Spectators from around the world will be able to watch up to 65 live-streamed games, including the semifinals and finals, from the upcoming WFDF 2023 World Under-24 World Championships, which kick off on July 2nd in Nottingham, UK — all streamed exclusively via WFDF’s subscription partnership with Ultiworld.
“It’s great to stage the World Under-24s, which historically were contested every other year, for the first time since 2019 in Heidelberg,” said WFDF President Robert “Nob” Rauch. “The pandemic caused WFDF to suspend all global competitions in 2020 and 2021 but we’re delighted to return to the United Kingdom for our first Worlds there since 2016. As we look ahead to next summer’s World Ultimate Championships in Gold Coast, Australia and the 2025 World Games in Chengdu, China, we’re delighted to showcase theseelite nexgen athletes from around the world who will likely populate those rosters as well.”
WU24 runs from the 2nd to 8th of July, featuring more than 1,000 athletes from 22 countries and 400 team officials. Participants from 45 teams will compete in three divisions –Open, Women’s, and Mixed. The official website is at: https://www.wu24.sport/.
There wil be two showcase pitches, with eight live-streamed games available per day with expert commentary and analysis, plus a third field with a video feed without commentary. All semifinals and finals will be carried live, available on Ultiworld.com. Ultiworld’s monthly subscription pricing starts at US$12.99 for two fields, up to eight matches per day, with an individual Event Package that includes all three fields available for US$16.99, and a Finals package for US$8.99. Event pack and Finals pack ordering instructions are at: https://ultiworld.com/product/143330/2023-under-24-world-championships-event-pack/
and https://ultiworld.com/product/143342/2023-under-24-world-championships-finals-pack/.
WFDF Managing Director of Broadcasting and Marketing and WU24 Executive Producer Tim Rockwood commented that “We are continuing our strategy of ‘players play and viewers pay.’ Our goal is for local tournament organizing committees to spend less of the players’ money on media coverage, thereby helping to lower tournament fees. We will also try our best to live-stream a diverse mixture of competition, taking into account gender and geographic diversity, while keeping quality high and subscriber fees — which offset production costs — as low as possible.”
Ultiworld Editor-in-Chief Charlie Eisenhood heads up a production team that will deploy four cameras to each of two showcase fields, with shared drone coverage. The WFDF talent team includes many of Europe’sleading ultimate commentators: Hannah Pendlebury, Liam Grant, Geegee Morrison, Lorcán Murray, Rachel Douglas, and Benji Rees.
Games will be available with Mandarin-language commentary throughout the People’s Republic of China, as with the last iteration of WU24 from Heidelberg and the 2022 World Ultimate Club Championships from Ohio.