In keeping with global football trends Kaizer Chiefs used this past Saturday’s game against Orlando Pirates, to usher in what should in time to come be a regular feature at Chiefs home games in the future.

The Amakhosi changed a number of their perimeter advertising boards at the FNB Stadium during Saturday’s draw with Orlando Pirates, as they began using new electronic advertising boards. In a move which will see the club eventually do away with the current standard perimeter boards used at most PSL, although Saturday was not the first time electronic perimeter boards were used in South African football.

It was the first occasion that the electronic medium was made use of by a PSL club with four parties opting to use the electronic medium at Saturday’s game, Chiefs brand manager Dara Caroll believes that in time to come a move to have all sponsors and partners using the electronic boards is on the cards.

“At the Pirates game two of the leagues sponsors our selves and our technical sponsors Nike, changed our signage from the old standard perimeter boards to these electronic ones.

We thought that we would try to move in line with what is used at other league games around the world, from what I have gauged we found the electronic boards work well. Also from a communications and publicity angle you can do so much more with electronic boards, in future we will try to make them more interactive what they do add is a lot of colour to the stadium” said Caroll.

Another plus factor in the argument for moving to the digital format for sponsors is that they can display moving imagery on the screens, for the club they can use the boards to update fans on fan club information. The digital or electronic boards have been met with popularity in Europe, particularly in Spain and England as fans in the former country find the messages translated on the boards entertaining especially when goals are scored.