More Free To Air Boxing......gone

el flaco

Channel 5 has now pulled the plug on their boxing coverage. Not sure where that leaves Hennessy's fighters? Tyson Fury, James DeGale and Chris Eubank Jr. are now without a TV home.
No doubt Boxnation will hoover up their fights. Failing that, we can always read round-by-round updates of the Fury v Cunningham fight on the net......

http://www.worldboxingnews.net/news/2013/03/19/channel-5-boxing-deal-fell-through-may-return-in-future.html

clubwelly

Not that it was the highest standard of tv coverage of boxing but it's a shame. I thought they had been getting good ratings of 1 million plus

Syferus

Terrible stuff. Being boxed (ho ho) into as niche a corner as Box Nation does the sport no good whatsoever.

megadodge

Syferus wrote: »

Terrible stuff. Being boxed (ho ho) into as niche a corner as Box Nation does the sport no good whatsoever.

Would you care to explain why?

Syferus

megadodge wrote: »

Would you care to explain why?

I mean in promoting the sport. To get it you need cable/satellite and then subscribe to a single, relatively expensive niche channel.

Boxing as a whole is better served by being on C5 or even Sky Sports than Box Nation.

3hn2givr7mx1sc

megadodge wrote: »

Would you care to explain why?

Boxing doesn't have a huge following anymore(relatively), but when there were big fights, or even jut British title level fights, on Sky Sports casual boxing fans(like myself) would be fairly inclined to tune in. Feck it, even the odd one on Box Office, but I am in my fúck going paying for a boxing-only channel.

megadodge

Syferus wrote: »

I mean in promoting the sport. To get it you need cable/satellite and then subscribe to a single, relatively expensive niche channel.

Boxing as a whole is better served by being on C5 or even Sky Sports than Box Nation.

Well, in an ideal world all fights would be on terrestrial TV, but I'm afraid the reality is those days are long gone and they ain't coming back.

How much boxing does Sky actually show? One show on a Saturday night and a good programme once a week in 'Ringside' and that's it. I fail to see how that is good promotion of boxing.

As for it being "relatively expensive", I appreciate we're in tough times, but €12.50 a month?? That's less than 50c a day. If you go into Rockford's on a Saturday night it's a tenner, then buy one drink and you've already topped that. Compare that to the entertainment you get in a month's constant boxing. No contest for a genuine boxing fan.

megadodge

baz2009 wrote: »

Boxing doesn't have a huge following anymore(relatively), but when there were big fights, or even jut British title level fights, on Sky Sports casual boxing fans(like myself) would be fairly inclined to tune in. Feck it, even the odd one on Box Office, but I am in my fúck going paying for a boxing-only channel.

Grand. You're not a big boxing fan as you said, so I'd hardly expect you to pay. For big boxing fans like myself I'm delighted with a channel that shows me more boxing in a few days than I've ever experienced in a month on any other channel and I'm prepared to pay for it.

Syferus

megadodge wrote: »

Well, in an ideal world all fights would be on terrestrial TV, but I'm afraid the reality is those days are long gone and they ain't coming back.

How much boxing does Sky actually show? One show on a Saturday night and a good programme once a week in 'Ringside' and that's it. I fail to see how that is good promotion of boxing.

As for it being "relatively expensive", I appreciate we're in tough times, but €12.50 a month?? That's less than 50c a day. If you go into Rockford's on a Saturday night it's a tenner, then buy one drink and you've already topped that. Compare that to the entertainment you get in a month's constant boxing. No contest for a genuine boxing fan.

On top of what could easily be a 60 euro Sky sub if you've got Sky Spirts - which a lot of boxing fans will have because few are simply just boxing fans alone - it's a very hard sell.

For the sake of my pocket I'd be very happy to see Box Nation become an affiliate of the Sky Sports package in the manner ESPN did.

None of that negates how useless Box Nation is at promoting the sport or talking to anyone other than the converted, at the end of the day the loser is the sport itself.

el flaco

Looks like there's negotiations to get the Fury v Cunningham fight shown on Channel 5. Fingers crossed.
http://www.worldboxingnews.net/news/2013/03/22/channel-5-negotiating-to-broadcast-fury-v-cunningham-live.html

barney4001

Syferus wrote: »

I mean in promoting the sport. To get it you need cable/satellite and then subscribe to a single, relatively expensive niche channel.

Boxing as a whole is better served by being on C5 or even Sky Sports than Box Nation.

there are lots of streaming sites on the net latest i found; here i think it was boxtube.net

megadodge

barney4001 wrote: »

there are lots of streaming sites on the net latest i found; here i think it was boxtube.net

Been there, done that - and I'm never EVER going back.

Utterly useless and hugely frustrating way of watching a fight. If you don't mind endless interruptions, picture freezing, streaming stopping just before the main event, etc. then streaming is ok, otherwise TV all the way.