TV Coverage

God no to Damien Lalor. He is a good journalist but his after match interviews with players for The Sunday Game was painful to watch. His questions more often than not were long winded and not very insightful.

He'd put something to a MOTM like "You have been training since December, you went through a tough 70 mins of football out there, your opponents were ferocious, the intensity was unreal, tell me did you always believe in all that time that you'd win here today?"

The player in question is hardly going to say anything other than what's expected.

Des on Newstalk with Pat Kenny earlier. Valid point about the difficulty of trying to cram in so many matches into one highlights show on a Sunday night. RTE have no rights for a Monday night highlights show. Ladies looking for camogie and football coverage. And more games next year with the new format in football. Seems like the right time for a revamp with so many of the analysts moving on as well. Donal Lenihan reckons he just wants his Sunday night pints though.

No problem with Hurley, as long as she limits her 'expert opinions' to camogie and ladies football i.e. the games they know.

Hmmm. Tad harsh there Jack, but you do highlight the biggest problem with the Sunday Game.

Theres a lack of bite in there and for me , the show needs a kind of presenter not ‘embedded’ in the GAA.

The kind of person who could ask the hard questions without the risk of being ostracised by the GAA.

I have great respect for the GAA and those who run it but a presenter with no ‘form’ or dog in the fight

might be the way to go.

Dessie likes de partie, far more interested in de bants and de celebrations than the actual game.

In de studio doesn’t give him much chance to get emotional.

The presenter of a show like does doesn't need to be an expert St all imo. A straight man (or woman) who will just negotiate the links between the games and tee up any experts or guests with good questions. A proper journalist with homework done and a bit of charm would do it.

There is a bigger question, for the GAA more than RTÉ, in how much or little TV coverage they want in future. With the amount of games in the coming years, 90 or 120 minutes on a Sunday night isn't enough.

Maybe we need

* different shows for football and hurling?

*play Hurling and Football on different days? (eg.all Hurling on Saturdays /all Football on Sunday or vide versa)

*Sell rights to football and hurling to different broadcasters?

*have TV blackout on weekend afternoons with live TV of evening games only?

*how to incorporate streaming services - sell individual 'Season tickets' or run a 'Netflix' type subscription system in house (GAA Go type thing during the pandemic) with access to more games.

There is a balance to be achieved by the rights owners (GAA) to broadcast enough games without overdoing it and taking from club games and the quality of the intercounty 'product '. The GAA themselves have to analyse what they want to do before talking to the broadcasters to see what they are interested in buying. Just saying ' RTE should show more games) isn't a reality, the games aren't theirs to show.

Looks like the Sky agreement has ended. Sky wanted a package which included an additional 16 League games along with the usual Championship games and both parties couldn't come to an agreement

How much was in the pot for the Sky deal? IIRC it wasn't big money, think the GAA sold it on the fallicy that it was going to 'broaden the audience' or some pie in the sky like that. It was certainly not much more than the equivelant RTÉ were paying, for a lot less viewers IIRC. Lmight be wrong on that, but that was how I recalled it?

As you said above, an in house solution might be the way to go, but of course there will be some who will complain about Internet access etc. That is less of an issue with each passing year, and there isn't an ould farmer in the country but can use Done Deal and watch the cattle marts online, as well as being able to facetime the grandkids in Australia at this stage. Make it simple and people will use it.

I think it will be Virgin media. After all sky took over the old TV3 package.

Anyway it's good to see Sky gone. Their long term aim was to get exclusive rights to all the games( bar the finals which have to be shown free to air).As they couldn't increase the amount of games this time round they have thrown the towel in.

What's OTT?

Sky weren't interested in growing the audience or exclusive rights for all games, they just wanted enough games to keep Paddy from cancelling the Sky Sport Subs when the EPL wasn't on. Now that the intercounty is on at the same time as the soccer, it's no good to them, which shows where their interests are (TBF that's their perogative as a private company).

GAA can't really broadcast ALL games, they/we have to protect the product somewhat, leave people wanting to watch games rather than overdo it and have viewers sick of looking at the games with too much coverage.

Every day's a school day!

Did you not read the statement, sky wanted to show more games. Even at a time when the premiership is on.

They wanted to show 16 league games. And couldn't reach a deal with the Gaa and rte.

To be honest the Gaa are very backward. SKY know the value of showing a league competition.

The games are more competitive and not one-sided like the Half the early rounds of the football championship.

Probably at a minimum of €10 for one-off purchases

Big loss for the GAA and the games. Sky coverage of the hurling was top class. I wonder if the general 'anti Brit' vibe in Ireland played a part in this.

If these games are moved to PPV on GAAGO the hierarchy will be absolutely slated and rightly so, they need to thread carefully on this one, hoping Virgin can pick up the rights, just no Matt Cooper this time! The outcome of this will give a good picture of the GAA's priority and intentions.