, we needed to innovate within the guidelines and take into consideration that everyone is in lockdown in the safety of their homes.”

Sony Ten presents The Medal of Glory’ is hosted by Raman Bhanot – a well-renowned sports anchor, and presenter – who has also presented the previous five editions of the Olympics.

The Sony Sports programming team, along with Raman Bhanot, worked together to bring the miniseries to avid sports fans. “The mini-series comprises fifteen episodes of fifteen minutes each; Bhanot has already shot almost all the episodes on video call chats with these Olympians,” SPSN marketing head explains.

Bastawalla adds: “The sports enthusiast will see these medal winners talking about their road to glory, iconic moments from their sporting journey, candid discussions around the life amid lockdown and other light-hearted anecdotes during their conversation with Bhanot.”

The digital miniseries features iconic medal-winning athletes of India like Abhinav Bindra, Sushil Kumar, Leander Paes, Karnam Malleshwari and Sakshi Malik, to name a few. And, in the later episodes, it will feature Yogeshwar Dutt, Vijay Kumar, Mahabali Satpal and Vijender Singh as well.

Besides this digital miniseries, the sports broadcaster has already launched Sony Ten Pit Stop and Sony Ten India Stay Fit wherein they have had footballers like Gaizka Mendieta, David James, Australian Cricketer David Warner, Indian woman cricketer Jemimah Rodrigues, UFC fighters like Holly Holm and NBA stars like Trae Young, Jamal Murray, and Kemba Walker just to name a few.

In an attempt to explore multiple other opportunities and concepts, Sony Sports has also rolled out a show called WWE Live Dhamaal, which has live chats with WWE Superstars wherein it has featured WWE champion Drew McIntyre.

“A large part of SPSN marketing efforts for this miniseries is directed on digital and social media by using major social media platforms in a big way; however, it will also be promoted on-air across the network channels,” says Bastawalla. “We plan to launch three episodes each week across five weeks. They will be available for the Sony Sports community across key platforms.”

Though the primary focus of coming up with this miniseries is to engage our sporting communities; “A few brands have expressed their interest in the series and we are evaluating these prospects,” adds the SPSN marketing head without revealing the names of interested brands.

It’s over a month now since the sporting events across the globe have been suspended, cancelled or postponed to future dates amid the rising cases of the pandemic around the world. Sony Sports is the official broadcaster of the majority of international sporting events including two marquee events – Olympics 2020 and Euro Cup 2020 – which were scheduled to happen later this year but now have been suspended for a year to curb the spread of the Covid2019.

On similar lines, Star Sports has also launched a non-live talk show purely based on cricket called Cricket Connected, wherein they bring current and former cricket stars across countries to talks about the gentlemen’s game and the future of people involved with it.

The sports broadcasters are trying to find an alternative to keep their viewers engaged and occupied with some or the other content in the absence of non-live sporting events. Moreover, they have also started re-running the historical archived matches of various sports on their sports channels.