There’s not really anything to be said about the last 2 England football games, other than that they were rubbish. Completely rubbish. Plus in the Wales game they did something that I always hated when Liverpool did it under Houllier, and that is trying to sit on a 1-0 lead. Grrrr.
However, the thing that is disturbing me most in sport at the moment is the fact that the test match that starts today is the last test match that will be shown on terrestrial TV for a long time. We live in a country that has a nationalised television service, and (with the advent of digital) a good number of free to air channels, some of them part of the BBC, some funded by advertising. And I believe that everybody should be able to watch national sporting events. Everybody with a TV. Without subscription charge. The loss of the Premiership was bad, but the loss of international cricket, especially at a point when people are becoming more interested in it, is a death-blow to the sport. People won’t traipse down to the pub to watch cricket. And not many will by Sky Sports just to watch cricket.
I have a number of objections to Sky, which I will outline here:
- I object to paying for a service outright, and then having to watch more adverts on Sky than I do on channels funded only by advertising
- I object to have to pay for multiple channels for a single purpose – Sky Sports 1, 2 & 3 just to watch Premiership football?!?
- I object to having to pay additional money (on top of the subscription) to watch “special features” – Premiership+ and the like
- I object to a company having a monopoly in this fashion – Sky don’t get peoples viewing because they are providing a better service, but because they provide the only service.
Suggestions for improving the situation:
- All national sporting associations should refuse to sign ‘exclusive’ television rights for national sporting events.
- Sky should offer packages that allow people to buy the TV they want, but not what they don’t. I would consider Sky if I could pay a simple fee that allowed me to watch all of the Liverpool games.
mrBen