NEW DELHI: Top volleyball players from the country will once again get a chance to showcase their skills as the second edition of Prime Volleyball League (Pro Volleyball League rebadged for legal reasons) is set to begin from February 4th, 2023.
Co-promoted and exclusively marketed by sports marketing firm Baseline Ventures, PVL 2023 will be held across three different cities – Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Kochi.
All eight franchises – Calicut Heroes, Kochi Blue Spikers, Ahmedabad Defenders, Hyderabad Black Hawks, Chennai Blitz, Bengaluru Torpedoes, Mumbai Meteors, and Kolkata Thunderbolts – will play a round-robin before the top four teams in the league stage qualify for the Semi-Finals. The PVL final will be played in Kochi.
Season 2 of PVL, which will feature 31 matches, will be broadcast exclusively by Sony Sports Network across Sony Sports Ten 1, Sony Sports Ten 3 & Sony Sports Ten 4, and can be livestreamed on SonyLIV.
The commercial arm of the global body of Volleyball (Fédération Internationale de Volley Ball, FIVB), Volleyball World has joined hands with PVL and come on board as international streaming partner. The 2nd edition of the league will be streamed globally on Volleyball World across all countries (except the Indian Subcontinent).
Speaking about the tournament, Joy Bhattacharya, CEO, PVL, said: “After the successful completion of Season 1, we are sure that this year’s competition is going to be even more thrilling and evenly contested. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the partners, franchises, and players for their support. We are grateful that Sony Sports Network has once again shown faith in us and will be our broadcast partner for the second year in running, and we are delighted to join hands with Volleyball World to give our players an opportunity to showcase their talent around the world.”
Commenting on the partnership, Rajesh Kaul, chief revenue officer, Distribution and head – Sports Business, Sony Pictures Networks, said, “We believe that volleyball as a sport is evolving in the country and we are very excited to be a part of driving up this momentum. We are delighted to provide a platform to the top talent participating in this league and are confident that we will exceed all our benchmarks of the last season.”
The inaugural season of PVL lays claim to having delivered a cumulative television viewership of 41 million, with a choice of English, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam commentary. In addition, PVL managed to reach over 84 million fans across India, along with over 5 million engagements from audiences through various digital platforms.
A regional connection was also established through the contemporary social media platform Share Chat, while viewership was gained on videos through Moj. In total, the videos distributed across social media platforms garnered over 43 million views, the official release claims.
PVL has RuPay as title partner, A23 as powered by sponsor, EatFit as associate sponsor and Cosco as official partner for the upcoming season.
