29-01-2023, 12:43 PM
(26-01-2023, 12:28 PM)Brekkie Wrote:Golf future is unpredictable- it’s a sport in which nobody knows what the value of the rights in 5-10 years will be because of the breakaway.(25-01-2023, 01:11 AM)RhysJR Wrote: The Telegraph this morning reports that the BBC has dropped/not renewed its highlights rights of the Masters golf. The article also reports that ITV have likely ruled out bidding for highlights. And personally I'd doubt anyone else would want to, depite the prestige of the event in the sporting landscape, mainly because any broadcast will have to be shown after midnight.Not surprised and The Masters only have themselves to blame, especially losing the live coverage of the last two days and the unfriendly hours for highlights. I doubt the BBC will be putting in any knock out bids for it in the near future but perhaps the BBC pulling away from it's FTA coverage might open the door down the line for it to return fully free to air further down the track.
It will be sad to see, but another milestone on the erasure of golf from FTA TV and the public psyche at large. By my reckoning, and if all other contracts remain the same as last year, only 12 days of regular tournament golf will receive highlights (and all but The Open likely to be only an hour long after Newsnight or later) on FTA TV this year, with no live coverage at all*. The article states that in 2005 the BBC showed 28 days of live golf across the year - quite a rapid decline. Of course there is also the Ryder Cup and Solheim Cup in the autumn which are both in Europe and should have primetime highlights.
*Sky does offer a lot of mainly women's golf for free on YouTube with the selected holes or featured groups coverage of The Open last year availble for free on The Open's website.
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