Eir Sport looking to niche market with club deal
UP to 30 live televised GAA games will be broadcast between now and the end of the year after eir Sport announced an agreement to show county club championship games.
A five-year agreement is in place but a schedule of games, to be shown from May onwards, has yet to be firmed up.
The eir Sport coverage will not clash with TG4’s already established Sunday afternoon offering from October onwards which includes county finals and the provincial and All-Ireland club championships.
Instead, eir Sport will be concentrating on an even finer niche market with a conviction to cover games in counties that don’t feature as often.
The broadcaster, which is already showing 23 Allianz League games on a Saturday night with three games taking place simultaneously on different channels on their platform on most nights, will not be going up against games on the inter-county programme either which will take them away from most Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons.
“Obviously common sense will prevail in that regard,” said an eir Sport spokesperson.
In the summer months they could be targeting club fixtures taking place on Friday or Sunday evenings.
ENGAGING
“We’re currently engaging with counties on a programme of games and the response has been favourable,” said the spokesperson.
The first-round championship clash of Donegal county finalists Kilcar and Gaoth Dobhair in early May, featuring so many current senior and U-21 inter-county players on either side, could be an obvious starting point.
Putting so many games behind a pay-wall is unlikely to draw too many adverse comments as these are games which would not be shown live anyway and will provide a small revenue boost to counties.
“These are matches that haven’t previously been shown and we are delighted to open them up to a wider audience,” said Glen Killane, managing director of eir TV & Sport.
The broadcaster will, of course, be subject to the unpredictability of club fixtures in the summer with little ability to plan too far ahead and the risk of postponements so great because of replays and inter-county manager pressure.
eir Sport has been building its identity with Gaelic games with online clip rights for the Club Championships, Allianz Leagues and Senior Championship games and archive rights to show replays of classic GAA matches, on top of their extensive league coverage. eir is an official sponsor of the GAA Football All-Ireland Championship.