Peter Drury and Jim Beglin on Dundalk v Maccabi Tel-Aviv (BT Sport//ESPN - 8:05pm)

Lynsey Hipgrave hosting Hapoel Be'er Sheva v Southampton, along with Kevin Davies and Gordon Strachan (BT Sport 3 - 6pm)

its dundalk instead of MUFC, drury/beglin's commentary on dundalks last game was very good

A (somewhat brief) look behind the scenes at Leicester v Porto on Tuesday.

http://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/li...ail/story.html

Interesting that there's a dedicated truck for the "world feed", along with a suggestion that what we see in the UK is slightly different to that overseas (e.g. more close-ups of the home manager).

Jon Champion & Jermaine Jenas on commentary with Andy May reporting.

Manchester United V Zorya Luhansk- Paul Sarahs
Everton v Palace- Steve Bower for MotD
Swansea v Liverpool- Simon Brotherton for MotD
Dagenham and Redbridge v Tranmere- Adam Summerton and Adam Virgo for BT

Robbie Savage with Ian Darke for tonight's Europa League match it would seem.

Basically (surely) it means BT as host broadcaster produce the coverage for the world feed, but they effectively 'opt out' with their own additional cameras/shots.

I don't know the answer to this, but I would assume they were, if only because if they were in London they could probably get a more glamorous co-commentator than Clive Allen. I'm sure BT are sending commentators to all the British teams in the Champions League.


Dawson has always been on 5 Live, of course, even before he was on BT.


Well, this is no slight on you, but Ian Crocker? He wouldn't have done it anyway, but is Crocker really that much better than Darren Fletcher? I don't watch Scottish football so I don't hear Crocker much, but when he used to do the Premier League on Setanta I didn't think he was anything special. I don't mind Rob Hawthorne either but he wasn't that good on the 2005 Champions League Final, was he? I know that was ages ago but he'd been on the telly for longer by then than Darren Fletcher has now. I listen to them both of a weekend and I would hard pressed to tell you why one was any better or worse then the other, to be honest.

Darren Fletcher is not my favourite commentator but he's clearly highly rated in the industry and I think sometimes he gets a bad press on here mostly for a) not being Ian Darke and b) not being on Sky. And c) being BT's number one, but if BT want to make him their senior commentator, that's not his fault, is it? The Beeb clearly like him as well.

I think in many ways the BT coverage is far better than what we used to get on Sky. As mentioned the other day, the second choice match used to get ten minutes of build-up with Dave Jones and Paul Merson in a cupboard, now it gets 45 minutes of unique build-up with a proper punditry team. And the commentators on the red button matches, like Guy Mowbray, Jonathan Pearce and Simon Brotherton, are far better and far more experienced on big games than the likes of Taphouse, Stowell and so on who used to do it on Sky (you could argue they're better than the commentators on the main matches, but clearly BT want their own names on those, not freelancers more associated with another channel). I mean, obviously you have to pay for it, and I would certainly much prefer one match at least on ITV (or another FTA channel) to showcase it to the widest audience possible, but if you've got it, it is very impressive.

Jake with Paul Scholes and Michael Owen for Manchester United vs FC Zorya Luhansk. Commentary from Ian Darke & Robbie Savage with Des Kelly Reporting.

Thursday 29th September - BT Sport 2

Live UEFA Europa League: Manchester United v Zorya Luhansk

Jake Humphrey presenting from Old Trafford alongside Paul Scholes and Michael Owen

Commentators: Ian Darke and Robbie Savage

Reporter: Des Kelly


BT Sport 3

Live UEFA Europa League: Hapoel Beer Sheva v Southampton

Lynsey Hipgrave presenting from the studio alongside Gordon Strachan and Kevin Davies

Commentators: Jon Champion and Jermaine Jenas

Reporter: Andy May, with Alex Gordon-Martin providing pre-match features


BT Sport 3, BT Sport Extra 3 and BT Sport Showcase

UEFA Europa League Group Stage
Fenerbahce v Feyenoord - Adam Summerton and Clive Allen

BT Sport 3 will pick up coverage at the conclusion of their Southampton coverage from around 8.20pm.


BT Sport//ESPN

UEFA Europa League Group Stage
AC Sparta Praha v Internazionale - Steve Bower and Efan Ekoku
Dundalk v Maccabi Tel-Aviv - Peter Drury and Jim Beglin


BT Sport Extra

UEFA Europa League Group Stage
Schalke 04 v Salzburg (X2) - Steve Wyeth and Stewart Robson
AFC Ajax v Standard Liege (X4) - John Roder and Richard Hughes
Athletic Club Bilbao v Rapid Wien (X2) - Dan Mason and David Pleat

Think with Drury back on tonight at BT towers, I'd think probably was offtube rather than in Russia.


In a word... Yes.

Robbie Savage

What an absolute mess of a commentary that was.

Great movement by Rooney?

Well any half decent striker would move into space...

As for an assist!

Well....I guess Robbie wasn't known for his attacking ability.

I saw bits of the first half and didn't think he was that bad - was he particularly bad in the second half?

Have to say not impressed by BBC using PM tonight on the PL Show at all. Can't stand the man. I could name a good few dozen people that would've better for the Beeb to use and he appears/is talked about on the BBC in general way too much for my liking (i.e. more than zero times).

As I mentioned a few days back I'd even rather have Stewart Robson talking about Arsene Wenger - something I very rarely say.

I've no idea what Savage said but Rooney's contribution to the goal is classed as an assistant (which only goes to prove how ridiculous the whole stats business on football usually is).

Thursday 29th September - ITV

UEFA Europa League Highlights

Mark Pougatch presented alongside Steve Bruce and Glenn Hoddle

Manchester United v Zorya Luhansk - Clive Tyldesley
Hapoel Beer Sheva v Southampton - Sam Matterface, with Andy May (as BT Sport) conducting interviews
Dundalk v Maccabi Tel-Aviv - Joe Speight

Round-ups - Richard Henwood and Tom Skippings

Pougatch voiced the action from the other games in the English clubs' groups. There were no post-match interviews after the Dundalk edit. We didn't hear who ITV's interviewer was at Old Trafford, but I imagine it was Clive.

City vs Celtic only averaged 573k

Excellent again tonight

Dundalk are better than MUFC in the Europa League

West Ham v Boro- Jonathan Pearce for MotD

Sunday 9 October on RTE2

Moldova v Republic of Ireland- Darragh Maloney presents. With analysis from Damien Duff, Didi Hamann and Richie Sadlier, commentary by George Hamilton and Jim Beglin, and reports from Tony O'Donoghue.

Watford v Bournemouth- Steve Wilson for MotD
Hull City v Chelsea- Martin Fisher for MotD
Burnley v Arsenal- Guy Mowbray for MotD2

no dunphy, this is great news

EE have got an offer on where all their customers can get BT Sport free for 6 months.

I wonder how much that has effected the figure.

You would imagine a good few thousand have signed up.

Course, it could have easily been Alan Parry doing it if the Champions League was still on Sky.


Well, even though I despise Morgan more than virtually everyone else on the planet, he is clearly a famous Arsenal fan and Wenger critic, and they can stitch him up in the edit and make him look stupid anyway.

I was going to ask what people were making of The Premier League Show, actually. So far I wonder if I like the idea of it a bit more than the execution. A lot of the time I'm wondering what it's doing that Football Focus isn't already doing - not helped by many of the items also appearing on Focus too. I got the impression that it was supposed to be a bit more in-depth and intelligent than that - a broadsheet as opposed to Focus' tabloid - and certainly you watch in a different mood at 10pm than you do at midday. But the one piece on the BBC I thought would be tailor made for this show, Jake Livermore talking about his personal life, wasn't on it, it was on Football Focus.

I think sometimes the items have been a bit longer than they really deserve, I suppose Anthony Joshua meeting Troy Deeney was a bit of a coup but it went on a bit and I don't think we learned much from it. I guess much of it is based on the fact that it feels like it should be a bit investigative or a bit irreverent, but they're reliant on getting access to the players and the clubs so they can't really do that.

I've quite liked the tactical bits they've done, I think the VR bits work quite well because it helps the pundits get their views across - it could be quite gimmicky but I think it's done quite effectively and not used for the sake of it. The comedy bit at the end hasn't been very good, to be honest, but I think that's been a problem with the contributors rather than the concept.

I like the idea of a more considered and intelligent football show but I'm not sure if this is it so far. It reminds me a bit of that David Squires comic strip where the couple are watching television and one says "Oh, not another rip-off of The Wire" and the other one says "It's Football Focus" (it's funnier than I'm making it sound). I think all the moody lighting and backdrops and pauses in interviews have been become a bit of a cliche, trying to make it look a bit more intense and important than it actually is. I know I've mentioned it before but one of the things I enjoyed about Baker and Kelly on BT is that it actually spent time to ask what being a footballer was actually like. Football isn't very important, really.

Everton v Crystal Palace - Steve Bower

Swansea v Liverpool - Simon Brotherton
Hull City v Chelsea - Martin Fisher
Sunderland v West Brom - Guy Mowbray
Watford v Bournemouth - Steve Wilson
West Ham v Middlesbrough - Jonathan Pearce



Man United v Stoke - Steve Bower
Leicester v Southampton - Steve Wilson
Tottenham v Man City - Simon Brotherton
Burnley v Arsenal - Guy Mowbray

Haven't really caught the PL Show to be honest. Just thinks it's a bit unnecessary though as a show to be honest - not sure if there's anything it does that Football Focus couldn't do.
Whereas with other new shows - like Premier League Tonight/Score I can see the purpose of them being there (PLT so BT can review the day's action and it doesn't interfere with the main match coverage and Score is the place they can confine some of the less able BT pundits).

Would've watched it last night though probably if Morgan hadn't been on there.