Freesports

Netherlands v England U21s on Friday.

We're getting excited to bring you top sporting action on #FreeSports from the 31st August.

Because sport is better free! #FreeFootball ⚽️ pic.twitter.com/vTlR7mgtBu

— FreeSports 📺 (@FreeSports_TV) August 28, 2017

Notice that the Virgin logo has disappeared from the image above. Presumably the channel won't launch on Virgin from day one.

I wonder if the falling out between Virgin and eir Sport in Ireland has had anything to do with that. In theory it shouldn't anymore but the Setanta crew are very much still involved with the running of eir Sport despite the sale.

Some more detail in this article
http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/new-free-sports-tv-channel-11076516

The tennis content is 25 ATP 250 events throughout the year. I count Eurosport as having 14 of the 40 on the calendar so that's just one missing.

Virgin Media's logo is still there on the FreeSports website. I would assume that launching on VM UK is delayed until further notice.

A fairly low key launch with ident before cutting straight into sport coverage this morning, complete with commentary only mentioning Premier Sports with it being time delayed. Although when it was starting at 6am, it was only to be expected it'd be a quiet start.



Some of the adverts seem to have been loaded on to the playout system in the wrong aspect ratio so far, but otherwise a fairly smooth start. Some other coverage from this morning, including any idents I've spotted so far are online here:-

https://www.tvwhirl.co.uk/presentation/other/freesports/

It's there on Freeview Channel 95, but doesn't appear to be in the Sky EPG yet (at least for a London Sky sub)

You can add it via ADD CHANNELS on a Sky box - 11.426 V 27.5 5/6 and it appears as channel name "52556" - which you can then via via OTHER CHANNELS.

Both versions are dismally poor picture quality (Local TV bad...)

To be fair I'm not sure one can take too much from a website with a "Launching this September" tag for a channel that has already launched - in August.

I note newer material now omits the Virgin logo.

Also...

Hi Gary. We have nothing to announce about this at the moment. Hopefully it can be something we do in the future. ^Ben

— Virgin Media (@virginmedia) August 30, 2017

I am seeing some Irish highlights from The Junior Cycling Tour of Ireland until 4pm.

After that; it has highlights of the Xiamen Marathon in China for an hour from 4pm to 5pm.

Freesports posted this list of confirmed content so far. Nice to see a channel added to Freeview that isn't for shopping or +1.

Unfortunately the picture quality is poor and whilst some channels might get away with that, it seems to be a bigger issue for a sports channel.

Football

Portuguese Primeira Liga- 2 games a week
Belgian Pro League – 3 games a week
Spanish La Liga 2 - 1 game a week
Superliga Argentina - 2 games a week
Barca TV - full game from La Liga and Champions League
Dortmund TV - 1 hour weekly game highlights
Bayern TV - full game from the Bundesliga and Champions League
AC Milan TV full game from Serie A and Europa League

Motorsport

Australian V8 Supercars live
NASCAR Cup Highlights
NASCAR Xfinity series live
NASCAR Truck series live
Swedish Speedway live in 2018
Monster Jam highlights
Arena Cross highlights
Formula Drift highlights
FIA World Rallycross Championships highlights
On the Limit Sport magazine show

Ice Hockey

National Hockey League – 3 games a week that can’t go live on Premier
International Ice Hockey Federation – 20 live games from Championships and 5 GB games from Div1A
Champions Hockey League – 20 live games
Swedish Hockey League – 2 live games a week
Spengler Cup live semi's and final

Rugby League

50% of NRL live until the end of 2017
Select games from the Rugby League World Cup live
Championship Rugby League – Toronto matches in England live
NRL Full-Time
The NRL Footy Show
Rugby League Back Chat

Other Sports

ATP 250 – 25 events mostly live
New York, Berlin and Melbourne Marathons
IAAF Athletix
Spanish Basketball League and Copa Del Rey final stages
FEI Nations Cup
One Championship
World Series of Fighting
FIS Magazine show
Transworld Sport
Drone Champions League
Weight Lifting World Championships
Pro Bull Riding
Golfing World
Crankworx World Tour

While FreeSports are currently showing one ice hockey match, a second is free to air on Premier HD.

Virgin Media has generally tended to gain some channels at a later date compared to the likes of Sky and Freeview - don’t think it would be surprising to see this scenario manifest again.

Edit: Freesat viewers will be having a longer wait until 11th September.