Feckin Ecclestone....

Unfortunately, I think the prancing horse prancing off has a lot more to do with their cr*ppy results this year and willingness to spend way more than they'd be 'allowed' to by the gents agreement within FOTA than anything else... notice Red Bull weren't far behind either.  Now, IMO, I think this is all unfortunate because the smaller teams will just end up much further away from competitiveness (if such a word exists) as the bigger boys spend, spend, spend and they are spending all that dough on a much more developed platform to start with....

Good news for Sky HD subscribers.... clicky

Yep Mr Ecclestone agreed to the deal, no doubt the additional £9m his company will get from the partnership might have swayed it a little. Apparently he never forced the BBC to break their exclusive rights deal (they had that until end of 2013 season) though. They couldnt afford it so approached him with the Sky deal to make it work.

I started off by blaming Ecclestone but having read as much as I can about it, I think I'm starting to believe the BBC may be more to blame here than it first seems. They seem to be trying to portray the organisation as the innocent party in all of this by saying they couldnt afford it and this is the best outcome as at least some races stay free to air. If they'd have walked away they would have had penalty clauses but ALL races would be shown live on free to air, on another channel.

Funny how they are claiming poverty after having just spent £900m moving to Manchester (urr perhaps the Sport dept really should still be in London due to a little shindig going on there next year - apparently the expenses bills are going to be huge, but remember folks its a money saving scheme!).


Edited by chrisg - 02 Aug 11 at 8:46am

Of course what I read may be misinformation being spread by FOM....

As I said I'm sure something fishy is going on.

I think the concorde agreement had a loophole added that said something along the lines of the rights holder had to ensure that not all coverage was on a pay to view channel. So, as the BBC will have some races live next year they are in the clear on that one.

Something fishy is definitely going on. I've read further that it wasnt actually Ecclestone who brokered this deal but that in the BBC cost cutting measures (£900m to move to Manchester anyone) they couldnt afford to honour the remaining period of their contract - to the end of 2013. Bernie said it wasnt down to him to sort out so the BBC went to Sky to partner them. Apparently if the BBC had pulled out wholly then the F1 people would have had to go to a free to air channel and Channel 5 had offered whatever Sky were offering for coverage. But the BBC don't view Sky as a direct competitor but do ITV, Channel 4 and 5 etc so by keeping some races effectively closed the door for any other terrestrial channel in the UK to bid for the whole shebang. Plus the murdoch's are currently trying to buy F1 company which may have had something to do with it...

What I also don't understand is why the teams are swallowing Bernies line that this will increase viewing figures, must be the promise of the additional £1m payment they are being offered from the deal. It's weird becaue every Sky customer can already watch F1 on the BBC, but not every BBC viewer will be able to watch Sky Sports. So how does that improve ratings?

Can you imagine the uproar if the BBC decided they could only afford to show every other episode of Eastenders next year? I heard that the viewing figures for yesterdays F1 was +6m. The most watched program on any channel in the UK. Niche sport huh?

I loved all of the little digs in the commentary over the weekend - Brundle opened with " the Skys closing in", right through to where during the forum afterwards the three presenters went to talk to the crowd and someone grabbed the microphone and said we dont want sky. Jake Humphreys did a really fake shocked look. Brilliant.

And breathe.... Apologies. rant over.....

p.s. over 6000 negative replies to the head of BBC F1's blog so far - do you think they get the picture yet?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/sporteditors/2011/07/f1_coverage_to_be_shared_betwe.html


Edited by chrisg - 01 Aug 11 at 2:34pm