Although it usually generates little interest in Taiwan, soccer is set to capture the hearts and minds of the public over the coming four weeks, when the 2002 FIFA World Cup kicks off in Seoul this Friday.
With a time difference of only one-hour, the upcoming international soccer competition hosted jointly by South Korea and Japan, looks set to be one of the most tuned into live sporting events in Taiwan since last year's Baseball World Cup.
The entire 64 matches -- or 5,760 minutes excluding extra-time and penalties -- of the competition will be broadcast live exclusively by TVBS' ERA Sports Channel (
According to TVBS sportscaster Martin Lin, the station expects the number of viewers to reach one million, or around 10 percent of the population.
Although TVBS has made great play of the amount of advertising revenue its live broadcasts will generate -- NT$100,000 for 10 seconds -- a station spokesperson has ensured viewers that the channel will not make the same mistakes Chinese Television did four years ago.
When it aired the quadrennial international soccer competition in 1998, the terrestrial station was inundated with calls from irate soccer fans whose enjoyment of the matches in the opening league stage was aggravated by commercial breaks cutting into the live broadcasts every ten minutes.
To keep both armchair sports fans and advertisers happy, TVBS plans to work the six hundred seconds of commercials -- roughly 15percent of a 90 minute soccer match -- around the games.
"We realize that we can't interrupt the games for commercials and we obviously can't do without commercials," Lin said.
"We came up with a plan that we hope will please the viewers and soccer fans alike."
The game screen will be shrunk and account for a quarter of the television screen whilst advertisers boost the merits of their products without disrupting the flow of action.
As many of the matches will be taking place during working hours, ERA and Much TV will be airing re-runs of each day's action from between midnight and 6am on a daily basis.
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