No live England game from Headquarters on the BBC. Nice divvy up of the games, right there.
Does that actually mean anything really, in practice, in reality? Does anyone really care?
I suspect the BBC lot are more annoyed at losing their annual jollies to Rome and having to brave the icy chills of the gods of the Stade de France than on missing out on Twickers' hospitality.
No. ITV get England, Ireland and Italy home games and the BBC get Wales, France and Scotland home games.
Or Hatton to look at it another way, the BBC went and teamed up with ITV and lost England home matches but stopped the tournament disappearing behind a paywall. I for one am glad the BBC did this deal with ITV as the 6 Nations is one of my favourite sporting events of the year and is great I can still watch all games between ITV/BBC.
Well, I do care.
I would expect both live rights holders to have equal (or near equal if one is paying more than the other) share of the games.
And if in a year where England have just two home internationals at Twickers - BBC have one, and ITV have one.
Don't care how - Draw lots, flip a coin, Inverdale VS Durden-Smith in a best of 5 arm wrestle, to decide.
Yes I know that the BBC will still show the white shirts when they play away from HQ - but that isn't the point. The 6 Nations organizers should have ensured that both the BBC and ITV show at least one live home international from Twickenham, Millennium Stadium and Murryfield in the tournament - and that just ain't happening this year.
Post Edit -
Toby, I'm not having a go at who has the rights. Despite having Sky Sports, I was glad every game was still live on either the BBC or ITV, as I was fully expecting an F1 style carve up between the BBC and BT Sport at the last renewal of the rights.
I'm having a go at the disribution of live matches between the two. And no, neither am I having a go at ITV coverage. Nick Mullins is the best in the business at Rugby Union commentaries.
It is fair, just not split how you expected it to be. Makes sense for them to have their infrastructure at three grounds rather than six, though I guess the BBC and ITV are only home broadcasters for England, Wales and Scotland.
I do think it would be better if every two years during the deal they rotated the grounds they covered, but in reality ITV taking the England home games would have been the clincher in getting them to share the rights with the BBC and therefore keeping the entire tournament free to air, so it is a price worth paying.
England is where the money is for ITV so that's their incentive for helping coverage remain free to air. If there was any less England guaranteed for ITV this deal might have not gone through and BT Sport or Sky may well be the home of the Six Nations.
It also plays well politically in the nations for the BBC to have plenty of coverage of Scotland and Wales.
It's a deal that works for both of them and is in the interest of the licence payer.
Well, I do care. I would expect both live rights holders to have equal (or near equal if one is paying more than the other) share of the games.
They have an equal share of the games. Out of the 12 games which involve British teams, ITV has 6 as does the BBC.
The idea that a game is more valuable to a broadcaster because it's played at home is utter nonsense.
In fact if we were even going to attempt to value each match then Wales V England (BBC) is probably the biggest on paper. However it's pretty pointless because the real value in terms of viewers will not be known until the teams have started to play and we know who has the best chance of winning.
The idea that a game is more valuable to a broadcaster because it's played at home is utter nonsense.
You do seem to miss the fundamental point here. That means having more of one teams home games means you have more games in total of that team than the other broadcasters. It's clear that ITV attach a different value to England's games than they do Wales or Scotland. The BBC have reasons behind their choice too and letting the ITV take the games they have.
Swings and roundabouts, given history the current split seems about right. There'll be a time when the invincibles will become the laughing stock and vice versa. With 15 fixtures one side of the deal will always be the junior partner. Of course with six participants in alternate years there'll be two or three home games so that adds to the fairness over time too.
Swings and roundabouts, given history the current split seems about right. There'll be a time when the invincibles will become the laughing stock and vice versa. With 15 fixtures one side of the deal will always be the junior partner. Of course with six participants in alternate years there'll be two or three home games so that adds to the fairness over time too.
Let's be clear though the most attractive matches or teams in terms of success isn't much of a deciding factor.
ITV's bottom line would have meant they absolutely had to have more of England. The BBC then probably said "that's good but we absolutely have to have Scotland and Wales", then ITV picked up the next two most lucrative teams in terms of the audience leaving the BBC with Italy the least attractive.
I've seen it cited many a time about how well the rugby plays in the nations as a reason for them not dropping this competition over keeping F1 rights for example.
I know Ireland also covers NI but it blurs the lines a bit with it being an all Ireland team. So I think they'd regard Ireland as less important.
I don't know if you can say it's a fair deal but both broadcasters get something that's important to them.
Last edited by Jon on 17 January 2017 12:30am - 3 times in total
ITV have Italy while the BBC have France. We assume the BBC picked Scotland over Ireland rather than ITV picking Ireland over Scotland, especially as ITV didn't own UTV at the time of the deal.
TL
toby lerone 2016
BBC have outlined their plans for their coverage this year, main headlines is Paul O'Connell is joining the punditry team and Sara Orchard is providing commentary for Rugby Special. As already discussed the BBC have 7 live matches, 4 Rugby Special highlights shows on BBC Two this year but also have weekly highlights of the Women's 6 Nations presented by Lee McKenzie.
BBC Team
Presenters: John Inverdale & Gabby Logan
Pundits: Paul O'Connell, Jeremy Guscott, Jonathan Davies, Martyn Williams, Keith Wood, Brian Moore, Chris Paterson, Andy Nicol,
Mike Blair, Thomas Castaignede & Ali Williams.
Commentators: Eddie Butler, Andrew Cotter & Sara Orchard
Reporters: Sonja McLaughlan & Lee McKenzie
A few questions about Mark Pougatch involvement in ITV 6 Nations coverage may have been answered, tomorrow ITV4 are showing The Big Fight Live presented by Mark Pougatch as part of their new boxing portfolio ahead of the launch of ITV Box Office and BT announced yesterday Matt Smith is presenting BT Sport Score tomorrow in his absence and I actually predicted this last Saturday
I think it's more likely that Pougatch will probably take time off BT Sport Score and was probably agreed with BT when he signed up to host the show and could easily see someone like Matt Smith hosting in his absence.