London
22nd February, 2002

    The UK's top sports sites Sportinglife.com and Sportal.com have today launched their tailored World Cup 2002 site. The World Cup site will allow Sportinglife and Sportal's 1.5 million unique users to stay on the ball with action in South Korea and Japan, as well as pulling in other football fans from around the globe.

    The World Cup 2002 site is accessible through both www.Sportinglife.com and www.Sportal.com and includes the latest football news from around the world, in-depth analysis, as well as match reports, live scores and a television schedule. The interactive section of the site takes a more light-hearted approach and features polls, competitions and a memory lane section. The site also features news and information on all 32 participating teams from Argentina to the USA, including profiles on the leading players. Finally, the special site also includes a Betting Zone with the latest World Cup odds and tips from in-house betting experts.

    The internet is set to be an especially major focus for this year's World Cup, owing to the time difference between the UK and host nations. Many people will not have access to televisions in their offices, so the Sportinglife and Sportal World Cup site will be a vital
destination for fans following England's progress.

    For fans lucky enough to be attending the World Cup, however, the site includes a travel section on both Japan and South Korea with phrase books, food, drink and hotel guides, as well as a guide to etiquette.

    David Annat, managing director of Sportinglife and Sportal, said, "By combining the content and expertise of these two sites, we believe we have created the leading World Cup Site for UK fans. We also hope that with 1.5 million unique users to our two sites, we will create the UK's most visited World Cup site. With this in mind, the newly launched site represents an advertiser's dream, as we can put them directly in front of a key AB1 audience."

    Sportinglife.com and Sportal.com's betting arms, www.Totalbet.com and  www.ukbetting.com, are also providing World Cup bets in the run up to and throughout the 2002 event.
 

About Sportinglife.com
    Sportinglife.com is the online authority on UK sports. Sportinglife.com was launched in January 1997 and developed its name and strong brand associations from the former racing paper of the same name. The site is owned by ukbettingplc, which also owns Sportal UK, ukbetting.com and Totalbet.com. Sportinglife.com boasts an average of over 45 million page impressions per month. The UK accounts for 70 per cent of traffic on the site.
 

Jon Wayth 
jon.wayth@firefly.co.uk
Telephone: 020 7386 4840