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The ball is round, but that's where the comparison with
regular football stops. Scoring by hand, no headers or offsides, unlimited substitutions,
balls fired from cannons and coaches who go on the field to kick a penalty are
all part of Masters of Madness which aired in Belgium earlier this year.
This is the latest new soccer format targeting younger
generations on social media (see also The
Sidemen vs YouTube All-Stars; Baller League and Kings World Cup Clubs).
Masters of Madness is designed as a new football competition
format with shorter, faster games for younger TV viewers, streamers and YouTubers
rolled into a daily sports entertainment show.
“It's not's conceived to replace anything. That would be a
bit crazy,” says Serge Bellens, Head of Directors at Play Sports. “Well, okay,
we do try to do something crazy but it’s not in competition with regular
football. It's not going to replace the Champions League or national club
competition. That wasn't the starting point at all. We wanted to try and make something new that
can coexist alongside regular season football and be something fun to watch
during the Christmas holidays up to the end of March.”
The league’s first season was played in December at
Antwerp’s Google Pixel Arena and broadcast earlier this year on Play Media’ commercial
channel Play4, the network’s GoPlay streaming service and on YouTube.
It is the brainchild of media production
companies Woestijnvis and Sporthouse Group and two ex-pros: former Belgian
Footballer of the Year, striker Dries Mertens who won 100 caps; and Ajax and
Spurs central defender Jan Vertonghen who played 157 times for the national
team.
“Every decision was made with them and run by Dries and
Jan,” says Bellens. “It was Jan’s idea for instance not to have any headers
during the game.”
The basic concept is a six versus
six indoor football competition played between eight mixed
gender teams on a pitch measuring 46m x 26m. The teams are made up of amateur
players, ex-pro players, personalities from the world of football and
celebrities. Each match comprises four quarters of eight minutes. The teams play the entire match on the same
side of the field. The home team defends the left goal, the away team the right
goal (TV view). The LED boarding surrounding the pitch is playable to create a
faster game.
So far, so conventional. However, games can be switched up
in all manner of novel ways. These ‘Maddies’ and ‘Boosters’ are played like
‘Jokers’ by team coaches or by the officials and include adding an extra ball
onto the field (fired by cannons), raising the height of the goal by 50 cm,
reducing the number of on field players and introducing zones on the pitch
which can’t be played in. Goals might
count double for a limited period, the goalkeeper and an outfield player have
to switch positions, one team’s goalkeeper can be penalised for actually using
their hands and there’s a ‘Hand of God’ in which one team can use their hands
to play the ball “like Maradona did in 1986.” On certain match days, teams can
even add a ‘legend’ to their team, won via social media challenges.
“It is certainly quite different but that was also what was
exciting, because we created the crazy ourselves,” says Bellens, a highly
experienced live match director who calls the shots for Play Sports’ UEFA
Europa & Conference League games and was involved from inception including
helping devise the rules of the game.
He has also worked as live producer for HBS on match
coverage during the 2022 FIFA World Cup Qatar and previously at FIFA World Cups
in Brazil, Russia and UEFA Euro2020. At the same time, he is also a Senior Match
Director for VTM (DPG Media), covering the Belgian National Football team, the
UEFA Champions League and the Belgian Cup.
“We’d seen the success of other initiatives and that gave us
the opportunity to do something completely new. We wanted to get rid of the
things that happen in a normal football game that “younger” people might
consider to be boring. Our goal was to create something shorter, faster and
perhaps more immersive, meaning to keep the viewers’ attention span awake.”
“We wanted to divide each 8” quarter into certain moments
where something exciting, new or surprising could happen which you don't expect,
because ofcourse, it’s not allowed in a regular game.”
Test runs of the gameplay and production took place in a
warehouse. “It was a very basic test but with all the technical aspects in
place,” Bellens explains. “One of the things we tested was the length of the
quarters. Should they be 8 or 10 minutes, 12 or 15? Should we do two x 15
minutes or two x 10 minutes? What would work best for getting optimum attention
for audiences? If we went with two halves of ten minutes and we wanted to
include a 2 Boosters for each team and a Maddy during the game, and maybe even another extra Maddy surprise,
that would be too much. We had to get the balance right.”
They finalised on four times eight minutes, incorporated a
countdown clock (familiar to US sports like NFL or hockey) and rejected some
Maddy and Booster ideas because they either didn't work or they were too
complicated to understand immediately for players or viewers.
At this stage the production didn’t test results with social
media influencers but Bellens says that across the production team the younger
generation target audience was well represented.
“We also wanted to keep it a secret,” he says. “We did make an edit of the shows and showed
that to people for feedback and as you can imagine it went through a lot of
discussion.”
With such a new and potentially complicated format happening
so fast making the game play comprehensible was a priority.
“We talked about all the visual aspects of the game, the LED
visuals, on-screen graphics and the commentary which all help to explain the
rules during the game. We didn’t want to have a section explaining the rules
before every game because that's boring. We wanted to let the visuals or commentary
explain how things work in real time.”
Given the complications of starting a new game from scratch
they decided that recording the matches would be easier. This was done over six
days in December and January.
“Practically it was much easier doing this in the Christmas
holidays. We could hire the venue for 2 weeks and ensure that all the players
could be there for those days rather than risk interference with other
schedules. Some of the female players also play for Belgium Clubs or the national
women's team, for instance.”
Recording also gave production the leeway of correcting a
wrong replay or graphic or inserting more relevant coach or celebrity reactions
at certain points. Each team has dual coaches who are filmed being interviewed live
by a pitch side presenter and live commenting on the game in progress. These
interviews are displayed picture in picture during the live game.
“When players were sent off, or had a 2’ penalty they came
as guests on the commentary position and added fun as a pundit on their own
teams’ game.”
He adds, “The main challenge was getting the best quotes of commentary into the
game when it is being played at such a fast pace. For a show of 45-50 minutes
long our timing and our editorial needs to be spot on.”
While Bellens directed all the matches, a live producer
monitored the interactions of team coaches and their interactions with the
pitch side presenter.
To cut down on potential chaos, the production team knew in
advance which type of Booster or Maddy would be thrown into the mix.
“The biggest chaos was the multiball when there are several
match balls in play for two minutes. That was horrifying to direct.”
Eight social media creators and influencers were invited on
site to make their own content of the match, fans, the coaches and players
before, during and after the game. This content was captured by creators but
held back and posted in sequence as the games were played out on YouTube,
GoPlay and Play 4. There was even a studio-based Watch Party which ran on
YouTube in parallel to the broadcast of the final.
“Core to the whole concept was to create a ‘Madness’ community
and to do that generating a lot of activity on social media is part of the game.”
Technical provision
EMG Belgium provided facilities with live graphics from
Boost Graphics. Set and show light design by Creme Fresh and Never Fear
Shadows.
The camera plan itself is familiar to a conventional match
day including the main camera centre pitch (LDX 24x) and close-up next to it on
the TV platform (LDX 86 x).
“We didn't want to confuse viewers of soccer completely with
cuts to very exotic positions all the time.”
Other positions included a main tactical camera above one goal,
and a portable Super Slow Motion (LDX 24x). A couple of Sony FX 3 on DJI
gimbals were able to go onto the pitch after each goal; RF Sony FX 6’s were
trained on team benches, Insta360s & Marshall camera’s were placed as in-goal
cams, Google Pixel Cams provided POVs from the ball cannon and PTZ covered
commentary positions.
A live drone was used during the game flying close to or
behind the players and at key moments such as when a coach comes on to take a
penalty.
“That’s one advantage of organising the competition
ourselves. We could make up the rules. The drone acted much like a less
expensive version of an indoor Spidercam.”
For the live referee cam they custom-made a minicamera to
fit above the ear. “We tested one worn on the ref’s chest but in my opinion
it's not quite as good because you don’t see the exact viewpoint of the
referee. With a body cam, it only points in the direction the chest is aimed at
and often, if there’s a foul, you don't see the action or if they are speaking
to somebody you only see half a face. The ‘ear cam’ didn’t have these problems
and was one of the technical revelations.”
Ten ambi mics were stationed around the arena, the presenter
and guests had handheld mics with mic and headsets on commentary positions.
Further mics for live audio of the head referee, assistant referee, and each
coach duo. Also, every match one player was miked up, to use later on Masters
of Madness social media posts.
Distribution
Coverage was packaged into a match day consisting of four
games. These were released on consecutive Fridays on YouTube and on GoPlay. The
following week each of the four games was stripped across Play 4 Monday through
Thursday.
“It was a hybrid combination of dropping things online for
the younger generation who want things more immediately – although what’s
young? I'm in my late 40s and like watching shows on YouTube! – and
broadcasting for a different audience on linear. Both of those worked out
really well.”
So much so that talks are underway about running a second
season and also possibly exporting the league to other European territories.
The inaugural winner was the Racing Pannakoek team, with an
all female coaching staff led by Belgiums’ ex-international Imke Courtois.
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