It was the news of the day last Wednesday: SPORT1 was nominated for the German Television Award in the “Best Sports Program” category with the Ice Hockey World Cup on-air team around Sascha Bandermann, Basti Schwele and Rick Goldmann. Basti Schwele comments on the great honor in the interview – also on behalf of his two colleagues.
Basti, first of all congratulations on the nomination. How did you feel when you found out about it?
I think we were all stunned when we received very personal emails from the German Television Prize on Tuesday morning. And because we can't trust anyone, I first thought it was a joke (laughs). The SPORT1 officials quickly clarified the matter. And yes, it is simply awesome and a great honor to be nominated for the German Television Award. And that too with a team that has been working together like this for over six years. Not only does she work, but she's actually really good friends, practically like a small ice hockey team.
It's particularly great that ice hockey was taken into account for the first time, right?
It's a nice sign that our joint work is being recognized in this way. Of course, it also fits perfectly with SPORT25's 1th birthday. We have been trying for years to bring the best sport in the world closer to viewers in an entertaining way. Rick and Sascha would say we do “sporttainment”.
The performance of the national team was the deciding factor, right?
The home World Cup was of course a perfect podium and the German team made an enormous contribution to the success of this World Cup. The matches against Latvia and the quarter-final against Canada were particularly difficult to cope with emotionally - even for us. We are definitely looking forward to the gala in Cologne and hope that the whole sport can benefit from it and generate even more attention.