Big media and spectator interest in handball

London – GBR, August 05, 2012: The handball tournament at the London 2012 Olympic Games is a big success – this is proofed by facts and figures from the first six match days of the preliminary round. The Copper Box, where the handball matches will be played up to the women’s quarterfinals on 7 August, was nearly sold out in every session (each two matches).

Until Thursday evening in average 95 per cent of all tickets for the handball games had been sold. And also the figures for the knock-out stage look great, as currently no tickets are available for the matches which will be played in the Basketball Arena from 8 August on, despite the huge capacity of 12.000 seats in the venue.

But Olympic handball does not only attract spectators, but also the media. Olympic rights holding TV stations all over the world get the coverage produced by the Olympic Broadcast Service as a world feed including interviews in English after the matches. And a big number of TV stations all over the world have their own reporters and commentators in the Copper Box to cover the games of their national teams.

The number of written press and photographers in the Copper Box are huge too: In average more than 350 written journalists and photographers covered the handball matches per day, with day 2 (29 July) on top of the ranking with a number of 385. —- IHF