24-03-2024, 05:36 PM
(24-03-2024, 02:55 PM)thegeek Wrote: just looking ahead at next Saturday's schedules - BBC One Scotland are foregoing the Boat Race in favour of Scotland v France in the Women's Six Nations. England v Wales is going out later on BBC Two network.
Tacit admission that nobody north of the border really cares about the Boat Race? It does feel a bit like the kind of scheduling quandry that BBC Two Scotland would have solved in the past.
It's also not really showing a commitment to parity in women's sport if some of the W6N games are only available on iPlayer in some parts of the country.
BBC NI seems to have went to a mainly online streaming on iplayer for a lot of their sport rights both men and women's.
They show a game every week in the Irish Premiership and a Cup Match, a few years ago they showed 8-10 games on BBC Two between League & Cup but this year seems to be all on iplayer. BBC NI have the rights to NI Women's Internationals but stream them whereas BBC Scotland/Alba or BBC Wales/S4C always show live on TV. Their coverage of the Super Cup NI (formally Milk Cup) the junior tournament had matches streamed a few years ago and finals night on BBC Two but that seems to have decreased or gone completely.
The 6 Nations for the first year the BBC had the Women's rights BBC NI did their own coverage of women's matches not on network but last year the matches was on iplayer.
The GAA rights from outside the Ulster Championship and All Ireland are on iplayer and their Schools Cup finals in Rugby was on the iplayer on St Patricks Day. The NW200 is always on iplayer with highlights on TV.
In fact BBC NI cancelled the Irish league highlights show (although increased live rights), Ulster Rugby show and Final Score from NI in recent years.