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Thomond Park

The ask

For stadiums such as Thomond Park in Munster, a powerful AV solution can almost be important as being the sixteenth man on the pitch. They wanted to make the most of the live match experience to bring a big event feel to Munster Rugby games.

And although the big screen in the stadium is the focal point for creating an atmosphere inside the ground, Thomond wanted to be able to bring the action to all corners of the ground by streaming it through their hospitality and bars as well.

The problem was that the stadium was built in 2008 with an analogue system, so getting the authentic modern match day experience was proving a challenge. As Colm Moran, Operations Manager explained:

“We didn’t want any of our fans to miss a thing. We know the passion Munster Rugby fans have for their team and we know the kind of roars they are able to produce on match night. Being able to help them keep up with action in the ground and in our hospitality areas – for us that’s crucial to them enjoying the experience.”

The fix

While it’s always exciting to get the opportunity to kit out as famous a stadium as Thomond park. Because of the size of the task, it required a lot of planning from us.

Upgrading their existing analogue infrastructure proved a challenge as we had to revisit the distribution. We were unable to recable what was there, and the limited bandwidth in the existing cables meant it was difficult to keep consistent connectivity. So, we had to use a new technology to solve the problem.

It involved compressing the video and extracting the audio from it to lower the bandwidth. Then, resynching the audio at a later stage and distributing it around in 2 kinds of feeds – a clean feed and a dirty feed.

The clean feed has no extras like logos or time clocks, and it goes up to the control room. From there it’s distributed to the teams. And they get multiple angles for the actual match day that you don’t necessarily see on TV.

Then the dirty feed is the one which carries the broadcaster logo, match day clock, etc. And it’s this one that is distributed internally to all the stadium screens.

The result

The results of using this creative approach were manifold for Thomond Park and Munster Rugby.

Not only did it give the fans the modern experience they demand these days, where nothing gets missed in the ground. But the digital distribution platform allowed Thomond to advertise on it and generate new revenue.

While additional work we did on the sound for them within their corporate Thomond Suite was received well by clients who rent it out as meeting space.

On top of this, not long after that Leinster Rugby contacted us about helping them their Donnybrook stadium too.

“James and his team delivered an excellent service which included the complete planning, sourcing and installation of the solution. We’re delighted with the results and our fans were too. We’re looking forward to welcoming them all back here when Covid-19 regulation allow – and the screens will play an important part of any safety messages we need to deliver around this, when fans return.”

Colm Moran, Operations Manager, Thomond Park

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