[NI92]

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.

[Scratch_Perry]

They would normally be however the red button channel has prioritised Final Score next Saturday.

Next Sunday BBC Two NI will show Ireland vs Italy over Arsenal vs Chelsea in the FA WSL Cup

Pedant point; Arsenal v Chelsea is the Continental Tyres Cup Final, which is the women's equivalent of the Carabao Cup.

[Steve in Pudsey]

Isn't that only as pedantic as calling the Carabao the League Cup?

[JACKLUFC1998]

Some more sTV related sports news - tomorrow night on BBC Radio 5 Live during the Monday Night Club, the draw for the quarter finals of the Betfred Challenge Cup will take place. Ties will take place across the weekend of 12th-14th April, with matches being shown live on BBC Two (even though it was previously said that BBC One would also show matches from that round onwards as well).

On Tuesday night, BBC Three is to broadcast the Scotland-Northern Ireland football friendly, however rather than doing it's own coverage and commentary, it will be taking the BBC Scotland coverage and commentary.

[Brekkie]

Assume BBC NI will do their own thing.

Talking of the Challenge Cup noticed when the clock went "red" it actually went pink, though strangely for Rugby League it went well into the 81st minute. I thought unlike Union in League the game usually ended at 80:00 with the horn.

[dvboy]

Assume BBC NI will do their own thing.

Yes, their own team on BBC Two NI.

[RhysJR]

First time I've really watched the C4 match coverage since they got the rights but finding Jules Breach quite poor compared to her contemporaries.

I barely watched any of the pre-match or post-match coverage today, so I can't comment on that specifically, but I generlly find Jules Breach quite a good presenter. On a wider point though, I do think the Channel 4 coverage whenever I saw it has been underwhelming/a missed opportunity. Jules, Kelly Somers and Steve Bower are all great broadcasters, but the whole programme is rather beige and flat; Joe Cole as the mainsaty pundit feels a bit overpromoted, especially as he appears for three UK broadcasters. One thing I will praise C4 for is their regular use of opposition pundits, something ITV's England coverage must have done only a handful of times.

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Assume BBC NI will do their own thing.

Talking of the Challenge Cup noticed when the clock went "red" it actually went pink, though strangely for Rugby League it went well into the 81st minute. I thought unlike Union in League the game usually ended at 80:00 with the horn.

There was no video referee on Friday, so I'm going to assume it was like 'the good old days' with added time rather than the clock being stopped when needed.

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Some more sTV related sports news - tomorrow night on BBC Radio 5 Live during the Monday Night Club, the draw for the quarter finals of the Betfred Challenge Cup will take place. Ties will take place across the weekend of 12th-14th April, with matches being shown live on BBC Two (even though it was previously said that BBC One would also show matches from that round onwards as well).

On Tuesday night, BBC Three is to broadcast the Scotland-Northern Ireland football friendly, however rather than doing it's own coverage and commentary, it will be taking the BBC Scotland coverage and commentary.

Scotland v. England in the Women's Six Nations will take priority in the usual 14:30ish slot on BBC One on that day. I guess the Challenge Cup will air after 5pm, live the majority of BBC's Super League matches will air.

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It does bring up that the UEFA friendly intro does indeed have no “titles”, which I’ve always found really wierd. Not even a “UEFA presents” which is pretty standard on all of their intros. Not sure if the broadcaster is meant to overlay a caption but I’ve never seen it done.

Agree it is weird. Their predeccessor for the bonus friendly game in the 2018 WC Qualifying cycle did have a basic titles caption at the end, similar to what Channel 4 did last night.

www.youtube.com 

This video can only be viewed on YouTube.

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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.

I'm a bit confused by the scheduling of the Women's Six Nations. The two network matches only having 15 minutes build-up (half of which is taken up by the anthems) felt very brief and a little rushed. A prime example today was the feature on England captain Marlie Packer being shortenned pre-match, with a lengthier version signposted on the website and also airing at half-time on the Saturday match. Although I have now began an interest in Peter Ustinov Poirot films waiting for the coverage to start, there can't be much extra cost in starting those build-up 10-15 minutes earlier, then having a bit more chatter and context to those of use that don't pay as close attention to domestic women's rugby as men's.

Similarly, there shouldn't be much reason that BBC Scotland's coverage next Saturday can't air nationally on BBC Two rather than being iPlayer only.

[RhysJR]

There's been some internet controversy over an alleged incident in the Saracens v. Harlequins Premiership Rugby match on Saturday. In the viral clip, the Television Match Official (TMO) is believed to be heard saying that an unseen incident has been picked up on TNT Sports' commentary by Austin Healey and they should ignore it.

Whilst I condone anyone going against anything Austin Healey says, if this is what happened, it is quite dodgy. I was not aware that the TMO listens to the commentary, and I don't think they necessarily should. They could probably pick-up on things extra eyes have spotted, but they could easily be lead astray.

x.com 

[Brekkie]

Wo der if ITV will return, if UEFA permit it, to using their own intro when England rights return to them.

And looking for the Friendlies intro on YouTube stumbled across what looks to ve tge Euro 2024 intro instead.

youtu.be 

[JACKLUFC1998]

Assume BBC NI will do their own thing.

Talking of the Challenge Cup noticed when the clock went "red" it actually went pink, though strangely for Rugby League it went well into the 81st minute. I thought unlike Union in League the game usually ended at 80:00 with the horn.

Regarding your first paragraph, they are, their coverage is on BBC Two Northern Ireland with Stephen Watson presenting