The rights to highlight
The BBC Sport website has delivered some major projects in the past few years - World Cups, Olympics, big breaking news stories - but I would argue that none have been as complex and wide-ranging as the Football League coverage which launches this week.
The BBC won the rights to be a broadcast partner of the Football League back in 2007, as part of a joint bid with Sky, who will be the primary rights holder. Thus, from Saturday 8 August 2009, there will be a TV highlights show on Saturday nights on BBC TV after Match of the Day ("The Football League Show") wrapping up all the games from that day's matches in the Championship, League One and League Two, and on top of that, there will be an awful lot of highlights to watch for UK users on this website.
Namely, this website will be bringing you video highlights of every game in the Coca Cola Football League, Carling Cup and Johnstone's Paint Trophy. That is quite a simple way of stating what you will see on bbc.co.uk/football. How it gets there is a little more complicated.
BBC Sport is in partnership with an independent production company, IMG, as well as BT, on this project. Hence all of the 'film' (the industry term is "rushes") captured by the camera operators at each and every ground is sent to BT Tower in central London on the evening of the game. Here the rushes are edited into neat packages, ready for publication on the website at midnight the following day.
So, I will take a moment to clarify that, because it is not an easy thing to explain. We are allowed to publish from midnight the day after matches. We will try to get some content up on the stroke of midnight, but most of it will go live the following morning.
That means, if your team plays on a Saturday in any of the competitions I outlined above, you can expect to see a video edit of that game (approx two-five minutes) on this website when you get to your desk at 9am on Monday mornings. If your game is on a Tuesday night, check in with us on the Thursday morning. Sunday game? We should be showing that to you on Tuesday mornings. You get the picture!
In addition to the match edits, we will also offer a video edit rounding up all of the games from each division (one edit for each division) after each full programme of fixtures.
If you really cannot wait to see your team's goals online, there are two other options I can point you to. The Saturday night Football League Show will be on the BBC iPlayer from Sunday mornings, and a lot of club websites will be offering their own games earlier than we are allowed to, mostly (I believe) on a subscription basis.
The BBC will also have 10 live Championship games on TV this season, plus one leg of each Carling Cup semi-final, and the final itself. Each of those live games will be streamed on this website (again, for UK users only), starting with West Brom v Newcastle this coming Saturday; two of Sir Bobby Robson's clubs and, coming so soon after his death, it should be a poignant occasion.
Beyond video, this site will also see some changes to the way we present live football coverage this season.
It used to be the case that our match previews used to become a bit, well, empty while the match was going on. We used to put "Match report to follow later" there, while a separate page carried a feed of live data, which we get from the Press Association who have reporters at every ground. Hardly an ideal user experience.
Well, we think we've fixed that now.
When you read our match previews you will effectively be looking at what will become a 'match centre' for that game. When the game starts, all the live data from PA will feed straight into that page, and the report will also appear there, and then finally, after the delay outlined above, the video from that match. Some of this content - principally the live data from PA - will be available on our mobile site for the first time.
You should also see a bunch of new features including live scores modules on the right-hand side of our much-loved text commentaries; as-it-stands tables which means every time a goal goes in, the table will automatically update to show how things would look if the score stayed that way; an easy-to-view guide on club pages to your team's last three games, next three games, and others. Most of these new features will update automatically without you needing to wear out your put-upon F5 key!
I have probably bored all but our most fanatical users into submission by now, so I shall stop, but I'm happy to answer any queries about Football League coverage on the web, or any other aspect of our website, and if your question is about the TV coverage, I am not responsible for that, but I'll see if I can find the answer - or get somebody more qualified to post here.
Lewis.
PS - it's been a while since we updated this Sport Editors Blog. Sorry. I tend to think that a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff on the website is a little dry! Plus a lot of our TV 'talent' now have blogs where a lot of issues to do with TV coverage tend to get discussed, eg Jake Humphrey's blog. Hence this area has become a little neglected. But I am happy to blog here if there's enough interest. I also won't take any offence if you choose to tell me that having read this one, you're happy to not see any more!
© MMIX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~41~RS~)
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Thanks for the blog. While I gather that all Championship matches will be highlighted in "The Football League Show", will there be enough time for all 36 games to have a 2 minute highlight package in the 1 hour 20 minutes available?
And I have to admit I find the scheduling for this Saturday's edition rather sloppy - why does a Lara Croft film get precedent over The Football League Show, leaving it in a graveyard 23:45 slot? Seems rather sloppy to me.
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the live games are something I am very excited about, I'm just worried we will see too many games focusing on newcastle and the other so called big clubs of the championships.
Having waited this long for live games on terrestrial tv it would be a shame to ruin it by giving fans of clubs who are already used to live games too much of a preference
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Oh goodie. More football on tv. Be still my beating heart.
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O and at D_M_N i imagine it has something to do with the contract the BBC have drawn up with sky. plus this time slot is perfect get back in from the pub. watch some footie. A lot better than ITV's championship which i was typically either not awake or busy when it was on.
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Good point DMN, makes sense that the footy should be accessible for all at a reasonable hour.
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Well it's in the graveyard slot every week after MOTD. ITV had the much better idea of scheduling it on a Sunday morning, and I'm sure an hour could be found on BBC1 or BBC2 to accomodate it.
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Good to hear of the coverage the BBC will be giving to football outside the Premier League. One request for the highlights slot - please, please, please show every goal. One of the most infuriating things about watching particular highlights programmes on other channels was having to sit through 30 minutes of one match, only to miss out on goals from other games lower down the league - there's no excuse, they're all filmed these days. As a neutral when it comes to league football (these days), I'm interested in the goals first and foremost, and anything else only if there's time. This applies to FA Cup highlights too.
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Hi Lewis,
Many thanks for the Blog. I definitely would like more of these blogs as they are really informative. On this topic, I don't think that Barbara Slater the new Head of Sport has ever blogged. Can you ask her when she will? Also, we've not heard from Paul Armstrong from Match of the Day in ages. On this topic, no one from 5 Live Sport has ever blogged on here. I think this would be really useful in order to explain their choice of football commentaries etc.
On the subject of your coverage, is the football coverage being produced in-house or by an independent? I'm really pleased that the live matches will be in HD, though like MadGlover above, I'm a bit concerned that both you and Sky think that the Championship just revolves around Newcastle United.
Please do keep the blogs coming.
Many thanks,
Tony
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Hello all,
Just to tackle these questions ...
D_M_N - just to clarify, there is no way all the games will get two minutes on the TV highlights show. The 2-5 minute edits will be found on the website two days after the games are played. The TV programme will be doing well to get on air and wrap up all of the goals from all of the games (which is the intention) by 2345. There is no way you could get a show containing all Football League games on air for 2215, which is when Lara Croft is scheduled to swing her way onto BBC1 screens.
MadGlover, of the 10 live games the BBC has in the Championship each season, the ones to have been announced so far are:
Sat 8th August – WBA v Newcastle – BBC1 5.30pm
Sat 26th Sept – Ipswich Town v Newcastle – 5.30pm (Channel TBC)
Sat 24th Oct – Derby County v Queens Park Rangers – BBC2 5.30 pm
Sun 1st Nov – Cardiff City v Nottingham Forest – BBC1 2.00 pm.
So admittedly Newcastle is there twice.
Timbo21 and Brekkie, the show is ambitiously going out a lot earlier than previous attempts (ITV's was on Sundays, as you say), but it will be repeated on the red button until midday on Sunday, and will also be in iPlayer from Sunday morning. So, there are options for you if Sunday morning is more your thing. Or Sky+ of course, for those that have it.
Shaymatt - we'll try to show every goal. As I said, I am the web editor, so have no control (and no expertise) over the TV programme, but my colleagues assure me that is the intention. I can definitely say no one single match will have half an hour! And we no longer have the FA Cup - that is now on ITV.
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Thanks for the blog. While I gather that all Championship matches will be highlighted in "The Football League Show", will there be enough time for all 36 games to have a 2 minute highlight package in the 1 hour 20 minutes available?
And I have to admit I find the scheduling for this Saturday's edition rather sloppy - why does a Lara Croft film get precedent over The Football League Show, leaving it in a graveyard 23:45 slot? Seems rather sloppy to me.
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I assume that not all games will get their 2 minutes on the show itself, much more likely half the games will be goals/major incidents only just like ITV's offering last season.
As for the the time slot. It makes perfect sense for the Beeb to use the same slot this week as it will be using all season, which will be after MOTD, at around 23:45. The task of putting the show together is not an insignificant one, likely four times as many matches as the MOTD crew have to deal with so doing it in 6 hours or so will already be challenge enough, especially on the first week.
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Well, I'll be first to say I enjoy these types of blogs . . I never realised how difficult it was to get the highlights to the BBC. I'm suprised that you'd put the show after Match of the Day, I thought it would be a BBC three jobby. All the more reason for Fulham to not get relegated then!
Also will the BBC possibly be bidding for setanta's lost FA Cup and England rights? I think that was a big loss for the BBC
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Hello there.
Could you tell me how the football league show will be structured?
For example, how long will each match be shown on tv?
Will it be like the itv 30 second effort, and one main game at the start, or will it be like match of the day with extended highlights of every game?
So basically how many minutes of highlights will be broadcast on the football league show of each game?
Thanks
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What time will Football League highlights be, who will be presenting, who are the pundits and will it clash with MOTD? And who's gonna be replacing Stubbs on Final Score? Thanks.
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" At 12:58pm on 05 Aug 2009, Brekkie wrote:
Well it's in the graveyard slot every week after MOTD. ITV had the much better idea of scheduling it on a Sunday morning, and I'm sure an hour could be found on BBC1 or BBC2 to accomodate it."
ITV would move it around each week, at least the BBC will have it on iPlayer should you miss the programme; there was no punditry (not sure whether the BBC version will have it), adverts in the middle will be gone. The programme time is fine, but would the show be repeated on BBC3 during the week? Will the BBC do a highlights show midweek if there's a full midweek set of fixtures?
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Fantastic news....as a Grimsby Fan working down South I've previously had to rely on the goals making the cut on Soccer A.M's best bits as I can't make many games....now I can actually waste my employers money by watching the goals on their time....brilliant!
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Hopefully the coverage of the championship will be more than just Newcastle.
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My original point was would all the goals be shown from all the leagues - it appears you've addressed this though which is a good thing.
@ gunner-zp - Rosicky Returns! Believe in Bendtner: see --> http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/8170690.stm
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Hi Lewis, perhaps you can give me a better answer than the automatic response I received upon complaining about the fact that with rights to 10 games throughout the season, covering a league with 24 teams, you'd think the BBC would be smarter than to show Newcastle twice in the opening two months!! Anyway, I was informed the reason to show the Ipswich v Newcastle game was the opportunity to see 'two of the last decades greatest players in Keane and Shearer match up as managers'. To me this is a ridiculously answer for the following reasons:
(i) I don't think many people really care to be honest about Shearer v Keane
(ii) If the person making the decision of which games to air actually knew an ounce about football, they'd know that Alan Shearer as manager is still by no means a certainty and reports suggest he'll be back on MOTD this season and not in the Newcastle dugout.
As it happens Sir Bobby's passing adds new meaning to the Ipswich v Newcastle clash, so I'll be more than happy to watch it now and accept it as the chosen game. However, when the decision was made this certainly wasn't the case and whatever justifications were made for showing it really do need to be scrutinised. Finally, in future reasons for showing games should be more transparent as inevitably certain teams will not be shown this season and it is therefore a sensitive issue which can be curtailed with some reason and honesty.
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Hi Tony, the first part of your question is a difficult one for me to answer. Barbara is new in her job, and Paul is now in a slightly different role, and I guess everyone is adjusting to their new positions. I would also claim some responsibility here myself for the lack of posting on this blog - for one thing, even as a champion of the web within BBC Sport, I have been unconvinced of this particular blog's merit (although you may be changing my mind!) and for another thing, I've hardly been prolific here myself, and I'm a blog evangelist (just usually other people's, rather than my own). Re the second part of the question, the coverage is being produced in partnership with IMG, an independent media company.
Hackerjack - absolutely, and thanks.
Lone Cottager - I can't answer the Setanta question. It goes way above, and beyond me, I am afraid!
It's hard to answer your question, royal_forbary. We'll show as much of the games as is editorially relevant, but you can't really say how long until you know how good the game is. What I can say - and again, this is not my area of expertise, I'm to do with the website - is that they won't have time to dwell too much on any one match. The website will have longer edits of all matches in the Football League, Carling Cup and Johnstone's Paint Trophy.
Gunner-zp: This week's Football League show is on at 2345. It won't be the same time each week, but will generally be after MOTD. So, no, it will not clash with MOTD, once MOTD starts again on Saturday 15 August. The Football league show will be presented by Manish Bhasin, Football Focus (Manish's old job) by Dan Walker, and Final Score by Gabby Logan.
LowerRousRant - we are now allowed to re-broadcast the Football League Show on TV after midday on Sunday (when it comes off the red button), but it will be in iPlayer for seven days, and of course all the match edits will be on the website for seven days in longer form. There might be a midweek highlights show for Carling Cup rounds, but I do not think for Football League midweek programmes - those matches though, again, will be on this site.
In Cod We Trust - glad you're looking forward to it. Come on you Mariners.
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I'm just glad that the highlights will be on telly I can watch - as STV opted out of showing the Championship north of the border.
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Great news - I had no idea this was all happening! I can now follow my beloved Bristol Rovers from afar!
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I hope That BBC Scotland won't be cutting the coverage.
STV (Scottish ITV) already stops me from watching England games and the FA Cup, as well as The Championship last season.
As a Bristol City fan living in Glasgow i find it extremely irritating having English football replaced in schedules by repeated drama and film from the 70s.
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wednesdaymorgs - I am slightly struggling here to offer up a meaningful answer. As I hoped I had made clear from the outset, and throughout, I am the editor of the website, and was really trying to make a web audience aware of what we were planning on the site, and happy to answer any questions about the website, or any aspect of our coverage of this or any other sport on it.
I was not involved in the selection of the TV matches, and will not be involved in the selection of the remaining live games. Therefore, I would not want to patronise you by offering a weak explanation, which would be a presumption on my part of why my colleagues made that selection. I can offer a view, which is that both the West Brom-Newcastle game and the Ipswich-Newcastle game were of sufficient editorial interest to over-ride any concerns about favouring one club, but I cannot stress enough, that this is my own opinion, and not an attempt at an explanation.
Just to re-iterate, I will try to get answers on the more straightforward aspects of our TV coverage, but it is not my area, and I am not particularly qualified to discuss it!
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Goodness me - a Rovers and a City fan at comments 21, 22. Be nice, you guys ;) Noctambulant - your Bristol City games will be on the Bristol City page, but I cannot say what sort of access you will get in BBC Scotland to the TV output.
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Hi Lewis, very interesting blog.
As a footie fan who's now living abroad, I'm sure I'm asking a question you've gotten hundreds of times. Will there ever be a day when highlights, live streaming and iPlayer etc etc will become available for non-UK visitors to the website? I understand there must be a mountain of legalities to be overcome, but I'm just wondering if it's something we could look forward to, or should we not get our hopes up?
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This is fantastic to hear. Any live games on BBC are good and are always preferred to ITV's poor coverage. The Carling Cup Semis and Final is an added bonus. Now with this league show on after MOTD will there be new up-and-coming commentators on this show? Or will 'big' commentators work on the show at all? Also will Premiership highlights be available on the red button? Many thanks.
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Will you only be showing live Championship games, or will you show a couple from the lower leagues.
I'm sure most football fans would love to see what's going on with Notts Counties football revolution or whether Southampton, Charlton Athletic, Norwich City etc. can perform at a lower level.
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Hi lewis
Great Blog
Never Underestimate the power of football - Loads of interest in lower division behind the scenes stuff - The two videos I've just watch on the div two promo are excellent
Questions:
Will the BBC when it shows the coverage from every game use the club commentators on the website for commentary ?
Who will commentate on the Football league show and who will host it ?
Will there be guests ?
Will any of the Johnstone paint trophy/final etc be on the BBC ?
Will the clubs receive any money from you for being shown live or as highlights ?
And finally what will happen to the poor people from the Blue Square prem ?
Thanks for this
Paul Fenton
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
as another Grimsby fan here, one thing that particularly irritated me about Football League coverage on ITV was that there was no programme on weekends when the Championship clubs weren't playing, whether for international breaks or FA Cup. Are the BBC intending to correct this or will I still need to watch Sky for some half-decent lower league coverage?
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Keep up the blog Lewis, it's still interesting to find out what's going on in regards to changes etc.
One question I have:
You mention that the old match previews are being switched to a new "match centre" where the video and other info will be collated. What I'm wondering is, how long will this match centre (and the highlights) be available for after the match? Most in regards to highlights.
Will I be able to go back to football highlights from 2 months previous incase I want to check something out? Or will the video be taken down after a while?
Also are you putting any time and resources into giving users more options in regards to personalising what they see when they come to BBC Sports pages? I just think it would be cool if you could log on to the sports (or football) home page and it would be personalised for you (for example, you could have one section of the front page with all your team news on, one section with transfer rumours etc, and if you don't like a section you just close it. Like iGoogle.)
Lastly, are you going to do anything to combine 606 and the sports website? At the moment they're two seperate sites held together by links and stuff. Are there any plans to bring 606 into the sports site for easier use?
Cheers
Dan
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Hi Lewis, no worries. I guessed you weren't involved in the decision making and I didn't intend my comment to come across as an attack was just hoping that maybe being an insider you might have more of an idea. If you're a Mariners fan I'm guessing you can understand the resentment felt by many football league fans that Newcastle, a team who I believe had 8 of their final 10 games last season televised, benefited from having the first two BBC live games as well. Combine this with my personal annoyance that the Ipswich v Newcastle game had been chosen ahead of the Steel City derby which was not due to be shown on sky either. As it happens, Sky has since chosen the game to be shown and as such my resentment is somewhat reduced but nevertheless I do believe the majority of football fans will be hoping that Newcastle will not be selected for coverage in any of the remaining six games. Once again, I apologise if my original post came across as an attack.
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Lewis thank you for all the information
not sure if you can supply an answer to these questions
1)In the last month I read some where that the BBC had negotiated
a new deal with the football league for full local radio commentary
rights.
The essence being only the home team will now get a payment from the BBC,
is that correct?
2)Which will be the featured radio match on the 8th august on BBC five live at 3pm?
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Hi Lewis,
I have some questions although you probably won't be able to answer most of them which is understandable, perhaps you can ask the Editor of the new show or someone else to do a blog? I reads
When there are games on a Sunday is there any chance that the goals will be shown on MOTD2? Or on Inside Sport (when it is on) on a Monday like is already done for Premier League Matches.
On the odd occassion when there are Football League Matches but no Premier league matches will the show be moved to an earlier time slot to give it more exposure?
Will the live matches come under "The Football League Show" branding with mnaish presenting etc... will they be covered by MOTD?
Will there be new features and blogs on the Football League on the website (like was done when F1 returned to the BBC earlier this year) or will it mostly stay the same?
Are the Play Off Highlights to be shown online? I am guessing they will be but don't think I've seen any specific reference to them.
By the way for anyone that is interested this press release gives a little more information:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2009/07_july/28/league.shtml
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Hi, Lewis. Interesting stuff. As a Brentford fan this is very encouraging, even if it doesn't seem to offer much over ITV's previous offerings. I would like to echo the previous sentiment that you must make it clear to the TV people to show all the goals in the highlights programme. It got right on my nerves when there were 4 or 5 goals in a L1 or L2 game and they'd only show 2 goals but happily spend time on the featured Championship game showing unexciting things like ball going out for a throw-in. Also, if you could pass on that it's preferable to show sendings off too, that would be useful. Other than that, it sounds like you're getting all the content in one place for each team, which is great. One last question: Why has the BBC been so slow to update Brentford news in the last few weeks? Signings news has been slow and there's been nothing at all about the proposed 'partnership' with our largest investor, something which is very important to a fans-owned club such as ours. There was also no news about Alan Bennett's signing. He played for us on loan from Reading but was a free agent and the signing saga lasted for most of the off-season, so it's disappointing to have seen no report there.
Would also like to echo the above about this blog, keep the behind the scenes and technicalities coming, it will get read.
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It will no doubt be a shambles as pretty much every other football league highlights package has been. As lower league football gets treated with barely disguised contempt, unless your name is Newcastle or Leeds.
As soon as the first international break comes round and there is no MOTD to show, our highlights programme will be quietly dropped for the week and we'll be palmed off with the excuse that "the highlights are available online"
I also reckon that not every goal will be shown. If the match involving your team features more than two goals don't be surprised when they show two goals from your match and just tell you about the other ones.
Up the O's
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It still irks me that it states on the website for UK users only. As a RUFC fan , currently working in Germany, and pay my TV licence at home in the UK and here, I still miss out on the replays on the web or iPlayer
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I look forward to the announcement of a similar deal for the Scottish Leagues...
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This is fantastic news. 1 hour 20 is a good time for the show, and putting it after match of the day can only be a good thing. Even better the fact that I can watch it on the red button in case I miss it, and then on the iplayer all week after that! Good stuff, i only wish Match of the Day could be shown like that.
Following up from a previous comment - all the goals MUST be shown, especially if the tag line for the trailer is "we support your team". Not to do so every week would be criminal. I also hope a show for TV will be made for midweek programmes of games, of which there are many more in the Football League compared to the Premier League? This should certainly not be forgotton
As a Nottingham Forest fan I am glad to see my team picked for a live game, but to have two Newcastle games already is a bit much - they are used to live football, show some teams we're not used to seeing.
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Hi Lewis,
A simple question really, will match of the day highlights be available on BBC iplayer? If it will, when will it be available in terms of timing after a normal MOTD broadcast on say a Saturday evening?
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Ilovesnailmail - should you look forward to it, or not get your hopes up ... I would answer, don't get your hopes up. I can't imaginea governing body selling worldwide rights to one website because they are effectively ruling out their chances of selling the same rights to another website in every other country. Does that make sense? On a related note, we have no rights to use the Football League edits outside of bbc.co.uk, so they are not embeddable on other UK sites, either.
SuperLuka - I hope that's Luka Modric, as a fellow Spurs fan (wednesdaymorgs - I'm not a Grimsby fan; I was just expressing a bit of affection for my mate In Cod We Trust, not least because he has such a cool screen name) ... they will need to use more commentators than before, so I guess up-and-coming guys will get their chance, but I think it's fair to say the likes of Steve Wilson will still mostly be doing Premier League games. And no, we have no Premiership red-button rights, but from 2010-2011, MOTD2 will be going into the iPlayer, and that contains a round-up of Saturday's games, which means that from that season onwards you will be able to see every goal in the SPL, Premier League and Football League on bbc.co.uk, if not bbc.co.uk/sport.
Freddawlanen - all 10 live games will be Championship affairs. Though as someone who covered Norwich City home and away for the Eastern Daily Press in a previous job, I'll be looking out for the Canaries too.
Paul Fenton - the commentators (or voice overs, more precisely) on our web edits will be different voices to the club sites if that is what you mean. The Football League show will be presented by Manish Bhasin, and feature a range of commentators as you can imagine with that many matches. Steve Claridge will be the most regular guest. I am not sure at this stage about the Johnstone's Paint Trophy final. Will the clubs receive any money from us for the live games? Not sure - again, out of my sphere, but obviously the Football League deal with Sky and the BBC is worth a significant amount to the clubs. And as for the Blue Square Premier, whilst we haven't got the video rights, and unfortunately Setanta will no longer be there to show them in the UK, we do have a section for each of those clubs on this site and many of them are very well covered by BBC local radio.
Pontoon - that's a really good question. I promise to get an answer and come back to you. Let me quickly answer everyone else first.
And finally what will happen to the poor people from the Blue Square prem ?
Dan - the match centres will stay in our archive ad nauseum, but the video will only be available for seven days after it is first published. So if you do go into a match report from two months ago, you will still see the text report and all of the stats, etc, but the video will say that you can no longer watch it. Personalisation is a desirable, but the trouble is we get hit constantly by these major projects, like an Olympics, F1, the Football League, etc, and development time is spent on those. In the meantime, you can personalise the bbc.co.uk homepage, if that's of interest? I don't see 606 and the main Sport site coming together as such, as someone who is responsible for both, but I would like to make the main /sport site a bit more interactive ...
wednesdaymorgs - it didn't come across as an attack, don't worry, but thanks. Sorry I couldn't shed more light, and I'm glad your derby is on Sky now. I am meeting your chairman for a coffee tomorrow - a fascinating man!
Nevertothedarkside - not sure on either of those, let me come back to you.
Rexel - I'll try to get answers to the first three questions, and I'll try to answer the last three myself. Manish won't do all the live matches - Gary Lineker is doing Saturday's West Brom-Newcastle game, I believe. We won't be rolling out an F1 style Football League mini-site, that I can confirm. But partly that's because we have always been in the FL - we've always had a page for every club, the local BBC stations have covered their teams, and we have Paul Fletcher's blog (www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/paulfletcher) too. We should, I think, be able to show any game that's on TV live on the site, as a simulcast.
BrentfordVTG - as I've said, my colleagues in TV have every intention of rattling through all the goals they can capture ... they are not in the mood to mess about and sell other games short.
Cushdy-penguin ... not a whole lot I can say to that. I hope it isn't a shambles, and I don't think it will be, and as the website editor, I hope the website is just somewhere for stuff to be palmed off!
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Hi, are you or Sky the host broadcaster for the Carling Cup Final?
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Rexel - there will not be Football League goals from Sunday in MOTD2, and probably not Inside Sport either. It's the website for those! Also, will the Saturday night show be moved to an earlier time ever? Unlikely it will ever go out significantly earlier than 11pm.
Pontoon - there should be at least 40 Saturday night shows, I am told, and these will generally be where there is a full round of Championship, League One and League Two fixtures. So I think it's unlikely there will be a show on international weekends, but not definitely ruled out, is my understanding.
Nevertothedarkside - haven't got your answers yet, will see what I can do.
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Hi Lewis, as I understand it from what you've said so far, the goals and highlights will only be available for 7 days after the matches on the BBC Sport website, is that correct?
Which I'm sure is good enough for most of us, I'm just checking there are no plans to publicly archive all the matches, so you could perhaps look back at the goals from a famous victory of your club months down the line. Would it be possible, for instance, to collate some of the best goals from each division into a little 'goal of the month' feature, or do you simply lose the rights to any footage after the 7 days is up?
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Thanks for this
Two last question
I know the cameraman in the north of england who will film these guys have been asked to do interviews after each game will these be available on the website...
Also did you see the great job ITV did do with the FA Cup stuff on a video wall - Will the stuff on the Beeb be similar ?
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Meeting Lee Strafford ay? He certainly is an interesting man. He has pretty much single-handedly reinvigorated the club. I don't know how much you can divulge regarding the purpose of your meeting but I would be very interested in any details you could provide.
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Nevertothedarkside - just heard that Derby-Peterborough will be the featured game on 5 live on Saturday afternoon. Clough v Ferguson - tasty!
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Very disappointing to hear of no highlights show during international weekend - I would in the very least have expected a show - even if in a reduced one hour format @ 11pm on BBC Two.
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Nevermind, my questions already been answered now so no worries. I'm still wondering whether you have any rights al all though, like as I said to maybe have a goal of the month/season package after those 7 days which would be a nice little bonus.
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Hi Lewis,
just wanted to thank you for taking the time to blog and to implore you to please keep it up.
As a neutral living in London I am very much looking forward to watching the live games, and the highlights of league football on the BBC.
Best wishes.
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Thanks Lewis. At least i get to see one week's worth of action on TV up north before the Scottish League kicks back into action.
I suppose i'll have to be investing in the internet in my flat rather than peeking at the goals at work!
Many thanks for the blog though, most informative and great to keep abreast of developments on the BBC showing real football for a change.
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Interesting blog.
And well done for answering some of the TV based questions even though you are only really working for the web team.
If you could convice some of your colleagues from TV to blog more often that would be great. Roger Mosey's blogs were always a useful way of finding out about future plans, tv rights etc - something that Barabara Slater has not appeared to have been keen to do since taking over.
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Rawkmonster - you don't have to await an announcement for the Scottish leagues, as that happened first. We've had the SPL video rights on this site, and on BBC Scotland, for a couple of seasons. I hope you're enjoying them.
David - MOTD is not going into iPlayer. But from next season (ie 2010-2011, MOTD2 will be in iPlayer, and that has a round-up of all the weekend's Premier League action.
loyalsince1904 - I don't think that has been worked out yet.
Fred - our rights are just for seven days. We are hoping to do a Goals of the Week round-up, probably on Fridays, but there won't be a Goal of the Month, as it is just a week, and then the video will self-combust (or something ...)
Anton and Noctambulant, thanks very much. And tvphil (great name), Roger is doing a blog still ... www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/rogermosey.
Oh, wednesdaymorgs, it's really just a follow-up to this excellent piece by Paul Fletcher http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/paulfletcher/2009/07/sheffield_wednesdays_man_with.html#109185. Because Lee is interested in the web industry, he's popping in to say hello while he's in London. We'll discuss industry stuff, and I shall doubtless be humbled by a chairman of a football club knowing more about the web than the bloke who is responsible for the BBC Sport website ;)
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Dear Lewis,
The extra coverage sounds great, but what about us non UK users of the website. Will we at any time be able to see the highlights. Good news about the match centre, having everything in one place and auto refresh will be a great step forward.
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"...And tvphil (great name), Roger is doing a blog still ... www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/rogermosey."
Thanks, but this is of course all for his new London 2012 role, which is interesting in its own right. However, no-one at the BBC has really taken over blogging about tv rights, issues and future plans that he used do in his previous role.
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Thank the Lord that league football is no longer covered by ITV. They have, by far, the worst commentators, coverage, pundits and timeslots imaginable.
I remember last year when my team (Southend) played Chelsea in the FA Cup 3rd round at Stamford Bridge. We drew 1-1 with a last minute headed equaliser. In the highlights show from ITV, we got about 30 seconds coverage whilst the Hull vs Newcastle game (which ended 0-0) got about 5 minutes! I was fuming and complained - which I didnt get a response to.
Anyway, hopefully the BBc coverage will do the football justice - there are a lot of fans out there that dont support a Prem club (me included) and who want to see decent coverage of their teams games.
The time might be an issue though - straight after MOTD on Saturday? Im OK, ive got Sky + so ill record and watch in the morning.
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A few people - lanzafox most recently - have been asking about seeing these video clips outside the UK. In terms of our website, that will not be happening. Sorry. It's not because we don't want to, it's because we are contractually not allowed to. However, my understanding (and I'm waiting to have this confirmed by the Football League) is that some of the club websites themselves offer subscription services through which you can access the highlights of matches worldwide. Like I say, don't take my word for it, but it's worth having a good look around the website of whichever Football League club you support, and working out if you can see the clips outside the UK. And even if you're inside the UK, it's worth a look at these services, particularly for the diehard fan who cannot wait until Monday to see the clips on our site.
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To be honest I don't care about all the ins and outs of when and why and how highlights or previews or whatever are shown as long as there is more free football and live matches like the upcoming weekend.
I think you should still do a regular blog, it's always good to have extra sports news to read, but try and keep the content less confusing like this one was!
http://www.loserscomesecond.com/
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Hi Lewis
I am a Southampton fan who lives away from home for up to 4 weeks at a time, during which I can't stream videos from the internet. I'd quite like to see us get back into positive points when I am at home, so I was wondering how long the highlights from each game would remain on the website before they are removed.
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great news for me, not long been on t'web and now all these highlights to watch. cant wait for the new season. well done for this website, i find it easy to navigate and always informative. keep up the good work, cheers.
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Please don't put anymore Newcastle live games on. With 10 games you can show a max. of 20 clubs out of 24. Unfair to 4 clubs, now it's only 19. Who are the 5 that'll miss out?
Also, who's gonna present Football focus now that Manesh is doing this show and Stubbsy is going to ESPN-Sky and Jake is off travelling the world. (Lucky ******, I remember when he used to do CBBC. :P )
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It's about time terrestrial TV had this kind of coverage again...hats off to the BBC.
However, i'm gutted as i've just moved to America and wont be able to enjoy any of it. Is it possible to watch BBC iPlayer from outside the UK?
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Lewsi I hope this blog proves that there is the appetite for the sports editors blog.
You have had to deal with lots of TV questions, its an exciting time for BBC Sport with this new football league contract and many people want to know what the coverage will be like but none of the TV people have told us anything. The Sports Editors blog was excellent for all these questions and if Paul Armstrong, Phil Bernie etc had blogged you wouldn't have been besieged with all these questions!
I hope to see more blogs for the sports editors.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
what happens to the individual clubs sites? I'm a Rovers fan and won't fans desert it for the BBC? It is not the best site but they must make money from it which helps pay the players wages etc. I thought the BBC isn't meant to dominate online. Are you doing stuff to help clubs like the Rovers?
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Lewis, thanks for the update.
I sincerely hope your coverage of the Football League will be a lot better than ITV's pathetic effort. However I have a couple of main concerns.....
As a Blackpool fan I feel that ourselves and a few of the other BBC's so called 'smaller' clubs be once again overseen. For example, a pre match game preview last season would mostly say 90% about the opposition and then for example, Ian Ivatt is out injured. Now this is typical lazy journalism from the BBC in regards to Blackpool. The player in question is called Ian Evatt however this is a frequent mistake to misspell players names and provide no pre match coverage.
Secondly these so called 'experts'... I really hope you don't spend 30 mins of these programs asking their opinions, to be honest I would rather see the games than listen to their so called knowledge. Ok, if you have sent them to the game and they have watched it, I will quite accept their opinion, but to have watched 2 minutes of coverage like the rest of the country they cant really add any more to a game.
Finally, are you going to do a fantasy football game, like the prem in future?
And please, please, please don't make it the Newcastle show. They are not the main attraction to the total Football League audience.
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Lewis, great article. As a fellow Norwich fan, I am lookign forward to seeing the Canaries on BBC this year. A couple of questions I have about the coverage... firstly, will there be a preview shown going into the weekend (ie, a thursday or friday evening?). secondly, will there be a highlights package if there is a round of midweek matches, or will we need to get these from the website?
Cheers.
otbc!
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Hi Lewis,
Firstly, great to see a blog posted here. I was a big fan of the sport editors blog and think its great it has returned. I hope more editors see the responses to this and see the interest that is out there.
As I work for Virgin Media, I must mention that V+ is also available as a PVR! Sky are not the only choice!
As a Southampton fan, we've not had much to look forward to recently, but the new tv contract may just coincide with a great new beginning at the souths best club!
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Hi.
I seem to remember reading when BBC first won the rights, something along the lines of "10 live games in the first season", does this mean this is something your expanding on in seasons to come or is the contract just for 10 live games each season?
Will Local radio station broadcasts ever be streamed online? Im an Ipswich supporter living in wales and it can be annoying only ever getting the build up.
You said earlier that the Sport frontpage probably wouldnt be customised but is there anyway we can link the Club Page to the Main bbc Page and not just "Football"?
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Hello Lewis, it is great to see a blogger that wants to interact with the poster
It i something I like to see as it makes me feel the writer isn't just filling time with a pompus thread.
One thing i would question is the fact you didn't actually help me with my worry
2 out of 4 games for newcastle. If they end up getting 5 games it will be a shocker.
Cheers for the blog anyway enjoyed reading it.
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Hi Lewis,
Thank you for the blog, and keep it coming.
If the coverage is anything like last season's SPL web highlights, then it's going to be good and I hope your bandwidth will cope. Whatever happens to these clips? Are they stored in a secret bunker on disk somewhere?
Given that you will have a period of time between the live action finishing and loading the clips online, will it be possible to get a referee point of view on match incidents. I understand that this cannot be done during the TV programme but it could add to your online coverage.
Further, will be nice if the BBC make moves towards showing online highlights from the top tier's of Wales and Northern Ireland football.
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I was just wondering whether the highlights on the website will be in 16:9 or 4:3 because your confederations' cup highlights were in 16:9 but the Celtic Dinamo highlights were in 4:3
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How often will you be showing live football league matches and will it just be championship matches or will there be the odd league 1 and league 2 match aswell?
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Luka Modric (and spurs) are indeed super. Hopefully he can solve our left sided problems, and hopefully, now with the final on the beeb, we will reach our third carling final in a row.
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Apologies if any of comments 58-74 (which are all awaiting moderation as I type) confirm what Lewis Wiltshire said in comment 57, but most if not all FL clubs do indeed have subscription services (often called 'World', i.e. Orient World for my team Leyton Orient) accessible from anywhere in the world. Some years ago, the FL clubs (or those at the time, anyway) signed up a to a deal with PTV for online and media rights, which is why practically every FL website follows the same template.
Overall, I like the sound of what is planned both on TV and on the website for FL highlights, with two caveats:
1) One of my frustrations with the World online highlights packages in the past has been key moments sometimes being left out just because they weren't goals or sendings-off - for example, near misses or great saves. So while the TV programme will of course only have time for the goals and (hopefully) sendings-off, I hope that the longer package put up on the website will contain these 'flavour' moments; I'm generally hopeful they will, judging by what I've seen from SPL highlights packages on the website;
2) Regarding the Saturday night programme, I'm very disappointed to read that "it's unlikely there will be a show on international weekends" - these weekends are a rare 'moment in the sun' for Leagues One and Two, and it would be a real shame if we weren't allowed to take centre stage when the opportunity allows. Sky didn't/doesn't take Big League Weekend Two off the air when there was no Championship, and I don't think the BBC should perpetuate the myth that there isn't any decent football in the lower two divisions.
Finally, a 'yes please' from me for blogs like this that pull back the curtain a bit and allow us an insight into the decision-making process, particularly for something as new as the FL coverage; like the BBC HD blogs, it allows for two-way communication between those in BBC Sport making the decisions, and we viewers trying to influence and inform those decisions.
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Sorry for another TV question Lewis but -
I noticed the Celtic match last night had fancy new graphics, are these graphics being used for all of the BBC's Football coverage from Saturday?
And i'm another one who likes to know whats going on behind the scenes at BBC Sport, future plans etc, so please keep the Sport Editors Blog going!
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Good morning everyone,
SH - the video highlights of each game will be up for seven days after publication. Dam_boi - Football Focus will be presented by your namesake, Dan Walker.
Arizona Owl - none of these clips will be available outside the UK, I am sorry. There is still a wealth of material on our site internationally, of course, but not these video highlights. You could try the Sheffield Wednesday site though - highlights could well be available there, worldwide.
RovingBristol1 - we are not competing against club sites. We are partners of the Football League and the FL club websites. The Football League, it should be said, did the deal with Sky and the BBC on behalf of its clubs, and we treat them all as partners who we will help support. We drive traffic to the club sites from every one of our club pages, and as I hoped I'd made clear here, we are keen to make everyone aware that club sites can be of great use if you are outside the UK, where our rights do not reach.
Seaside_Barmy_Army - sorry we spelled one of your players' names wrong. We'll try not to do that next season. And no, there will not be a return of Fantasy Football to this site. We have not done it for many years, because the commercial market does a very good job of providing that service, and there is no need for us to deny them users.
ncfc_johnno - there won't be a Thursday/Friday highlights programme as such on TV although there's Football Focus of course and the website will have preview material ahead of every match, and more so full programmes eg Saturdays. There may sometimes be a highlights show midweek on TV, but I can't really confirm definitively. Midweek games will always be on this site though. On the Ball, City ...
SaintStatto - you're quite right to pick me up on that. Very poor from me. Thanks.
Edmundomctractor (the new best name on here) - there is no immediate prospect of the radio commentaries being streamed, for contractual reasons, and we're going to have to disappoint you on the personalisation too, as I don't think that is yet possible. You can just bookmark the Ipswich page of course, or use our RSS feeds if you have an RSS reader account?
Midwalesfootball - we did have a "You Are the Ref" column during Euro 2008, which was popular. To be honest though, our team will be flat out just getting all these edits published after match days, eg Sundays. There will not be a lot of slack for extra features, although I appreciate the suggestion.
Sono - wow, there's a question. I'll try and find someone who knows the answer to that.
Joffonon - I'm hopeful we will not disappoint on point (1), and as for point (2), I definitely take your point.
Tostevin - we have 10 Championship matches live on TV per season, and they will be spread over the campaign, as editorially appropriate.
Luka - amen to that.
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Sono - they will be in 16:9.
Lewis.
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I'm pleased the highlights are going to be shown on BBC and on iplayer. I don't think I'd be able to sit through Stoke V Bolton and Hull V Burnley just to watch more exciting teams in the championship on a saturday night.
Well as a Newcastle supporter I'd obviously like every one of our games to be shown on TV but I share the views of other fans that I would not want to see the same team all the time. As an ignorant Toon fan, I haven't got a clue about the players in the Championship (after all they don't have diamond earrings like the Premiership sort) and so need an education by watching other teams.
It was always an annoyance of mine that the FA cup coverage when it was on BBC would always show Man U or Arsenal irrespective of who they were playing.
Besides, I'm sick of Sky having all of our fixtures moved so that they're either late on Saturday night or on a Monday. I live in Sheffield now and we were supposed to be playing at Bramall Lane on Sat 31 Oct, which is my birthday. I was hoping my mates would travel down for the match followed by a night out. Now Sky have changed the match to a monday meaning a few of my mates can't come.
Good work BBC, showing ITV how its done.
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And it's pretty obvious why Ipswich V Newcastle was picked before Sir Bobby's death - Keane Vs Shearer (hopefully). Who wouldn't want to see that? Although I was disappointed that Sunderland Vs Wolves didn't see any sparks a few seasons ago.
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It is a shame that your first Football League show couldn't have been on a bit earlier as there is no Premier League MOTD to fit in first.
Infact, your own listing page http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/5161070.stm is still advertising it as 23:10 even though it has been shunted to 23:45 now.
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Thanks for the blog, Lewis - personally, I find the behind-the-scenes stuff far more interesting than a typical "What a Prem star had for breakfast blog".
One favour - I understand that you don't control the live match selection process but please, please try to get the decision-makers to read this blog. The FL coverage really shouldn't become The Newcastle Show and if the coverage goes too heavy on the "big teams" then there'll be a helluva lot of resentment from fans of the other teams. The fairest solution would be a 12-match package featuring each team once - it's not going to happen now but at least, try to maximise the number of clubs benefiting from the coverage.
On Leagues 1&2, even as a Wednesdayite, I'd happily watch a programme concentrating on Leagues 1 & 2 on international weekends. It's worth sussing out (maybe a poll on the next blog?)what the level of interest in such a programme might be...
One final point: I understand the Beeb not wanting to offer too many services clashing with commercial operators, such as Fantasy Football, but as Channel 4 and the Guardian have both scrapped their offerings for 2009/10 (was the C4 model the Beeb's originally before getting transferred), there might be a sizeable gap in the market by this time next year...
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Hi Lewis
All sounding very exciting.
One question which you may or may not be able to answer... You mentioned BBC iPlayer for 7 days, does this mean that the programme is also available on Virgin's catch up TV service?
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Hye Lewis,
That is a fantastic blog giving us the updates of the BBC's new rights to Football League coverage. I am sure BBC will put their best efforts in producing great highlights and coverage from the leagues. It definitely is fresh air compared to the daily Premiere League coverage we normally get.
I am a big fan of those league since i lived in England for four years. now i am back in my home country of Malaysia.
i hope you can answer my important question as i cant get any answers from the net or others.
How can fans from outside the UK watch the highlights or maybe Live games through the BBC? I really hope you can answer my question here.
Thanks so much and keep up the good work!
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Well Lewis, i hope judging by the number of reponses, that you are finally convinced that this blog, is far from Dry and you do indeed publish more blogs, in the not too distant future.
PS:Were you planning to publish this blog,or did Roger Mosey encourage you to publish this blog;-)
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RovingBristol1 - Like the Sky/BBC deal, the PTV premium video deal was negotiated by the FL on behalf of its clubs, so as Lewis says there is no conflict; the clubs still get income for their video rights from two sources, a guaranteed income from Sky (and now the BBC) and a subscription-based income from their own sites.
It's up to the clubs to ensure that their online product is good enough and offers sufficient extra content to entice fans to subscribe to it; I believe they can post highlights online earlier than the BBC can, plus they can post whatever pre- and post-match interviews, behind-the-scenes etc. footage they like, as well as live match commentary.
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Very interestingblog Lewis. I'm really happy with the BBC lately for their blogs. I think they've really steped up especially with Formula 1!
What i'd like to know (if possible)...will the Sheffield United V M'Boro shown tommorow night get highlights on Saturday night or will it only be showing highlights of Saturday's fixtures...?
Thanks!
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Hey.
2 questions:
-What will be done about play offs on the BBC?
-Will there be any time for interviews with players or managers on the television show?
Finally, i'd just like to stress again how frustrating it is as a League One fan when the Championship is given a lot more spotlight than 1 or 2. ITV did it all the time and i hope BBC try to avoid this problem.
Thanks for the blog!
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41. At 3:14pm on 05 Aug 2009, Lewis Wiltshire - BBC Sport wrote:
Ilovesnailmail - should you look forward to it, or not get your hopes up ... I would answer, don't get your hopes up. I can't imaginea governing body selling worldwide rights to one website because they are effectively ruling out their chances of selling the same rights to another website in every other country. Does that make sense? On a related note, we have no rights to use the Football League edits outside of bbc.co.uk, so they are not embeddable on other UK sites, either.
We all live in hope... It can be so annoying to use the BBC site as my main source of information for football, F-1 racing etc, only to find I can't watch any of the media streams. Would be great if the BBC introduced some kind of membership licence for Brits that live abroad.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
Lewis,
Oxford fan in need here, firstly great blog I like to know what is happening behind the scenes as it were, The BBC football website Oxford page is good despite it mainly being regurgitated news from the club website. Also I know neither BBC or the defunct SatantaUK will be showing live Blue Square games or Highlights but have you any idea who if anyone will be, I know Eurosport were rumored to be making a bid?
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r1_fan - I do not think the graphics will necessarily be the same as those on the Celtic game. They will be specific to the Football League.
Tvphil - oops, have changed that now. Thanks.
Eaves - I am going to be honest here and say that I don't know enough about Virgin's catch-up service to know the answer to your question. I can try to find out for you, but it might well be one for Virgin to answer, to be honest. In fact one of their employees posted here earlier - if you're still reading, SaintStatto?!
malaysianfan - these Football League rights are not available outside the UK. I am sorry. Like I said earlier, it might be worth subscribing to the official website of whichever team you support. You could possibly access the highlights there, and a lot more besides as joffonon says.
Professor Techno - nope, he didn't. It was all my own idea! Roger has more important things to worry about than my work, I'm sure (like delivering the 2012 Olympics for the BBC!)
Adasi - the Middlesbrough-Sheff Utd game will be available on this website from late on Saturday night (UK time). Not sure, to be honest, whether they will have time to squeeze the goals into Saturday night's TV show, but you will probably see them on Football Focus on Saturday lunchtime, possibly Final Score later on Saturday, and very probably on the regional TV news bulletins for those two areas during Saturday.
BritAbroad - it's not so much us wanting to do it, or not wanting to do it, or setting up a membership service for Brits abroad. It's more that rights holders limit rights packages by region. You simply cannot get, for the most part, global web rights to an event. I'm always really keen to correct the idea that we somehow just don't want to!
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How about some footage for us non UK residents.
It would be great for world listeners to have the same oppertunity to watch highlights of matches.How will we be able to see them
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I'm a Colchester fan who lives outside the analogue range for BBC Essex and I can't get them via DAB either. Am I going to be able to listen the live United commentaries on a Saturday afternoon via the net ...or will the broadcast suddenly disappear as the game kicks off for "licensing issues" (I've even sometimes been told I can't listen because I'm not resident in the UK although I live on the East Suffolk coast!)?
Thanks.
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53. Lewis Wiltshire - BBC Sport wrote: "You don't have to await an announcement for the Scottish leagues, as that happened first. We've had the SPL video rights on this site for a couple of seasons."
Rawkmonster's query (#38) was about "a similar deal for the Scottish Leagues". You do know there are leagues outside the SPL in Scotland, just like those outside the Premiership in England, which is what this blog is all about after all, so why would he be asking about the SPL? Not sure if you deliberately ignored what was asked or not, but needless to say, I don't expect to see it happen, and considering the pitiful amount of news coverage of teams/games outside the SPL by the BBC, like Rawkmonster, I won't be holding my breath....
Good move by the Beeb for football fans down south though, but as for showing the footage on BBC Scotland, although for any fans of Football League teams staying north of the border I hope the highlights will be, please, please BBC don't broadcast any of the live games.
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With Steve Claridge on the panel of pundits, I hope he has a good word for Saints occasionally, as he never did on Sky ;-).
Also, could Southampton's highlights please not be last every week like they have been on BBC and ITV for the past 20 years? Ta. Good luck with the new show!
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Interesting blog Lewis, thanks. I have the BBC Sport Editors' Blog bookemarked on my PC and can't say I really ever read any other BBC Blogs, so there is certainly a market (just look at the number of replies to this for instance).
As for the Championship, it's good to know I can see the goals on the BBC Website. I often look at the site for SPL goals and know it is handy when you hear radio reporters talk about "goal of the season" candidates in a game.
I share the worry amongst many Scots that the TV show will be dropped although I notice it's scheduled for after Tomb Raider this weekend. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come and not just a one-off.
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Can I just say to Lewis, well done on answering all those questions, (some of them multiple times to different users). I have, (since about post 6) just been scanning to your answers and was amazed by how much you replied.
And majority of answers included the question so I didn't have to scan up the page, all in all..
GOOD JOB!!
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Very funny that the Toon are on the first two games, tell me, what do I do as a Toon fan in our present predicament, forget the diamond ear rings, the starting eleven will be in nappies soon enough as our club is sold down the river. I suspect the team that lines up on Saturday will be a bit different come September, so in essense, it may be worth checking them out pre and post the transfer window closing.....
Good effort BBC, if only I were able to look forward to it all!!!!!
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It is still only 2-5 minutes, will it really differ from the abysmal itv / virgin coverage last season?
I hate sky and the stranglehold it has on our national game.
VFF
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thanks for replying Lewis
now, where do I find your blog on a regular basis?
and remember Welsh and Nth Ireland top leagues, which are on par with the Scottish Div 1 [lower]
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Thanks for the excellent blog & answers provided so far.
Sky Sports are claiming on their website that they will have 'highlights' from every game too:
"And to complete your coverage, this season we will have video highlights of every Coca-Cola Championship, League One and Two game plus action from the Carling Cup."
Will these video highlights be the same 'package' as the ones published on the BBC website, or are Sky cutting their own version?
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Fingerbob - no, we have not got those rights, sorry. AntonBear - thanks very much, really kind of you to say so.
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So, no news on any Boro matches, I'm guessing it'll be a trek to the pub to watch the odd crumb Sky throws our way!
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Great to hear that 'proper' football is getting an airing on national TV. Too many parts of the media dont even acknowledge that there is a world outside the Premier League.
The match day website coverage sounds great, I love to see 'real time' league tables, especially at the start of the season where every goal can make huge positional changes.
As for the choice of live games issue, its impossible to please everybody. 10 live games gives a maximum of 20 teams that can be shown, which would leave the remaining unchosen teams complaining of bias against them. Just enjoy what is put out there, seeing 1 team twice is better than not seeing anything.
And I echo comment 98, it really does make a refreshing change to see a blogger responding to comments. Thanks.
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#94 fingerbob69
I don't work for anyone related to them but would recommend that you sign up to your team's subscription service on the club's official website (at the top right and called U's Player. You get full live commentary from people close to your own club, as well as highlights the Monday after a Saturday game and the ability to view them through the whole season instead of just for a week.
My one for Brentford is £34.99 and it's well worth it. I have a season ticket but don't often go to away games so it's very useful and well worth the money. You can also use your membership to sign into the website of any participating club and watch their videos or listen to their commentaries if your lot aren't playing. Great value for money.
Good luck for the upcoming season.
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Hi,
Very informative blog, thanks.
One tiny suggestion for the programme - it always irritated me on ITV that for Leagues One and Two they would announce the final score at the beginning of the clip. I know it's only a minute long, but I like to find out the final score at the end, even when I'm watching two teams I barely know anything about.
And one question. After the broadcast there's bound to be loads of comment about the format etc of the programme, and it may be that a lot of people do that here. Is here the most effective place to post it (in terms of suggestions getting to the programme makers) or would that be somewhere else?
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PS. I should also have just said how delighted I was to hear that I will be able to watch Football League highlights on Saturday night (and not on the dreadful ITV). And the League Cup Final is to be live on terrestrial telly - quite right too.
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Why not take off that rubbish Tim Lovejoy programme on a Sunday morning, replace it with the league highlights and get him to introduce that, if the BBC are so desperate to employ him?
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Hi Lewis
I know your rights do not currently include the Blue Square Premier, but as no other broadcaster has picked up these rights (previously held by Setanta) is there any possibility that you will be able to show at least brief highlights of any of the big games on Final Score, The Football League show or Football Focus?
Particularly AFC Wimbledon v Luton which is going to be a massive game tomorrow.
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Hi again Lewis and Eaves,
The plan is for The Football League Show to be avialable on iplayer on Virgin Media. There are also rumours the live match will be on there too but I am not as sure about that one.
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Lewis,
Two questions, are the live games also being broadcast in HD (in which case will iPlayer offerings also be available in HD?)
And secondly, will iPlayer offerings be available for download or will they only be available for streaming?
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To Lewis:
Yes, if theres a blog on here I tend to read it so why not a behind the scenes one if the material is interesting. I remember being the sole member of a tour around the reebok when I stayed in the hotel attached in the off season and it was really interesting even though I don't support Bolton.
To Noctambulant:
Buy a sky box, you can then switch over to the regional BBC channels and also theres ITV London on nine hundred and ninety something for those England games.
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Hi,
Why doesn't the BBC negotiate harder with Sky when structuring joint ventures such as the Football League contract? Surely, one game per week should've been the bare minimum given that the BBC has no other live football. Having such few live games from the FL will inevitably mean that these programmes will be just a showcase for Sky. Who wins? Sky of course.
Also, I like the vast majority of fans support a premier league club. However, I wouldn't mind watching a few of best games from the Championship every Saturday. Why doesn't the BBC put together a one-hour programme on BBC3 around 8pm (Saturday) showing 3/4 of the big or most entertaining games from the Championship?
Regards,
Dave
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Stampoutthecheats - we are going to do it as you suggest, you'll be pleased to hear. It is a bit of a shame when you display the result before you watch the clip, I agree. Regarding your question, this is as good a place as any. I'll check in on Monday to see if there's been new comments here, and it is worth saying that I can't really respond on comments about TV, just make the relevant people aware of them. More than happy to answer any questions on the website though. For the same reason, Dave (comment 114) I can't really shed much light on that. I'm not privy to those negotiations - you credit me with being more senior than I actually am!
TvPhil - we haven't got the rights to the Blue Square Premier, so no, those games won't be on the BBC, however tasty they are (and I agree, Wimbledon-Luton is a decent match).
Hardy24 - tomorrow's West Brom-Newcastle game will be in HD, I can confirm, but I don't know what the plan is beyond that, at this stage. And all our web rights are streaming and on-demand, but not download.
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Lewis you must get annoyed at the repetitive questions sometimes. Just wanna say good blog, more would be great, as all bbc sport blogs are. also cant wait for new season to start. is it really tommorrow? summer flew in. back to the nailbiting.
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"it's been a while since we updated this Sport Editors Blog. Sorry. I tend to think that a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff on the website is a little dry! for one thing, even as a champion of the web within BBC Sport, I have been unconvinced of this particular blog's merit"
Well it's obviously so unpopular. Nothing at all to do with any criticism you got of course, the tiny bit that's allowed through, that isn't 'moderated'.
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Is the Football league show available on BBC i player?
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Good to see the Sport Editors blog back off life support, and even if Barbara Slater doesn't want to contribute personally, more blogs from the various editors and producers of BBC Sports output would be hugely appreciated. Something about the World Athletics Champs coverage would be great.
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KTfoot - I promise you my own inactivity on this blog is not down to a fear of criticism. I have no fear of criticism - I am used to it after eight years of marriage. Feel free to tell me what you really think - this blog is moderated, I admit, but we should only be blocking comments that are abusive, not ones that are merely critical.
Myerla - yes, it will be in iPlayer.
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I like many are still critical of the choice of Newcastle being on TV twice...also Lewis Wiltshire, you you tell us which smart person decided just to get 10 games a season on...this isnt the Premier League, its the Championship, 4 more teams!
However, the BBC have made this all by having 2 Leicester City fans on their Coverage with Gary Lineker and Manish Bhasin.
I will be watching.
Also who will be commentating? Is John Motson doing it as Motty sounded he likes the Football League on the Podcast from the Football League so is it Motty?
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Great blog except for the come on you mariners comment!! Also you have a lot of patience with the countless people who keep asking you about outside UK issues even though youv'e addressed them several times above...Just wanted to know if the highlights on the web for lower league teams would be more than that offered by the club subscription service? I subscribed to the Lincoln City highlights when i moved away for Uni and was left wanting more after just seeing the goals and maybe a couple of missed chances so will the BBC offer any extension on whats already offered by club websites?
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Hi Lewis
You have great patience!
It must have already been stated 6 times just on this blog that the Football League Show will be on the iPlayer before Myerla asked the question yet again.
I have also lost count how many times it has been asked about the online rights to show highlights outside of the UK on this and similar blogs.
Perhaps as a suggestion - the iPlayer and international availablity could be stated at the top of each of these kind of blogs to avoid the questions always being asked repeatedly. [I know they are explained in various places on the BBC website already but it doesn't seem to stop people from keep asking at the moment].
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Looking very good so far!
One thing does concern me, however - according to your league table, Southampton have ten more points than they should do at this stage of the season!
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Well it looks like there is going to be excellent TV and online coverage of the Championship in this upcoming season from the BBC. It's almost a shame I'm a Wolves fan and we got promoted last season :-D At least this year (and the next few, whether we stay up or not) we are guaranteed to be on BBC highlights, whether its MOTD or The Football League Show. Funnily enough when we were last in The Premiership, ITV had the highlights. So I think it will be the first time for 25/26 years since we've been on MOTD (apart from FA Cup highlights)
Anyway Lewis, I also have to say that this has been an excellent informative blog. It really is a refreshing change to read a blog that follows up an initial good "article" with rapport and feedback with the user community. I also feel you have to be additionally commended on your persistence in answering questions that have been answered numerous times before.
You may not blog very often but at least when you do it is worth reading and you respond to the community. Keep up the good work.
P.S. How come I can't view the highlights if I am outside the UK?
:-D Jooooooke!
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Live text for club matches used to show the list of players taking part. On the first matches for this season shown online this seems to have gone missing. Can this be rectified ASAP?
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WebbyFoxes - there will be a lot of commentators, so hard to say exactly who will be doing it. If you think about all the matches in the Football League on Saturdays, you can imagine that the commentator pool has been widened slightly!
Imp_88 - oh dear, I've stumbled into an East Midlands rivalry which frankly, as a Tottenham supporting Londoner, I am unqualified to delve into. Come on Lincoln, if that helps! To answer your question, this website will have less than the club sites, not more. If quantity is your thing, you'll be better off on the Lincoln site. I have not subscribed to any of the Football League sites myself, but my understanding is that you can sometimes get 10 minutes or so on there. I guess each club will be different, but if this is the case for Lincoln, that's your best bet. We are contractually capped at five minutes, and it will be a good deal less if the game is a stinker (which will never be the case for the Imps, obviously ...)
Tvphil and Mattray - appreciate your posts. Loved your joke Mattray - for a second I thought it was for real!
Will - the tables have been an issue so far this weekend. The As it Stands functionality I mentioned above has not worked out. We have people working on it. It's been the main thing that has gone wrong so far - everything else has largely worked (except for a few smaller issues like the one you raise brian192, not to disparage the linking issue, as I know it will be important to some people).
I have to say so far I am happy. If I had to choose one thing to not work, well, the As it Stands tables were always a nice thing to have, rather than an absolute essential, like the various live scores modules we have now which all look really good I think. And we will get the As it Stands tables going, I'm sure.
First bit of video due to be published tonight, of last night's Sheff Utd-Boro game. Then a whole bunch of video tomorrow!
Have you seen the Norwich score? Amazing. I used to cover Norwich for the local paper there, as I mentioned above, and have a lot of affection for the club. A sensational result in the offing for the East Anglian region.
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I think your Live Scores need a bit of work as well as they're not updating.
Also the text commentary is a bit behind as well.
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Hi, if you publish and respond to my question, please tell me:
You used some very nice modern graphics for BBC Sport Scotland's coverage of Celtic's Champions League game. At first I thought you (the BBC) were just carrying the host feed or something, but after it appeared post-match and used BBC-like fonts, I began believing that new graphics had arrived.
This would be very good news - not that your current graphics aren't bad, certainly better than what Setanta's was, but they've been in use in some form since the 2002 World Cup. Surely a change is in order, and would go well with the new rights and new live football.
However, from today (writing this during the WBA v Newcastle match), it looks like it's same-old, which is a shame. Also, your graphics for this particular match don't look good. The red/silver combination looks nice, but the scoreboard is too long, and the 3D effect on your names etc look fat with black bits behind it, which devalues the quality of the broadcast somewhat.
Last time I thought you were introducing new graphics was the first time I saw that white/red box you use to tell people of other sports events coming up on the BBC. But obviously that wasn't the case.
So, though your graphics aren't bad per se, I'm just curious as to why Sport Scotland managed to get brand-spanking and shiny new graphics for a one-off game but the Football League gets same-old? Or am I missing something - there's a Scotland v Norway friendly coming up, and the Premier League after all. Of course, not forgetting the World Cup, which I cannot wait for.
Well done for your coverage of the Football League otherwise, it's very nice to see the BBC having a great deal of football, both live and highlights.
If you reply to this also, much thanks. :)
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I quote: "I have to say so far I am happy. If I had to choose one thing to not work, well, the As it Stands tables were always a nice thing to have, rather than an absolute essential, like the various live scores modules we have now which all look really good I think. And we will get the As it Stands tables going, I'm sure."
I hope this As it Stands table thing turns into reality because towards the end of the season it will become especially vital in case you're team is near the drop/going up.
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How come Sky Sports News are allowed to show nearly all the football league goals before your highlights show. Is that part of the contract?
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Not a bad programme despite the late timing (accept you have to cater for all including non-sporting fans) and ofcourse the mishap in the middle of the League Two goals.
Personally I don't really take note of the pundits because in reality just want to see some goals really.
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Much better show than I expected - I feared it would be a kind of MOTD Junior. And Manish proving what I've thought for some time - he is the best football presenter within the BBC.
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I liked the show, good to see its not just a copy of MOTD and was pleasantly surprised by the new studio, I expected it to be the usual BBC Sport studio.
I will reserve my complete judgement until it has been going for a few weeks but so far so good and a defnitite improvement on ITV. It is better than MOTD IMO as well which has become stale and needs a make-over. This show on the other hand seems fresh and modern.
One criticism, who created the title music? Everyone I have spoken to agress it is rubbish, I thought at first there was a problem with my TV, it just doesn't sound right IMO, almost as if someone forgot to add the main part.
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Should be alot of contact on www.bbc.co.uk/football
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Don;t get me wrong, it's great to have proper football on the BBC, but I'm afraid I was pretty disappointed with the show. What football fans want, above all, is action from the games. What we got were snippets, even with the so-called feature game, and a load of pointless and uninteresting magazine-style filler. Holloway and Claridge were blander than bland, saying nothing of note or even interest; the raft of witless email and text comments added absolutely nothing; and overall, the show appeared aimed at a slightly below-average intelligence ten year old. Which given that it went out at 11.45 pm is probably not the target audience.
Let's see some imagination. Drop the studio guests; keep interviews and post-match analysis to an absolute minimum; leave the quirky "guess where we are this week" stuff to Football Focus - ditto the wretched 'viewer feedback' nonsense; and SHOW US MORE FOOTBALL. Twenty-five minutes for a main game used to be standard - you could manage that easily if you lost all the filler. Or even have two games - fifteen and ten minutes each. That'd be a football show worth watching.
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Thanks for sorting out the lists of players names now available through match stats. As far as the TV programme is concerned seems quite good although I thought the need to include e-mail comments was vastly overdone. Given that this will be on i-player all week an online discussion board could be set up for this instead of inclusion within the programme.
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Wow - that sucked!
Awful intro, terrible set (a wall? is it meant to be outside? what is the scrolling red LED board all about? why did Manish and co have an echo like they were in a disused warehouse?), pointless co-host (I'm sure she's a good presenter and all but the need to get drunks and imbiciles to comment on every single programme is unnecessary - for football, leave it to 606), rubbish graphics (are they meant to be in 3D? they are not sharp at all even on a decent TV), I could go on.
On the plus side, at least the show managed to get every goal in, unlike ITV's old show and Manish is a good host. But to be honest, I'll either stick to Sky's Goals on Sunday or I'll Sky+ the BBC show and flick through the e-mail nonsense and try to ignore the dodgy sound and poor graphics.
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Thanks for the comments. Leaving aside the ones about TV, which as I have previously said I can't offer much insight or expertise on, I was largely happy with the website's opening weekend. We've just got most of the video edits of the individual matches up, and the divisional round-up videos went live at midnight last night.
One or two of you are very correct to say that some of the live scores and text commentaries on Saturday lagged a little behind. I apologise for that, and we will seek to improve these delays markedly. Considering the amount of new features we rolled out in one go, I am pretty pleased.
We will also try to find out this morning, why the As it Stands tables didn't work. Again, apologies.
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Having looked at the Bristol Rovers vs Leyton Orient highlights just now - come on you O's! - I'm a bit disappointed that the 1'19" length is a long way short of the "approx two-five minutes" referred to in the blog. I don't know what length the other games are getting, and fair enough for a 0-0 or 1-0 game if you can't cobble together many highlights, but this match had three goals and (so I gather from reports) at least one decent save that didn't make it to the highlights. It all seemed a bit rushed, to be honest, and not much more than was shown on the TV show.
And on the subject of the TV show, mixed feelings; the sound quality was appalling, it sounded more like an empty warehouse than a TV studio, and I'd happily ditch the e-mail views if it upped the amount of highlights for each division's 'featured game' - I'm assuming each division had one, it seemed that way anyway.
Overall, 7/10 - good start, improvements to be made. :-)
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The Football League review (or should it be called "I wish I was doing a Premiership Show". Having just watched it I was not surprised that the Newcastle bias of the live show was continued. The Bobby Robson tribute was "particularily poignant as he was always linked to Newcastle". As many of his obituaries acknowledged the best of his playing career and his England caps were at WBA (that was the other team playing by the way!). The old WBA players applauding were there because they played along side him. If you are going to do a show about the Football League at least get a presenter who knows his football. And then to add insult after the highlights we get a comment from Newcastle manager and nothing from WBA manager. ps try asking your presenter to come up with the 2 unique acheivments of WBA to date to prove he knows his football.
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Fair enough Lewis, TV's not your bag - but can you at least get someone to reply about the show whose responsibility it is? Specifically, why so much pointless chat and analysis; why the text/email thing; why not more action?
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Whilst I am glad to see some live football league games on terrestrial TV again and the new show on Saturday night, I also cant help but feel that it would be better to have the program on at a reasonabel time on Sunday morning.
However I did tune in on Saturday evening to what was largely a good show, except the needless reverting over to the emails and messages being read out by the new presenter who's name escapes me. Most of the emails were pointless opinions or comments left by idiots with no clue about football and just left me feeling as if the show had taken a tacky turn for the worst.
Still its good to have football back!
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In response to theshawshank_reading, I think that the shiny new graphics used by BBC Scotland during Celtic's "heroic" (fluke) 2-1 victory at Dinamo Moscowmay have in fact been used by the television crew or the broadcasters in Russia, as many internationals on the BBC don't use the BBC graphics. The recent FIFA confederations cup used some of the official graphics because it was just the BBC copying FIFA.tv.
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In addition to that, can I add my name to the minority of people who would like Welsh and Irish top level football on the BBC in addition to Scottish Divisions 1,2&3 (As a Livi fan, I don't know whether I'll be paying attention to Div 1 or 3 the most yet!). It is a good idea!
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It may be just me, but I think the most important, non-negotiable feature of a highlights programme is that it doesn't give away the final scores in advance. There's nothing worse, whether it's done John Inverdale style ("Wasps beat Bath 10-6, here's the extended highlights") or ITV style by accidental giveaways. The Match of the Day presenters are so good at not spoiling things that I have wondered whether they are sent on a special training course for the purpose.
If so, could the presenters of the Football League show please be sent on the same course? They got off to a truly appalling start. While the opening theme music was still going, Manish ruined the top billed match by telling us that Newcastle had to settle for a point. Within a minute, Ian Holloway had told us that QPR had got a last minute equaliser against Blackpool and Steve Claridge announced that all but three of the Championship matches had ended in draws. Before long, Manish introduced another game by telling us it had finished goalless. If it's going to be like this every week, I won't bother.
Nothing so blatant for the rest of the programme, but the drip drip drip effect of constantly watching events which Mr Voiceover had just told us were about to happen slowly sucked the enjoyment out of the programme. It would have been far far far far better if we'd just heard the club commentators (however biased and amateurish) commentating on the action as it happened. If that's not possible, at least Mr Voiceover could try saying 'but Joe Bloggs missed the resulting penalty' AFTER we've seen the penalty.
I will be watching next week, because I'm a visual person and prefer to see the football rather than hear it on the radio. But I might turn the sound down.
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The new Foorball League show initial observations:
Stick to what you are good at and know.
A presenter who knows anout the Football League without the need to keep looking in the mirror and trying to be matey.
It isn't a phone in so no e-mails with the Childrern's TV presenter. All ladies on a football show have been blown out of the water by Gabby Logan because she knows her subject and cares about the sport.
Knaff set trying too hard.
Was it recorded in a barn?
More of the action less inane chat.
At least Steve Claridge knows about the Football League and doesn't make love to the camera.
It can only get better with a new team and concentrate on the football don't try to be all things to all men. Perhaps someone with experience of standing on the terraces on a mid week,freezing cold January night, 3 nil down at home and just a cup of overpriced Oxo to keep you warm.
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