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Freesports

Free-to-air sports channel (July 2017)

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AL
alexhb01
From a516digital.com

Quote:
The management team behind Setanta Sports and Premier Sport are preparing to launch a new sports channel in the UK.

Details of which competitions Freesports will show are still unclear, although the channel is due to cover tennis, rugby and football. The channel is due to launch 31st August 2017.
MY
MY83
Is it 2003?

Also Setanta *and* Premier?
CI
cityprod
MY83 posted:
Is it 2003?

Also Setanta *and* Premier?


Yeah, Premier Sports came out of the wreckage that was Setanta Sports UK. Almost a direct descendant.
GE
thegeek Founding member
Setanta [Ireland] and Premier [GB] co-existed, and the former has become Eir Sports. The company which runs their technical facilities still refers to itself as Setanta.
DJ
DJGM
What exactly is Freesports going to show when all the sport stuff that most people want to watch is stuck behind the premium subscription based paywalls of Sky Sports, BT Sport, and perhaps to a lesser extent, Eurosport ... ?
ST
Stedixon
Tiddlywinks? Very Happy
TL
toby lerone 2016
DJGM posted:
What exactly is Freesports going to show when all the sport stuff that most people want to watch is stuck behind the premium subscription based paywalls of Sky Sports, BT Sport, and perhaps to a lesser extent, Eurosport ... ?


There is plenty of sport they could show that aren't in the mainstream or youth sport they could show but whether that will attract an audience is another question.

They could make it a FTA outlet for Premier Sport & Eir Sports and they cover the likes of Belgian Football, Northern Ireland football friendlies, Scottish Challenge Cup, NRL, Nascar, GAA, Ice Hockey etc, but that might take viewership away from their pay tv outlet and I can't really see it working, both Motors TV and Frontrunner have been on freeview albeit not around the whole UK but haven't lasted long.

Looking on BARB at Frontrunner ratings and they were getting between 8,000-14,000 for Greyhound Racing, BDO Darts coverage, Poker and their highest rating programme I found was 22,000 for an episode of Mobil 1 The Grid in March. Motors TV also had poor ratings on freeview hitting around 8,000-15,000 for most shows the biggest ratings I see for them is 80,000 for Goodwood Festival of Speed in summer 2015.
Last edited by toby lerone 2016 on 3 August 2017 12:09am

20 days later

RE
Rex
Freesports has released a promo trailer showing the sport programming on offer.



bkman1990, London Lite and dvboy gave kudos
NL
Ne1L C
hmm
JO
Jon
Useful post there.

The project sounds like a good idea, can see the potential of an audience who'd watch any sport but have never felt the need to or justified the cost of subscribing. I think it'll be a bit of a hit.
Last edited by Jon on 22 August 2017 10:47pm
RD
rdd Founding member
Nothing I've seen or heard has convinced me that it'll be anything other than a version of Premier Sports / Eir Sport 2 shorn perhaps of its key GAA, NRL, and NHL properties.

Interesting colours they've opted for the logo though. Black and yellow...
DV
dvboy
All of the tennis clips in that preview are from the French Open which I believe eir Sport have secondary rights to in Ireland, as per ITV in the UK.

Interested to find out what tennis coverage they actually have, the only thing I can think of would be ATP Challenger tour which has free online streaming anyway, or the occasional ATP 250 event which Eurosport pick up a few of throughout the year.

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