Skysports

[wiggos sideburn]

Yeah, I think pay-TV has realized that one cannot put every single event of a sport they are covering behind a decoder, you will never generate new interest with that. I can see a split coming too, perhaps showing weekend stages and highlights on freeview TV.

To be honest, I doubt cycling is big enough to be put behind paywalls. They tried it in Italy and it didn't work. On the other hand, it is one of the biggest sports with daytime action on weekdays, potentially filling gaps in schedules.

Well they have the occasional highlights on itv, which I hope will carry on. But a thing with Sky is they have so many sports they struggle to fit it all on their channels as they have agreements to have specific amount of coverage on certain sports. I don't know what kind of deal they have at the moment to broadcast the current cycling highlights, I know sports like basketball have to pay a certain amount of money to be broadcast on the channel and in the deal they have weekly highlights and a few of the games broadcast live. I don't think the paying will matter too much as a high number of households have Sky Sports anyway and adding cycling can help an objective they have of increasing participation in sports

 

[argyllflyer]

I wonder, seeing as they've taken it from Eurosport, whether the Swiss races will go out live. Their highlights, which I haven't seen as I was an ex-subscriber, have been buried away at midnight or so. Midweek daytime schedules are generally just full of repeats of other things, unless there's golf on.

 

[argyllflyer]

The 'testing the water' thing seems a little odd - there have been a number of times this season that coverage has been shown of what has been on Eurosport earlier. A Sky Sports subscriber gets Eurosport anyway as part of the bundle - surely the best way to see what demand is would be to look at Eurosport's ratings rather than shove relatively minor races like Brabantse Pijl on SS3/4 at midnight?

 

[gooner]

I wonder, seeing as they've taken it from Eurosport, whether the Swiss races will go out live. Their highlights, which I haven't seen as I was an ex-subscriber, have been buried away at midnight or so. Midweek daytime schedules are generally just full of repeats of other things, unless there's golf on.

I would think they would show it live. Some of the other WT races they show highlights in like MSR, T-A, Flanders, and Amstel are already live on Eurosport so they won't bother clashing as most people will still watch Eurosport as it's not a huge subscription channel. Look at the TDU for example which Eurosport don't broadcast. Sky showed every stage live and can get the hole audience for themselves as a result. I say they will do the same with Romandie and Suisse with lots of repeats as well. No one else is showing it so they can target the whole cycling fanbase with live coverage.

BTW Flanders was shown afterwards from 18.00-20.00, similarly MSR from 20.00-21.00 and Amstel this Sunday 19.00-21.00. They only seem to bury the coverage for the races that are non-WT.

 

[The Principal Sheep]

What worries me about Sky getting more involved (apart from the fact that I do not have and do not want a sky package) is the possibility that we'll lose live coverage of races from Eurosport only to be given highlight packages of all but the most prestigious races on Sky.

edit: see this is already being talked about, I should have refreshed before posting!

 

[wiggos sideburn]

The 'testing the water' thing seems a little odd - there have been a number of times this season that coverage has been shown of what has been on Eurosport earlier. A Sky Sports subscriber gets Eurosport anyway as part of the bundle - surely the best way to see what demand is would be to look at Eurosport's ratings rather than shove relatively minor races like Brabantse Pijl on SS3/4 at midnight?

Because their seperate channels/entities and you get Eurosport as standard even if you're not a sky sports subscriber. If people are watching the highlights of a small race like brabantse at late hours they will be able to work out how many people will watch the bigger races

 

[argyllflyer]

I would think they would show it live. Some of the other WT races they show highlights in like MSR, T-A, Flanders, and Amstel are already live on Eurosport so they won't bother clashing as most people will still watch Eurosport as it's not a huge subscription channel. Look at the TDU for example which Eurosport don't broadcast. Sky showed every stage live and can get the hole audience for themselves as a result. I say they will do the same with Romandie and Suisse with lots of repeats as well. No one else is showing it so they can target the whole cycling fanbase with live coverage.

They didn't show Gent-Wevelgem live though, but that perhaps was down to their congested Sunday schedule. Even the prospect of favourite son Cav racing couldn't get it live.

The next step for Sky is to do their own thing rather than just take the international feed of a race which is what they used for example for Tirreno - Sky had Kirby and Lloyd who were doing it for the host broadcaster, Eurosport had rotating cast of commentators as Harmon and Kelly were doing Paris-Nice.

Did Liggett/Sherwen do much WT stuff last year outside of TDU, the major classics and the Tour? Do the Swiss do an English-speaking international broadcast for their races? It'll be interesting to see who does the coverage.

 

[argyllflyer]

Because their seperate channels/entities and you get Eurosport as standard even if you're not a sky sports subscriber. If people are watching the highlights of a small race like brabantse at late hours they will be able to work out how many people will watch the bigger races

I hear what you're saying but I just feel demand for a WT race would be fairly easy to work out by looking at Eurosport's viewing figures. The EPG must have some way of transmitting back to Sky Towers what is being watched. I know they are a separate entity but there is a degree of working together. I've seen Eurosport races promoted on the Sky Sports website for example. There was a feature last year ahead of Paris-Roubaix with Harmon and Kelly.

 

[argyllflyer]

Going by what's been said on Twitter today, cycling reporter Orla from Sky Sports has been in Tenerife doing features with Team Sky ahead of their Romandie coverage.

 

[The Hitch]

Horrible news.

Eurosport is, was and always will be, the home of cycling.

50 squid a month. Va fangool !

 

[The Hitch]

They didn't show Gent-Wevelgem live though, but that perhaps was down to their congested Sunday schedule. Even the prospect of favourite son Cav racing couldn't get it live.

The next step for Sky is to do their own thing rather than just take the international feed of a race which is what they used for example for Tirreno - Sky had Kirby and Lloyd who were doing it for the host broadcaster, Eurosport had rotating cast of commentators as Harmon and Kelly were doing Paris-Nice.

Did Liggett/Sherwen do much WT stuff last year outside of TDU, the major classics and the Tour? Do the Swiss do an English-speaking international broadcast for their races? It'll be interesting to see who does the coverage.

Kirby doing cycling commentary outside of eurosport?

Do we no longer live in a world where qualifications ability and talent matter?

I thought he was only at eurosport cos he was the semi normal cousin of someone who worked there who felt sorry for him so stuck him into the -commentary when no one else is around, job.

at the very least I assumed that es found it cheaper to throw commentary jobs at him cos they thought it would be more expensive to actually hire someone qualified.

But he's getting gigs outside of es now? Itv and BBC give us football Mic guys who don't know one thing about cycling. Es and sky give us clueless Kirby. these people then get to get called cycling experts in the press and their opinion sought.
.You know thing are pathetic when ligget is one of the most deserving commentators out there.

 

[jens_attacks]

have this skysports a place for bobke and that hammer guy who pronounce alberto cun.tador all july?

 

[argyllflyer]

Kirby doing cycling commentary outside of eurosport?

Do we no longer live in a world where qualifications ability and talent matter?

I thought he was only at eurosport cos he was the semi normal cousin of someone who worked there who felt sorry for him so stuck him into the -commentary when no one else is around, job.

at the very least I assumed that es found it cheaper to throw commentary jobs at him cos they thought it would be more expensive to actually hire someone qualified.

But he's getting gigs outside of es now? Itv and BBC give us football Mic guys who don't know one thing about cycling. Es and sky give us clueless Kirby. these people then get to get called cycling experts in the press and their opinion sought.
.You know thing are pathetic when ligget is one of the most deserving commentators out there.

Kirby's got a gig doing all the RCS Italian races for the English-speaking world, British Eurosport excepted (International seems to occasionally take the host feed). Dan Lloyd the co-commentator and post-race interviewer.

For an interesting view of inside the commentary box, you can see your favourite in action here!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSHAU27uIcA

Edit: Kirby also did some work for Al Jazeera at Qatar.

 

[Zam_Olyas]

They should hire Jimbo from the guardian, he is fairly knowledgeable.

 

[JimmyFingers]

Bit of a dearth of decent cycling commentators. I've always liked the Harmon/Kelly combo, which is ES 'A' team. Kirby works best when he's used as AnecdoteMan during the live feed in the tour, trotted out periodically to discuss the local sausages and read some tweets.

The BBC have just ditched Hugh Porter, so if anyone needs a commentator for the Murray Walker school, he's your man.

 

[argyllflyer]

Rob Hatch is doing Tour de Romandie for someone, likely it will be the commentary Sky Sports use.

 

[asdfgh101]

If anyone from Sky is reading this:

1. Live coverage (with sensibly inserted ad breaks) is far superior to highlights

2. 30min programmes (with 20 mins of race footage) are only suitable for races likely to end in a sprint finish; not for mountain stages and classics

 

[argyllflyer]

If anyone from Sky is reading this:

1. Live coverage (with sensibly inserted ad breaks) is far superior to highlights

2. 30min programmes (with 20 mins of race footage) are only suitable for races likely to end in a sprint finish; not for mountain stages and classics

That said, Sky's highlights (albeit brief) were better organised than Eurosport's which in such circumstances would have likely just been the last 15km 'as live'. I deliberately didn't watch the race live and still enjoyed the brief highlights.

But live coverage would have been far better.

 

[JRanton]

Bit of a dearth of decent cycling commentators. I've always liked the Harmon/Kelly combo, which is ES 'A' team. Kirby works best when he's used as AnecdoteMan during the live feed in the tour, trotted out periodically to discuss the local sausages and read some tweets.

The BBC have just ditched Hugh Porter, so if anyone needs a commentator for the Murray Walker school, he's your man.

About 10 years too late.

 

[JimmyFingers]

About 10 years too late.

You try telling him that. But agreed, his commentating is lamentable and usually totally inaccurate

 

[asdfgh101]

That said, Sky's highlights (albeit brief) were better organised than Eurosport's which in such circumstances would have likely just been the last 15km 'as live'. I deliberately didn't watch the race live and still enjoyed the brief highlights.

But live coverage would have been far better.

It was about 15 minutes of race coverage; not really highlights so much as a summary with the last few km as-live. Better editing than DDV which was impossible to follow but still perfunctory at best.

 

[gooner]

Sky are showing it live.

The prologue, stage 1,2 and 3 are live at 15.00 each day. I don't know yet about the last 2 days but I presume they would be live as well.

I did hear the TT on the last day is live but only on the red button but again I'm not certain. Even though I have Sky I don't have the red button function but I'm sure they will show repeats on their main channels throughout the day. On the Romandie website it says Sky will be showing it both live with highlights also.

 

[argyllflyer]

Sky are showing it live.

The prologue, stage 1,2 and 3 are live at 15.00 each day. I don't know yet about the last 2 days but I presume they would be live as well.

I did hear the TT on the last day is live but only on the red button but again I'm not certain. Even though I have Sky I don't have the red button function but I'm sure they will show repeats on their main channels throughout the day. On the Romandie website it says Sky will be showing it both live with highlights also.

thanks for the update Gooner. I'd imagine that Tour de Suisse will follow a similar format.

 

[argyllflyer]

All 6 stages live on Sky Sports 2.

 

[barmaher]

I will not be cancelling my Sky Sports subscription.