IPL live on ITV

Quite an unexpected cricketing coup for ITV.

The Independent station has just announced that it has picked up the rights to the IPL and ITV4 will be showing 59 of 60 live matches over 45 days.

There is a fair chance that it secured the rights for a nominal sum after the collapse of Setanta last year.

The tournument,the richest cricketing festival in the world is already being show on You Tube.

It all begins on the 12th March

Make haste to the Red Lion at Withington

As this blog reported earlier in the week,3D football is coming to our screens on Sunday Afternoon courtesy of Sky and the Arsenal v Man U game.

A number of pubs in Manchester will be showing it but in order to stifle the expected rush its appears their location is a bit of a secret.

How Do though thinks they have discovered one such place,the Red Lion Pub in Withington.

Anymore rumours out there of where the match is going to be shown?

IPL comes to You Tube

This week seems to be verging on a watershed for sports coverage.

Firstly we get rumour that Sky are going to be forced to lower their charges for sporting events to other broadcasters.

Now today You Tube that they are to show Indian Premier League cricket.

Coverage is due to start in March and Google will split revenues from the sponsorship rights with the IPL.

Whether this comes to the UK is still in the open.Setanta held the TV and internet rights to the competition in the UK .

Decision on ashes soon

Will the Ashes return to free terrestrial television.

Culture secretary Ben Bradshaw has according to the Independent

provisionally accepted the recommendations of an inquiry into TV sport led by David Davies, the former executive director of the Football Association

Junior minister Sion Simon told MPs that a decision will be taken before the next election

Sporting boards not happen with the new A list

It seems that the government's review of the sporting crown jewels has not gone down very well in many quarters.

Yesterday a report was submitted to the culture secretary Ben Bradshaw which added home Ashes Tests, competitive football internationals for all home countries, home and away, and Wales's home Six Nations rugby matches to the covereted A list which means that they have to be shown on free terrestrial television

Leading the attack was the England and Wales cricket board whose chief executive David Collier decribed it as turning Gordon Brown's much heralded "golden decade of sport" into a "decade of decay".

He wasn't alone though.Rugby league, rugby union, football, horse-racing, tennis and Olympics bodies unanimously rejected the findings as well.

The proposed list of protected events is as follows

Summer Olympics,Footballs World Cup finals,European Championship finals,Home and away qualification matches in the World Cup and European Championships,FA Cup final,Scottish FA Cup,Grand National,Wimbledon Championships,Open Championship golf,Cricket Home Ashes Test matches,Rugby Union World Cup tournament and,Rugby Union Welsh matches in the 6 Nations (in Wales only).

Off the list came the Winter Olympics,The Derby and the Rugby league Challenge Cup final.

According to the ECB

The "vast majority" of thousands of coaches recruited since it first signed an exclusive deal with Sky, now worth £75m a year, would have to be sacked if home Ashes series were listed. Its chief executive, David Collier, said its income could be halved if the Ashes were listed and the chairman, Giles Clarke, claimed half of all England players' central contracts could be cancelled.

whilst

The Welsh Rugby Union has argued the sport could be "decimated" by the decision, the Welsh FA said it would be "catastrophic" and the Scottish FA has claimed it will cost £12m a year. The impact on the International Rugby Board could be particularly acute.

FA Cup live streaming a success

It seems that the FA's experiemnt of live streaming first round FA Cup action has been a success.

Forced down the alternative route after the demise of Setanta,the FA's webiste reports that

The FA Cup First Round tie between Oldham Athletic and Leeds United, streamed exclusively live on TheFA.com, achieved over 176,000 plays on Saturday evening. This is believed to be a UK record for a free-to-view competitive football match on the internet.

Ht-Martin Belam

Is there room for more than UK sports pay channel?

Probably not is the answer as yesterday saw the final demise of the UK arm of Setanta after weeks of lurching from crisis to crisis.

Subscribers hoping to watch the channels were left facing a blank screen.

Another victory for Sky then who saw of ITV digital's attempts to broadcast football to the masses earlier in the decade?

The jewel in the Crown for any pay TV operator is the English Premier League.It was the deal that gave Sky its first shot in the arm and unfortunately other sporting events, whilst complimenting the Premier League coverage are not crowd pulllers on their own.

Setanta,a modestly successful Irish broadcaster saw an opportunity to encroach on Sky's domain when the powers that be took away the monopoly of Sky and Setanta initially won two out of the six packages.

They were though the second tear games,broadcst for the most part on Saturday teatime or Monday night leaving Sky with the showpiece events.

That was not enough to draw people to the service.Even US PGA golf,FA Cup coverage and the IPL failed to push subscriber numbers up to the required 1.9m.

When Sky won back one of the packages,it was the beginning of the end.Now 200 jobs and £450 million of investors money is at stake.

ESPN is running to take over the mantle,having already secured Setanta's premier league rights.

But surey for it to work it must form alliances with Sky?

Boost for the online Express and Star

Some good news for the local press and for my team.

Internet traffic at Wolverhampton's Express and Star has seen a big rise following Wolves' promotion last Saturday to the Premier League.

According to the paper

the website www.expressandstar.com received more than 600,000 page views – a record since the website was relaunched almost three years ago.
Internet editor Tim Walters said: “The website chronicles a great day for Wolves fans and we are amazed by the huge interest in it.
“The traffic on the website was enormous yesterday and today the levels of interest are being maintained.

Ht-Journalism.co.uk

ITV covers the moon landing

After last nights debacle at Goodison Park,Dave Lee finds another ITV exclusive

Murray brings viewers to the Beeb

Like many other sports,tennis seems to have lost some of its appeal in the multi channel intercative age and the epic classics of the past featuring the likes of Connors,Borg and McCenro seemed to have past.

However last night's 5 set epic featuring Andy Murray seems to have won the hearts of the television audience.The match continuing well past 9.00pm cut into the Beeb's schedules ,delaying the start of the thriler Criminal Justice.

Yet it seems the public were taken with Murray's comeback expoloits as coverage peaked at 10m viewers,giving the channel 445 of the audience share.

Who says that the Television event is dead?

Media gives more space to sports coverage

I am sure that the critics of too much sport in the media will be on their high horses this morning.

Firstly the BBC has announced that its Parliamentary channel coverage on Freeview will be taken over by Olympic coverage in the summer.

The Guardian reports

BBC Parliament's Freeview capacity will be used to "enhance" the quality of the interactive TV streaming the BBC is planning to use for the Olympics, which take place between August 8 and 24.
This will mean that viewers accustomed to the channel's in-depth coverage of parliamentary committee hearings will instead be introduced to the delights of a myriad of minor Olympic sports

although as they point out,Parliament will be in recess then

Secondly the Sun is planning to capitalise on the European football championships by producing a Polish version of the paper aimed at the countries Polish community and their interest in their national football team

With the football season about to start up and the great battle between Sky,Setanta,Virgin and BT Vision to commence,news that another player(quite literally has joined the battle.

Chelsea and England Midfielder Frank Lampard is launching his own mobile phone channel.According to Media Guardian

the channel, featuring fly on the wall material shot by him on his mobile phone, would give viewers a glimpse of his life behind the headlines. "One of the reasons I do this kind of thing, and I am embarrassed to put a camera in my own face, I won't lie about that, is to show we're average people at home with our families doing ordinary things.

How I changed Football

Apparently Rupert Murdoch has recorded a interview explaining how Sky Sports has changed the face of football.

It may be unfashionable,but I have nothing but praise for this arm of the Murdoch empire.

Since its inception in 1992,I have been one of the converts to have forked out good money to watch plenty of live football.For those who remember the era prior to 1992 when we were at the whim of one of the terrestrial broadcasters to provide coverage,the improvements are second to none.

We can complain about overpaid players,high ticket prices,corporate greed and too much exposure,but compared to the 1980's of crumbling stadia,hooliganism and a game dying on its feet,the difference is almost immeasurable.

And its not just football,cricket coverage is so much better,the BBC rarely showed overnight coverage from the Southern hemisphere.Rugby Union,a transformed Rugby league,golf......should I go on.

If he is remembered for nothing(which is highly unlikely),then his transformation of sport will be set in the annals