The Virgin Media Television thread

mikeym

https://twitter.com/VirginMediaNews/status/1476592720181440512?s=20

thesandeman

There's a Jennifer Saunders thing on VM3 at nine tonight and repeated at midnight on VM1.

That must be some kind of record.

iseegirls

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118393141#Comment_118393141

Not at all. The ABBA Christmas Party was on VM3 Xmas Eve at 12.30am. The same special was starting 40minutes later on VM1. So you had the options of ABBA, Emmerdale or ABBA that night.

thesandeman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118393772#Comment_118393772

Feck.

It's like they have three different people putting their hands in lucky dip buckets without anyone overseeing the process.

iseegirls

Despite them agreeing the snooker deal on the 15th December, the schedule for yesterday was never updated, so despite VM3 showing live coverage yesterday, you'd be hard pressed to find anything about it in the TV listings - either in print or digital. Even the Virgin TV have the old schedule still.

Here was VM3 yesterday:

11:50 Ireland AM Best Bits

12:00 Live Snooker

16:05 Odd Mishmash of Heineken Cup and Champions League Goals

16:50 Heartbeat x2

19:00 Live Snooker

22:00 Schofield's South African Adventure

22:30 Special: I Married A Waiter

23:30 This Morning

channelsurfer2

Didn't know they had snooker.what sort of deal is it? Any word on facup rights now that itv have them in UK

icdg

Premier Sports have picked up the dedicated ROI package but not the ITV matches. As it stands those games won’t be available to people who don’t have access to free to air satellite or Freeview overspill.

dublinman1990

Sticking with the Men's 6 Nations rugby rights. The Guinness 6 Nations app is saying that Virgin Media One will show Scotland v England on the 5th of February.

The other two games for the 5th/6th of February namely Ireland v Wales and France v Italy are on RTÉ2.

iseegirls

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118424980#Comment_118424980

Nice spot. Yep the fixtures and broadcasters have been updated on the 6 nations site.

RTE have Ire v Wal, Eng v Ire

VM have Fra v Ire, Ire v Ita and Ire v Sco

Mens https://www.sixnationsrugby.com/fixtures/

u20's: https://u20.sixnationsrugby.com/fixtures/

Womens: https://womens.sixnationsrugby.com/fixtures/

Virgin Media seemingly will be showing all their U20 matches on VM1 - which I feel won't happen (displacing Coronation Street on a Friday night). A mix of VM1 and VM2 being used for the Womens games.

thesultan

Will they apply for any of the GAA games?

dublinman1990

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118423944#Comment_118423944

VM3 is showing the UK Seniors Snooker Championship. The BBC Sport website has the rights to this tournament in the UK.

iseegirls

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118428849#Comment_118428849

A quote from them recently, when they lost out on the exclusive rights of Champions League in the Irish Times:

Virgin may also bid for certain GAA rights such as league matches or the club championships, Mr Farrell indicated, but does not intend to target the All-Ireland senior football or hurling competitions.

“The summer bit doesn’t do it for us, to be honest,” he said.

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/media-and-marketing/virgin-media-loses-out-in-champions-league-tv-bidding-1.4497952

icdg

Think that’s probably reflective of the fact that Sky are now established as the secondary partner, and that who they’d be bidding against. I’ve said before that the fury over the Sky deal would be put in the shade if the primary rights went to someone other than RTE - it would want to be a knockout bid and VMTV are not funded to do knockout bids at the moment, I think it’s fair to say.

If I was to hazard a guess, I think those Saturday League rights will probably eventually end up with either Premier Sports or RTE. Sunday League will likely stay with TG4. Be interesting to see what happens though, this is a big rights award that will be done in the next 3-4 months.

Digifriendly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118427376#Comment_118427376

Sorry if I have missed something recently but have VM lost exclusive live Irish rights to whole of 6 N or are they sub letting some games to RTE?

icdg

The rights are now shared between the two broadcasters. Six Nations Rugby wanted the broadcasters to do full coverage of the Women’s and U20’s so it may have been a joint bid on that basis as it would have been a lot for VMTV to do on its own.

Digifriendly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118437744#Comment_118437744

Thanks for this. At least some of 6N will now be in HD for Saorview only viewers.

Delta2113

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118379027#Comment_118379027

I'm sure they could show it LIVE but they are using it as a replacement for Elaine and probably don't want it up against the News at 12.30. Of course it should be LIVE on VM2 or VM3.

iseegirls

Highlights of the AFLW (Australian Football Women's League) starting on VM Sport tonight, and VM2 tomorrow night.

Strange one, seeing that TG4 already show full delayed coverage of matches at the weekend, and a highlights package.

https://twitter.com/VMSportIE/status/1479500053232422915?s=20

odyssey06

@issegirls ps that'd be the Australian Women's Football League

iseegirls

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118448610#Comment_118448610

Cheers, re-edited it there now. Thanks

Delta2113

I don't think it's strange. They have a full time Sports channel to fill and will grab anything especially if it's cheap. The recent snooker was good as it was only on BBC red button or I Player I think.

medoc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118394124#Comment_118394124

That is the best description I’ve seen to explain how Virgin Media program their channels. In fact it sounds so plausible I think you might be an insider leaking how it’s actually done.

EdmondShiels3

Watching WWE smackdown now and it is from two weeks ago. I knew it was a week behind. I have not watch raw is that still last Monday episode. If it is behind what is the point.

iseegirls

https://www.thesun.ie/tv/8206637/rte-late-late-falling-flat-virgin-media-boss-blasts/

Looking past The Sun's mistake of getting his name mixed up, quite an amazing statement from the Virgin Media boss. I would say something if VM created, made and hosted The Masked Singer, but this is brought in through their ITV Studios rights. And then he goes on with the following:

Bill recommended that Tubs and Late Late producers could learn a lot from switching over to Virgin Media’s Masked Singer

"Like The Late Late Show, The Masked Singer has quite a modest audience"

"It shows you can be creative about it. I don’t think that RTE shows like the Late Late and Tommy Tiernan’s show have managed to do that."

What about getting your own channels in order first?

lertsnim

Imagine using The Masked Singer as an example of how anything should be done. Brain dead television. It seems to me that he is only trying to get his wares in the media spotlight.

iseegirls

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118479098#Comment_118479098

Looks like they never aired either of them (Raw or Smackdown) on the 1st and 2nd Jan, so it's pushed out that bit more. Previously, there would have been a 5/6 day gap, but now it's 12/13 days. No sign that they'll catch up.

EdmondShiels3

What the point in showing Raw and Smackdown. If it is that far behind people will go to the internet. The one hour highlight was great for catching up as the full shows are too long.

dublinman1990

Joe Malloy of VM Ireland was in the Aviva Stadium with Jacqui Hurley today for the formal launch of VMTV's new Six Nations deal with RTÉ.

I don't think VM are showing these games in HD for their viewers on Saorview aren't they.

I wouldn't be surprised if that answer is a firm no.

Dodge

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118488766#Comment_118488766

Well The Masked Singer is an insanely popular show across the world but it’s weird for an Irish TV boss to use a British version of a Korean concept as an example of how his channel is better than RTE

icdg

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118437663#Comment_118437663

Just to give some further info, this article by Laura Slattery this morning makes it clear that it’s a fully joint bid and not a sub license from one to the other (which has happened before). What’s really historical this time is that there’ll be cross promotion between the two companies which is common in US sports but rare here.

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/media-and-marketing/rté-and-virgin-s-six-nations-deal-we-put-a-call-into-dee-and-she-was-up-for-it-1.4780705