This evening, ITV viewers in England will be able to watch an attractive live FA cup-tie between Manchester Utd and Fulham (kick-off at 5.15 pm). Unfortunately, the equivalent viewers of STV will be fobbed off with a re-run of an old episode of Inspector Morse.
I do not know why this should be. As far as I am aware, there are no Scottish football matches due to be played at that time this evening, so the question of competition should not arise. I assume that STV wants to keep in with the Scottish football authorities, even although STV is not allowed to show live matches from either the Scottish Cup or the Scottish Leagues. And why would the Scottish footballing authorities object anyway?
There is, however, nothing to stop the football fan from watching the match - free of charge and live - on the ITV website (here). The picture will not be quite as good as if it were on the telly but, if it replicates previous ITV football netcasts, it will certainly be better than Morse.
Oh and the Coventry-Chelsea match can be seen at the same website (kick-off at 12.30 pm).
3 comments:
I've been wondering about this myself! When BBC had FA Cup rights we got all the games covered live in England on BBC Scotland.
Anyone with Sky Digital will be able to see the games live on ITV London (it's hidden way up in the high hundred channel numbers along with all the BBC 1 regions- also handy if one wants to watch Northern Ireland or Wales international matches).
The CEO of STV which is a separate company from ITV was on the radio saying that there was no interest in the FA Cup in Scotland so they wouldn't be showing it. It is part of an approach which will be more responsive to the Scottish audience he said.
It's part of a dispute between STV and ITV. STV are desperate to pay less to ITV, and part of their attempt is to show less network output in order to persuade ITV to lower the price.
It's just another case of a Scottish media company weakening its product in an attempt to get by. It won't work!
Post a Comment