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Cape Town - A festival of 20-over cricket at Newlands will form part of a 24-hour cricket channel which begins broadcasting on Thursday.
To appease Cape Town fans, who would be losing out on the traditional New Year Test, SuperSport's unprecedented cricket coverage would include the hastily arranged T20 festival on January 4.
The festival could include a match between Springbok rugby players and the Proteas, the women's national cricket side, franchises and teams selected by fans.
"There is an extraordinary amount of cricket and we felt this was the best way to give it the coverage it deserves," SuperSport's marketing director Nomsa Chabeli Mazibuko said at the launch of the 24-hour channel in Johannesburg on Wednesday.
"We'll supplement the live coverage with legacy footage and the like, giving cricket fans hours and hours to sit back and enjoy."
The first Ashes Test, between Australia and England in Brisbane, would kick off the channel designed to accommodate the wealth of international cricket in the summer, much of it being played in South Africa.
Incoming tours to South Africa by Pakistan and India, West Indies' tour to New Zealand, Pakistan against Sri Lanka and domestic cricket would all form part of the continuous coverage, culminating with the ICC World T20 final in Bangladesh on April 6, 2014.
As a preview to Australia's tour to South Africa in February, some of the classic matches played between the two countries over the past two decades, would be screened.
