eir Sport closed

icdg

I don’t think it’s any secret or was in any way kept secret that WatchLOI is run by GAAGO, and in turn, who the owners and operators of GAAGO are (RTE/GAA).. Eir simply aren’t bidding for any more sports rights.

Dodge

icdg wrote: »

I don’t think it’s any secret or was in any way kept secret that WatchLOI is run by GAAGO, and in turn, who the owners and operators of GAAGO are (RTE/GAA).. Eir simply aren’t bidding for any more sports rights.

GAAGO is merely the platform. RTE produces everything for watchloi

Last year Eir showed games alongside this (available to non Irish watchloi subscribers, but not in Ireland) but this year they aren’t.

At all stages of tv/broadcast discussions for the LOI, eir were involved this year. The decision to pull out of sports ended that obvious

Watchloi ends in a few weeks too

Acosta

Red Silurian wrote: »

Maybe somebody at the LOI got fed up being on hold to Eir?

Most people have at some point

Dodge

Confirmation that eir sport is to cease broadcast this year

https://www.the42.ie/eir-sport-cease-broadcasting-5441729-May2021/

icdg

Wonder what happens to the last year of the Allianz League contract so. It was up after next season anyway, so maybe it will just be a case of the new rights holders taking over early.

The other remaining major contracts, the Pro14 and FA Cup, finish or have already finished this season.

I expect Premier Sports will probably now bid for the type of Ireland-only rights eir Sport traditionally would have, but probably on a reduced scale.

Red Silurian

dublin49 wrote: »

surely PRO12/14/16 whatever has as much drawing power as the GAA matches,I used to watch Rugby and tennis on SKY,can understand them not covering every rugby league or Tennis tournament but strange they withdraw completely from popular individual sports,they sponsored a cycling team without any cycling coverage,some strange decisions there.

Personally I wouldn't mind paying a tenner a month for the Pro14 but the commentary needs to be better than Liam Toland and Luke Fitzgerald

Looks like RTE and TV3 are beefing up their sports offering, they recently made a deal to share the 3 6N tournaments between them and rumour is RTE are front runners to the Pro16...

dublinman1990

How many subscribers are officially with Eir Sport at the moment? Will they be giving out refunds or credit notes to their customers bills once the channel closes this year? If not; Would there a possibility that Eir Sport could transfer customer subscriptions over from Eir Sport to Premier Sports Ireland, to get them on the Sky Sports Extra pack if they don't have it, given that both Eir Sport & Premier Sports Ireland are owned by Setanta. The reason that I am asking this is that Eir's customer service reputation has been performing very badly during the pandemic. Have Eir's staffing levels gone back to some form of normality up to now.

I presume the Eir Sport documentaries will be staying on with Premier Sports once Eir has closed the channel for good.

icdg

eir Sport isn’t owned by Setanta. Setanta used to play out the channel and rent them studio space but I think that is now spun off to a separate company also owned by Michael O’Rourke, Transmit Solutions.

Many of eir Sport’s “subscribers” did not in fact subscribe to the channel, which was actually eir’s aim. Many got it included in their eir broadband, Vodafone TV, or (while they were still talking to each other) Virgin Media subscribers.

There were still some direct to home customers left over from the Setanta days. Some of these would have paid monthly and some of these were on the cheaper annual sub. It is this last category that would be the only category of domestic subscriber which I think any notion of a refund might be entertained. The annual sub hasn’t been offered for a while now, not sure how long.

In ROI Premier Sports has had no virtually no relationship with eir Sport since they launched as a separate entity in August 2019. The only remaining link is that eir broadband subscribers get FreeSports as part of the eir Sport pack. In NI eir Sport 1 is part of the Premier Sports pack. In ROI Premier Sports are part of the Sky Sports Extra pack whereas eir Sport did its own subscriber management. I don’t see that eir subscribers would automatically or otherwise be moved to the sports extra pack.

Jerry Attrick

Red Silurian wrote: »

Personally I wouldn't mind paying a tenner a month for the Pro14 but the commentary needs to be better than Liam Toland and Luke Fitzgerald

........... I hope you're not forgetting Mark Robson!

_Kaiser_

awec wrote: »

Spot on. The problem is there is not really any competition among them, since each of them just carve off their own little exclusive part of the pie. So if you want the full pie, you need to pay all of them.

It helps to drive the price up rather than down. I am not convinced that consumers would be any worse off if we want back to the days when Sky were the only show in town.

It's like Tesco having exclusive rights to sell milk. Aldi having exclusive rights to sell bread. Lidl having exclusive rights to sell meat. "Competition".

This. Exactly this. The same thing has now happened with TV and movie rights - you need Netflix, Amazon, Disney, Apple etc all of which add up rapidly.

But where the Premier League is concerned even if you DO have all the packages, you still won't get everything because of the 3PM rule - whereas places like the US and Canada will have the lot.

It's no wonder "other" methods are growing, especially when the quality can be a lot better than things like NowTV.

Back in the day you paid Sky 15/20 quid and you got everything that was available. The rot started with the Premiership Plus idea and has only gone downhill from there from the consumer standpoint.

icdg

We haven’t heard when the closure is likely to happen, but the Pro14 Rainbow Cup final on 19th June (two weeks today) will probably be the last ever studio show from eir Sport. The GAA hurling league regular season concludes the weekend before.

Wimbledon will be a week and a bit after that, if they hang around for it, but that is strictly world feed stuff. After that all their live rights for 2021 are gone, though they still have one more season of the GAA leagues but I suspect that will be sold on, possibly to RTE whom they are already have a sublicense deal with.

Infoanon

Possibly the end of July when iirc the annual subscriptions roll over ?, or maybe when the transponder lease is up?

icdg

Infoanon wrote: »

Possibly the end of July when iirc the annual subscriptions roll over ?, or maybe when the transponder lease is up?

The end of July might be a good guess, I imagine. Either way it looks like the original Irish sports channel will go out with a whimper rather than a bang, which is sad after 17 years in operation. Premier Sports will hopefully fill the void in that regard (and are as much a continuation of Setanta as eir Sport are, really).

Sheep Shagger

Good article on the history of Setanta and then eir sport.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/sport/othersport/arid-40306739.html?type=amp&__twitter_impression=true

icdg

Excellent article. As I keep pointing out, Premier Sports logo being black and yellow is not a coincidence. This might be the end for Eir Sport, but the Setanta legacy is alive and well.

Sheep Shagger

icdg wrote: »

Excellent article. As I keep pointing out, Premier Sports logo being black and yellow is not a coincidence. This might be the end for Eir Sport, but the Setanta legacy is alive and well.

Yep the last line of the article says it all.

Infoanon

UK sites reporting that the Sky Irish EPG 422 spot will be taken by Freesports HD

icdg

Infoanon wrote: »

UK sites reporting that the Sky Irish EPG 422 spot will be taken by Freesports HD

I don’t know if that’s got any basis in any announcement but wouldn’t be surprised if that happens. FreeSports was only taken off the Irish EPG because LaLiga TV needed an EPG entry and is more important. The EPG slots have likely been owned by Setanta all along and sublet to eir. (It may not HD BTW. My recollection is that the Irish version of FreeSports was SD only?)

I also see the eir Sport studio in use for ice hockey on FreeSports tonight.

Dindane

Infoanon wrote: »

UK sites reporting that the Sky Irish EPG 422 spot will be taken by Freesports HD

eir won't be on for much longer after their last live broadcast.

Those slots are valuable, there's talk of a "different" kind of sports channel being launched in the near future too anyway.

Sheep Shagger

Dindane wrote: »

eir won't be on for much longer after their last live broadcast.

Those slots are valuable, there's talk of a "different" kind of sports channel being launched in the near future too anyway.

Rumoured to be Premier Sports Ireland...

Dindane

Sheep Shagger wrote: »

Rumoured to be Premier Sports Ireland...

That would make sense as it would be the smart place to put the Premier League games and other events they only have Irish rights for.

Having Freesports back on the Irish EPG would be a welcome move also, if this is correct.

But it's looking like a special-interest sports channel is coming too, from somewhere.

Elmo

Does eirSport still have rights to Wimbledon etc. will TG4 take them or FreeSport?

icdg

Elmo wrote: »

Does eirSport still have rights to Wimbledon etc. will TG4 take them or FreeSport?

They are supposed to still have Rolland Garros and Wimbledon but they don’t appear to have been showing the former.

Of the rights they list on their website, the following is the status:

* Pro14 - finishes on 19th June, tender complete but no announcement.
*Allianz League - finishes 2022 but unlikely to complete last year of contract. Tender yet to be run.
*FA Cup - finished May 2021, will be on BBC and ITV next season, no word on Irish 3pm games.
*Roland Garros - appears to be finished. Eurosport have this.
*Wimbledon - should be finished after 2021 tournament. Is on the BBC in any case.
*The Masters - not sure when this was due to finish but they are unlikely to show another one anyway.

Dindane

The listings on the eirSport website run up to 9am on 1st July.

Wimbledon is not listed.

icdg

Dindane wrote: »

The listings on the eirSport website run up to 9am on 1st July.

Wimbledon is not listed.

Eir Sport 2 now confirmed as closing on 20th July.

https://www.eirsport.ie/notice-for-customers

No closure date for eir Sport 1 though, indeed the message simply says that eir sport 1 is unaffected and continues to broadcast. Eir will broadcast its last studio show (the Rainbow Cup final) tomorrow and both channels are, aside from PFL (an MMA promotion I’d never heard about before last week) 100% comprised of repeats after that. I wonder if there is still some hope of selling the channel and its archive to Premier or someone else, because you’d think they’d cut their losses and just shut up shop now that all live content is virtually ceased.

cunnijo

As an annual subscriber on Sky I received the email detailing the closure of Eir Sport 2 yesterday. I contacted them to find out if there would be any credit/refund as a result of the closure but it seems not to be the case. I did ask about when Eir Sport 1 would close and despite no official word the rep hinted at around October/November.

So if anyone availed of the annual subscription in the last 12 months or less then contact them to cancel at renewal date. Otherwise they will charge €13.99 per month until final closure. That was what was offered when I cancelled.

Infoanon

A few websites are again reporting that Freesports will start on Sky 422 on July 20th but additionally that VM Sports will replace Eir Sports 1 on 1st October.

I would be very surprised by that move but there are multiple reports - was VM not expected to close soon ?

icdg

FreeSports replacing eir Sport 2 - not surprised at all, given where eir Sport came from..

VM Sport replacing eir Sport 1 - would be extremely surprised given the animosity between the two companies. Also VM Sport are in exactly the same boat as eir Sport, just not shouting off the rooftops about it. The only contract of note they have left is the UEFA international contract which runs for four years instead of three but even that’s just a week every couple of months rather than something that could sustain a channel full time. They could very easily see out that contract by putting the games on VM Three and no body would be less off. Have we a link to a reputable source on that one or is it just speculation being repeated around?

Infoanon

Eirsport 1 has now closed in NI , it was removed from the EPG earlier today.

Does anyone know if Freesports is already on the NI EPG?

trashcan

I moved to Eir broadband specifically to get the eir sport channel, for its league of Ireland coverage, which was excellent in its day. Maybe time to reconsider (or tell them I am anyway !)