R&A, HSBC & NTT Data's Virtual 'The Open For The Ages' With Top Golfers From Last 50 Years

With The Open cancelled this summer, The R&A has teamed up with partner patrons HSBC and NTT DATA on a virtual tournament called ‘The Open For The Ages’ which will see the best golfers of the last 50 years battle it out for the Claret Jug at the home of golf.

Objective:

It was back in April 2020 that The R&A made the difficult decision to cancel The Open for the first time since World War II and immediately after the decision embarked on an ambitious project to mark Open week in 2020 with the objective of delivering an alternative, related and highly entertaining golf broadcast.

Activation:

The R&A began with a question: ‘Could we take the greatest Champions from the last 50 years and create a Championship that saw them battle it out for the Claret Jug?. and from that The Open For The Ages was born.

The R&A teamed up with IMG Productions to mix footage and audio from five decades of archives and plot out possible narratives. The Open always has a winner of course, so The R&A wanted that decision to belong to the fans and thus combined a fan vote with historical player data provided by partner NTT Data to inform who would be the ultimate Open winner for the ages.

The project was complex from start to finish: involving hundreds of hours of research, a thousand hours of editing, multiple digital enhancements – including changing branding and removing players and golf balls from key scenes – and all done remotely.

The result was a three-hour final round “live” broadcast which was shown in more than 50 countries and available on TheOpen.com and The Open’s YouTube and Facebook channels and this was complemented with an extensive second-screen experience including a bespoke branded app, social media coverage with ‘in-play clips’, live leaderboard and highlights shows in the preceding days to build narrative and anticipation.

The project was promoted in harness with Open sponsors HSBC and NTT Data via a multi-channel, multi-brand campaign launched on 9 July which asks ‘What If The Greatest Champions In Golf Could Compete At The Home of Golf?’

The creative drives awareness of the tournament for the ages which will be brought to life from 16 to 19 July (the original 2020 Open date) and built around a three-hour broadcast.

From Tiger Woods to Jack Nicklaus, via Seve Ballesteros, Tom Watson, Sir Nick Faldo and Rory McIlroy, golf’s greatest stars will compete against each other over the Old Course at St Andrews in this Open celebration created from 50 years of archive footage edited and woven together with modern graphics and new commentary from Ewen Murray, Nick Dougherty, Butch Harmon and Iona Stephen.

The hero campaign video ran across The R&A’s social platforms and is also amplified socially by sponsors HSBC and NTT DATA and is supported in-play clips, leaderboards and statistics.

Where past meets present The greatest golfers from the last 50 years will battle it out in The Open for the Ages 16 – 19 July pic.twitter.com/qHkfipKIB7

— The Open (@TheOpen) July 6, 2020

‘The Open for The Ages’ culminated in a final round airing globally on Sunday 19 July on television, TheOpen.com and The Open’s YouTube and Facebook channels.

Anticipation and excitement for this final virtual round programme kicked off from Thursday 16 and ran through Saturday 18 July when coverage of the first three rounds of ‘The Open for The Ages’ was provided by in-play clips, live leaderboards and end of play highlights across The Open’s social media channels. The R&A’s broadcast partners – including Sky Sports in the UK, NBC Sports and NBC Golf Channel in the United States of America, and TV Asahi in Japan – televised ‘The Open for The Ages’ to fans all around the world and it was also be made available via TheOpen.com and The winner, Jack Nicklaus, was determined by a fan vote, which had already registered more than 10,000 responses five days before the last round, and a data model developed in partnership with NTT DATA that utilises player career statistics alongside the input by fans to calculate the Champion.

Congratulations, @jacknicklaus, Champion Golfer of The Open for the Ages#TheOpen pic.twitter.com/8GGSDxfXxF

— The Open (@TheOpen) July 19, 2020

Post-event the social campaign continued with additional content including a behind-the-scenes style spot.

“Golf is one of the very few sports where this concept can be created and brought to life. The way in which the sport is filmed allows us a truly unique opportunity to reimagine history and bring together the greatest players from many different eras on a scale which has not been done before, either in golf or in other sports,” commented R&A Chief Executive Martin Slumbers.

“We are all keenly feeling the absence of The Open from the global sporting calendar this year and so we hope that this broadcast will generate real interest and enjoyment for the millions of golf and sports fans who closely follow the Championship every year.”

Laurence Norman, VP Sports Technology at NTT DATA UK, added: “Technology is synonymous with modern sport, helping athletes compete at optimum performance levels. What’s even more exciting is the new emphasis on technology being utilised to enhance fan experiences. Building stronger fan engagement through technology is the future of sports, and while it will never replace the thrill of live events, The Open for The Ages demonstrates how technology can keep pushing the boundaries of what it is possible in sports broadcasting.”

Outcome:

The hero promotional spot was viewed 100K times (led by 44k on The Open’s own Twitter feed and 36k on YouTube) since it was posted on 6 July, while the final round livestream on 19 July (the day which would have been Championship Sunday of The 149th Open at Royal St George’s) was greeted with wide acclaim from fans, industry colleagues and the golf world alike. It was viewed by more than 2 million people.

Comment:

Well, we’ve already seen a virtual Wimbledon (see case study), Grand National, Kentucky Derby, numerous virtual grand prix and other series’ races, so why not a virtual Open? Especially one this great.