The Sport Thread

That was the trail style that came in at the 2008 Olympics, and this style lasted until the 2010-11 graphics style rolled out. I'm surprised that this trail style even made it up to Salford, as the 2010/11 graphics pretty much coincided with the move up to Salford...

Most fans of the league are going to the games anyway, they're certainly not expecting extensive television coverage. In this league even getting one match on television is a big deal. If you show loads you end up showing poor matches which are no advert for the league.

They're probably paying next to nothing for it, it fills a few evenings when they don't have anything else, it's more football, it emphasises they're committed to football at all levels and it emphasises to viewers in Northern Ireland that there's more content of interest to them.

Last time they had the rights to this it came free with Northern Ireland matches (which of course are now sold centrally by UEFA), when they also showed about half a dozen a season. I remember reading one of the Northern Irish papers referring to it as a "megadeal" in the same paragraph they said the televised fixtures would be dependent on grounds having floodlights.

Does Sky have the NI friendlies?

No, Sky dropped NI friendlies and Irish League when the UEFA rights became centralised only covering qualifiers. BBC NI held the rights for all friendlies in the last year (both home and away) after Northern Ireland qualified for the Euros and the Home Friendlies at least are now with Premier Sports for the next 2 years, the first match they covered was the friendly with Croatia in Belfast in November 2016.

Although now most friendlies are part of the Nations League, Sky will show them as well.

Tough pick now for the BBC for the next round of the FA Cup. Usually Chelsea v Man Utd would be a no brainer, but the way they've picked so far I think they may swing towards Arsenal v Lincoln.

I agree in a way if you want to go with the magic of the cup etc. however I believe the BBC will pick Chelsea v Man U as the first year the BBC got the rights back in 2014-15 they picked Man U v Arsenal over Bradford which were the story of that seasons FA Cup although they did get coverage of the replay which Reading won easily.

They've just shown Sutton vs Arsenal, and previously showed Lincoln vs Ipswich, so they've not been wanting for cup magic this season. Chelsea vs Man U is so obviously the first choice by several million miles. Yes, they play each other in the league, but how often do you get to see that on FTA TV?

.... as expected the Man City v Huddersfield FACR5 replay will be shown on BBC ONE,

📺

You'll be able to watch next week's fifth-round replay between @ManCity and @htafcdotcom on @BBCOne.#emiratesfacup pic.twitter.com/yLziNXJxbq

— Emirates FA Cup (@EmiratesFACup) February 21, 2017

Assumed it would be BT had the only replay in the last round. Good tie though for the BBC. Think its the last replay of the season too as IIRC they've been scrapped for the quarters.

Does anyone with lots of stats (I looking towards Steve Williams' direction!) know when the last time, if any Huddersfield Town was shown on terrestrial TV?

Hmm. I can't remember if Yorkshire showed them during the 2001-02 season when the ITV regions showed a few First Division matches. If not, they were shown against Liverpool in the FA Cup on ITV in the third round in 1999-2000.