Bennett: Broadcasting plays vital role in advancing football

AS Jamaicans gathered around screens, from the jumbotron at Caymanas Park to mobile phones in palms, hanging on to every play in yesterday's World Cup qualifying playoff between the Reggae Boyz and the Democratic Republic of Congo, the impact of televised broadcasts continues to spur the growth of football as the world's biggest spectator event.

Locally, the Premier League and schoolboy football have benefited from televised matches of feature games through various sponsors of the respective events.

The lower-tiered leagues are infrequently exposed nationally, a malady that McKay Security Limited hopes it will remedy by adding coverage of the St Thomas Major League final to that of the Kingston and St Andrew Football Association's (KSAFA) Major League's semi-finals and final.

Mark Bennett, president of KSAFA and chairman of the South East Confederation, recently welcomed McKay Security back as a sponsor of KSAFA and St Thomas, especially for broadcast sponsorships.

KSAFA's semi-finals and final will be broadcast live locally for the second straight season, a deal valued at $2.5 million. St Thomas' Major League final will also he broadcast under a $1 million McKay Security sponsorship.

"Broadcasting of football despite the emergence of new media plays a vital role in advancing the sport," Bennett pointed out, adding, "We are hoping the sponsorships not only redound to the clubs but Jamaica's football overall."

McKay, who said he has travelled to numerous World Cup finals and the majority of Jamaica's qualifiers since the successful France 1998 campaign, including the Reggae Boyz' recent 1-0 victory against New Caledonia in Guadalajara, Mexico, said exposure for the parish leagues are equally important as the Premier League.

"It is important that the public sees what is happening in parish football," said McKay. "Football is the greatest sport in the world, and broadcast exposure should spread as far as possible in order to attract additional sponsorship, which is what drives the sport, especially in the United Kingdom where TV deals make up the majority of funding for teams," he added.

Meanwhile, Bennett praised McKay Security's $1 million sponsorship cheques for winners of the 2026 KSAFA Wray and Nephew and Serge St Thomas Major League winners.

"When KSAFA was placed in the same confederation with St Thomas, we were assured it would redound to the benefit of St Thomas, who, through McKay Security Limited, already a $2.3 million title sponsor of their Under-17s, brought KFC on board with a $1 million nutrition programme in addition to $1 million towards the Major League's prize money," Bennett pointed out.

"I am happy to see the harmonisation that this sponsor has brought to the two parishes," Bennett said, adding that a similar $1 million McKay Security sponsorship to KSAFA has made prize money for its championship "one of the biggest ever, rivalling the national Premier League" in addition to a $1 million sponsorship of the association's Under-17s.