Reports: Channel 4 win UEFA Nations League Rights

[thebigdog2022]

This marks the end of the Bitter Sweet Symphony era at ITV I guess? I know it’s been asked before but how long ultimately did it last? Must have been well over a decade?

It started with the ITV/Setanta deal from 2008 for the 2010 World Cup Qualifiers.  Even when the rights were centralised and went to Sky while ITV kept hold of the England matches they only used the UEFA titles for the highlights shows or the secondary match on ITV4 and Bittersweet Symphony remained on the Live coverage. The titles had very little change to bar replacing the managers & players when they flew into Wembley at the end.

[Brekkie]

I think ITV took over the games from the BBC in 2008.

[Tom]

I think ITV took over the games from the BBC in 2008.

That's right and the Bitter Sweet Symphony titles have lasted 14 years and contained 5 England Managers (Capello, Stuart Pearce, Hodgson, Allardyce and Southgate).

[News Engineer]

That's right and the Bitter Sweet Symphony titles have lasted 14 years and contained 5 England Managers (Capello, Stuart Pearce, Hodgson, Allardyce and Southgate).

Trying to make ends meet,
Trying to find some money then you.....

....find Channel 4 have snaffled some of your key sports rights

[thebigdog2022]

I think ITV took over the games from the BBC in 2008.

That's right and the Bitter Sweet Symphony titles have lasted 14 years and contained 5 England Managers (Capello, Stuart Pearce, Hodgson, Allardyce and Southgate).

Also good amount of change with ITV Sport
Presenters: Steve Rider to Adrian Chiles to Mark Pougatch
Commentators: Clive Tyldesley to Sam Matterface (think Peter Drury did a few England friendlies when on ITV staff too)
Co-Commentators: Andy Townsend to Glenn Hoddle to Lee Dixon (unsure if Jim Beglin or David Pleat did any matches)

Pundits: First few years had a roving punditry lineup and had the likes of Teddy Sheringham & Danny Murphy appearing then the Gareth Southgate, Lee Dixon & Roy Keane panel appeared around the turn of the decade then when Keane went to Ireland Ian Wright replaced him and the last few years have had Keane, Wright an An Other.

[Brekkie]

Who produced C4's Club World Cup coverage? These things seem to go to Whisper nowadays.

[Jon]

IMG did the World Club Cup and do the Rugby League surprisingly. So can’t rule them out either. Ultimately I guess it’ll be a competitive process with past contracts only part of the reasoning.

[Brekkie]

Will be quite a quick turnaround with the first match in just 5 weeks.

Hopefully the BBC at least can pick up the other nations games for the Nations League at least, but guess they'd need someone to take the non-UK nations games off their hands too. Talking of which didn't ITV4 used to have a non-UK fixture per round - when did that end?

[thebigdog2022]

Talking of which didn't ITV4 used to have a non-UK fixture per round - when did that end?

They had that until 2018 World Cup Qualifiers, they had that for 2 campaigns and all the highlights. In Northern Ireland when we qualified for Euro 2016 they went from a full 30 minutes highlights programme to 5-10 minutes on ITV or ITV4 which was the problem I had with that deal.

[Brekkie]

Will be interesting to see what happens with the highlights here too. I think in the end all the nations ended up with highlights on the BBC, whilst ITV could show them on the nights they had highlights to the England games. Not sure how those highlights shows rated - if C4 end up only with highlights of England not sure how much value there is in showing them an hour or so after the live programme wraps up.

[telebox2001]

There's not enough FTA footy in this country. Ironically, the downsides when the PSBs held the rights - like Corrie going out at 10pm or the teatime Home and Away getting binned, are no longer an issue thanks to streaming.

Whilst Pay TV has been fabulous for the game, more football should be available for free than there currently is. It's why I welcome Amazon's entry to the field given how many people then have access to their games because they've got Prime anyway for deliveries.

[Brekkie]

I'd actually say there is probably more FTA football than ever with the new FA Cup deal, but a 5th choice FA Cup match isn't necessarily better for the viewer than one first or second chice Champions League match, whilst of course international football in the nations other than England are almost exclusively behind a paywall nowadays when it comes to the mens game.

[bkman1990]

Does Channel 4 need to contain new music for the new England football titles or do they use the official titles from UEFA for the Nations League or the European Qualifiers?

[no1fanofthepals]

Does Channel 4 need to contain new music for the new England football titles or do they use the official titles from UEFA for the Nations League or the European Qualifiers?

I don't think they will use the titles from UEFA but we won't know for sure until they broadcast the games in June.

[thebigdog2022]

Does Channel 4 need to contain new music for the new England football titles or do they use the official titles from UEFA for the Nations League or the European Qualifiers?

I don't think they will use the titles from UEFA but we won't know for sure until they broadcast the games in June.

Channel 4 use their own intro for F1 & Rugby Union so fair to say they could use their own