Politics still plays a pivotal role in ‘returning happiness to people’
England have so far won the World Cup only once in 1966 on home soil. They beat Germany 4-2 after extra time in the final at Wembley thanks to three goals, including one of the most controversial strikes in football history, by Geoff Hurst, who remains the only player to have scored a hat-trick in a World Cup final.
Thais were able to watch the match months later in a cinema.
Politics has since played a key role on several occasions regarding the live broadcast of the World Cup in Thailand.
Thais had the first taste of a live World Cup match on TV four years later — the 1970 final won by Pele-led Brazil who defeated Italy 3-1.
The match was only shown live here for political reasons.
It was reported that at that time, the military junta threatened to close down media outlets which published negative news about the government led by Prime Minister Field Marshall Thanom Kittikachorn.
Fed up with the situation, Thai Rath and Daily News, the country’s leading newspapers, decided to publish World Cup stories on their front pages.
The tournament became popular, prompting the dictatorship to order relevant parties to show live the final match.
Four years later, the opening game and the final were televised live.
In 1982, Thais were treated with four live World Cup matches, with the two semi-finals added.
Four live games were initially planned for the 1986 World Cup.
But football fans felt that was not enough and urged parties concerned to show more live games.
Gen Chavalit Yongchaiyudh, then army chief, became the ‘knight on a white horse,’ when he ordered TV Pool, a group of TV stations led by the army-run channel, to televise live matches from the quarter-finals.
A deal was struck in time for Thais to witness one of the most controversial moments in World Cup history — Diego Maradona’s ‘Hand of God’ goal which helped Argentina beat England 2-1 in the quarter-finals on their way to winning the title.
Chavalit later became prime minister.
Since the 1990 tournament, all World Cup matches have been televised live here.
Dhospaak, a company under Thai Beverage, maker of Chang beer, bought the broadcast rights for the 2002 and 2006 World Cup tournaments and for the first time matches were shown without commercial breaks.
There were no major problems regarding the live World Cup broadcast until 2014.
RS, which operates a satellite TV channel, planned to show only 22 live matches on free TV and those who wanted to watch more games had to buy its set-top boxes.
This caused an uproar as football fans thought it was unfair while some believed it was not in line with the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission’s (NBTC) ‘Must Have’ rules which state that seven sporting events, including the World Cup and the Olympics, must be shown on free TV.
The NBTC brought the case to a court which ruled in favour of RS.
Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha, leader of a coup which seized power just months before the 2014 World Cup, then told the NBTC to ‘return happiness to the people’ by using its funds to pay RS around 400 million baht for it to televise all matches live on free TV.
Shortly after the 2014 World Cup, Prayut, a former army commander, became prime minister, a position he has held until now.
The ‘Must Have’ rules scared away potential buyers of the 2018 World Cup broadcast rights and the Sports Authority of Thailand (SAT), led by its then-governor Sakol Wannapong, had to intervene by asking private firms to jointly buy the rights.
History repeated itself ahead of the 2022 World Cup as no private companies were interested in buying the broadcast rights.
A couple of weeks ago, Deputy Prime Minister Gen Prawit Wongsuwon, in his capacity as chairman of the SAT executive board, told SAT
governor Gongsak Yodmani to find a way to bring the World Cup to TV here.
With funds from the NBTC and private companies, football fans here are able to watch all 64 matches at Qatar 2022 live.
Former army chief Prawit reportedly wants to be prime minister, having had a brief stint as caretaker PM a few months ago.
Will Prawit’s role in the World Cup saga help him become prime minister and follow in the footsteps of Chavalit and Prayut? Only time will tell.