The Sport Thread

[RhysJR]

Fantastic news that Miles Harrison's recovery from colon cancer has gone well and it means he can return to the commentary box for the third British & Irish Lions test next weekend.

https://twitter.com/SkySportsNews/status...9395866628

A word too for Conor McNamara who has been an excellent stand-in for the rest of the series, has really stepped up to the massive hole left in Sky Sports' rugby legacy by the abscence of Miles.

[RhysJR]

Other sports right and presenter updates:

Gary Lineker is to join LaLiga TV to 'present key fixtures on LaLigaTV and feature regularly on the channel’s VIVA LaLiga studio programme'

https://twitter.com/LaLigaTV/status/1421017254871830529


Premier Sports to show DFB-Pokal in the UK and Ireland. They join OneFootball, German Football YouTube channel, BT Sport and Eleven Sport in broadcasting it in the last few years.

https://twitter.com/PremierSportsTV/stat...8719211520


And further afield, Scottish football to be shown on CBS Sports/Paramount+ this season

https://twitter.com/RaeComm/status/1420454552487223297

[Brekkie]

Fantastic news that Miles Harrison's recovery from colon cancer has gone well and it means he can return to the commentary box for the third British & Irish Lions test next weekend.

https://twitter.com/SkySportsNews/status...9395866628

A word too for Conor McNamara who has been an excellent stand-in for the rest of the series, has really stepped up to the massive hole left in Sky Sports' rugby legacy by the abscence of Miles.

Great that he is recovering but the wrong decision IMO - Conor McNamara has been excellent and to remove him from the final test, whether a decider or effective dead rubber, is unnecessarily removing the continuity from the series and a bit of an insult really. For me he's the better commentator too.

[Steve Williams]

Wouldn't have thought anyone would find something to complain about someone recovering from serious illness and coming back to their job, but there you go.

[Rdd]

Great to see Miles Harrison back (could be Sky’s last live rugby match, or at least that they will providing commentary for, for a very long time, so we might not hear him again for Sky for a while).

Other sports right and presenter updates:

Gary Lineker is to join LaLiga TV to 'present key fixtures on LaLigaTV and feature regularly on the channel’s VIVA LaLiga studio programme'

https://twitter.com/LaLigaTV/status/1421017254871830529

Yeah LaLigaTV. We don’t talk about it so much here (or previously at the blue place) and interesting to see Mediapro signing Lineker. The production at LaLiga Tv I often find odd, and some of it is as a result of being an official league channel (so it’s always “FC Barcelona”, rather than “Barca”!) but their habit of constantly playing background music during studio segments really erks me. Maybe that’s normal in Spanish football coverage, but I find it a real distraction.

[ethanh05]

Rocky start to Hearts v Celtic - Sky's graphics have almost all completely disappeared.

[RhysJR]

Rocky start to Hearts v Celtic - Sky's graphics have almost all completely disappeared.

And Piero graphics just failed on the Lions analysis (an error message came up on the bottom of the touch screen as Will Greenwood and Nigel Owens were about to use them).

[ethanh05]

And during the Trophée des Champions on BT Sport 2, the pictures were initially a bit ropey, then buffering frequently, and they were gone for about a minute, with BT putting up a breakdown slide and everything. It's in Israel, so that will likely be the main reason for it.

[japitts]

Great to see Miles Harrison back (could be Sky’s last live rugby match, or at least that they will providing commentary for, for a very long time, so we might not hear him again for Sky for a while).

Indeed so - if Sky regain the Sanzaar internationals that are imminent, that'll just be a feed from the Aussie/Kiwi/SA broadcaster. The autumn series will be Miles' next chance to commentate. Among other reasons, here's hoping..

[RR]

Out of interest, the English FA has registered the Saturday afternoon "blocked hours" with UEFA, which means (European) soccer can't be televised in England between 2:45 and 5:15 pm most Saturday afternoons.

https://www.uefa.com/insideuefa/about-ue...ing-hours/

At the moment they are the only Association to do so (and if so does mean that in theory if not in practice matches could be shown in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland).

[Rdd]

S4C did show Welsh league games in that slot (or perhaps a slightly different slot - I think they may have kicked off slightly later than 3pm) quite some years ago.

[Transmission]

Only very slightly different opening titles for the UEFA Champions League seen at the start of this morning's playoff draw (we're at the start of a new three-year cycle, when there's normally a bit of a refresh), expecting more of a change for the Europa League later with the launch of the new Conference League.

[RhysJR]

Only very slightly different opening titles for the UEFA Champions League seen at the start of this morning's playoff draw (we're at the start of a new three-year cycle, when there's normally a bit of a refresh), expecting more of a change for the Europa League later with the launch of the new Conference League.

In previous Europa League and Conference League draws there was a slightly remixed version of theme used in the last rights cycle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OelktNyPGQQ

And the intros seem to be strongly lnked with the trophies (like the overall branding):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToNJ3wsOOTc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7fSrGmUewk



And I mentioned before that the Bundesliga graphics seems to have been changed and indeed they have. More of radical evolution than revolution:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXCfBlH_1gg&t=7s

[Rdd]

A very late completion to the Irish UEFA club competition tender process as VMTV secure rights to the remaining package of FTA Champions League rights on Wednesday plus the UEFA Europa League and Conference League.

[thebigdog2020]

A very late completion to the Irish UEFA club competition tender process as VMTV secure rights to the remaining package of FTA Champions League rights on Wednesday plus the UEFA Europa League and Conference League.

No surprise there given the reports when RTE & Livescore won the rights that sounded likely to be handed to VMTV. I think the Irish TV coverage the last few years has been good and look forward to see it continue.

Under the new deal RTE have 1st pick on Tuesday Night and the UCL Final while VMTV have 1st pick on Wednesday Night and all matches in Europa & Conference Leagues.

https://www.broadbandtvnews.com/2021/08/...ree-years/