The 2019 Guinness Six Nations and 2019 Women’s Six Nations were launched in London yesterday, with all 12 captains and coaches in attendance to kick off two months of rugby that will dominate the sports news and the passions of fans over the next two months.
Rory Best, Ciara Griffin, Joe Schmidt and Adam Griggs were there to represent Ireland in what promises to be a special year. It is great to see the two Championships being given equal opportunity and visibility at the launch stage.
The Men’s team is bidding to retain its Championship winning form from last year while the Women’s team is bidding to build on last year’s third place finish.
A limited number of tickets are still available for the Women’s opening fixture at Energia park on Friday, February 1st. If you are looking for tickets to the Men’s game at the Aviva Stadium the following evening, the very best of good luck.
The challenge facing the Men’s team is outlined by the fact that no team has won back to back Grand Slams in the six nations era and only France in 1997/98 and England in 1991/92 have done it at all in the modern era.
Ireland, Scotland and France have never done it showing the level of difficulty.
The Six Nations is one of the world’s best attended sports events and regularly attracts record TV and online audiences in the UK, France, Ireland, Italy and all over the world.
Last year’s Ireland matches attracted an aggregate live TV audience on TV3 od 3.5 million viewers with the final Ireland England game the second most watched programme of the year on Irish television with 975,000 tuning in.
“For 135 years, the Six Nations has been rugby’s greatest tournament and as we all look forward to the kick-off of this year’s Championship it promises to once again offer huge excitement and fierce competition in both the men’s and women’s games, said Ben Morel, Chief Executive of the Six Nations presiding over his first launch.
“I would like to extend a very warm welcome to our new title sponsor Guinness. The Guinness brand has been a tremendous partner of both Six Nations and our Unions for many years and we are delighted to have them on board.”
“This is a hugely proud moment for our business, which has always been synonymous with a passion for rugby,” added Mark Sandys, Global Head of Beer at Diageo.
“Working closely with the Six Nations, we have six years to demonstrate our love of this beautiful game, including helping to drive and expand on rugby’s loyal fanbase, heighten the extraordinary experience of spectators in and outside the stadiums and to champion the women’s game, bringing it to a wider public. We can’t wait for the action to kick-off!”.
That is a view that will be shared by most sports fans.
Sport for Business will have an exclusive interview with Rory Sheridan, Head of Partnerships with Diageo in the run up to next week’s start of the tournament.
