Cricket might be the national game but when it comes to World Cup football the National Communications Network (NCN) will be giving the latter top priority.

The scheduled showing of the second day’s play of the first five-day Test match in Trinidad and Tobago between the West Indies and South Africa on Friday will clash with the opening matches of the 2010 World Cup football competition in South Africa.

Managing Director of NCN Mohammed `Fuzzy’ Sattaur said yesterday that the company will show the football games but will switch to the Test match after those games were completed.

The opening game of the World Cup competition between hosts South Africa and Mexico will be shown at 10am on Friday with the second game between Uruguay and France to be shown at 2.30pm.

“What we’re going to do is broadcast the football matches and show the cricket after the matches. We will also judge how the cricket is going and in some instances, we will show the cricket.”

He added: ”If there is an interesting part of the match that we cannot show then we will delay the broadcast and show it at night.”
Radio coverage

Sattaur said for those who prefer cricket coverage to football the Test match will be broadcast on radio.

“The cricket will be on radio. For those people who don’t like football, we will broadcast the game on radio.”

On the issue of sponsorship Sattaur said that the station had not yet reached its sponsorship quota.

“We have about half of the advertising spots sold. It is critical that we get the rest of sponsorship and we are asking people to come on board. It is good value for their advertising dollar,” he added.