ITV to show first two England matches in South Africa

March 23rd, 2010 | by: Rob |

ITV and BBC have carved up the World Cup matches between them, and have come to an interesting agreement. ITV will show England’s opening two matches (as well as the opening match of the World Cup alltogether) in exchange for the first two knockout round matches (should England progress that far) which will be shown on BBC.

So basically, ITV have taken the guaranteed ratings (unsurprising as they are in need of the ratings) over the potential goldmine of ratings that a Last 16 or Quarter-Final could produce.

Should England make the Semi-Final both sides will show the game, and both sides will show the final, regardless of who makes it.

You can see a big list here. As a general rule, I don’t think there is much to chose between the coverage of the two sides – it depends on who they get in to do the punditry. In the past BBC have had the brilliance of Leonardo and Gordon Strachan, but they’ve also had Alan Shearer and Ian Wright. Meanwhile on ITV, they’ve had Terry Venables and Bobby Robson, but they’ve also had Teddy Sherringham and erm, Ian Wright.

So we’ll have to wait and see. But it does make the WC feel closer already.

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http://www.worldcupblog.org Daryl

I have no facts to back this up, but for some reason I feel a lot more confident about England’s chances when they’re playing on the BBC.
http://vuvuzelas.biz/ Vuvuzelas

I always prefer the coverage on the BBC – if for no other reason than the lack of breaks throughout. I can’t wait to watch 3 games a day for the first week and a bit!
http://japan.worldcupblog.org/ Aidan

Daryl – I’ve often thought the same! I reckon various painful shootout defeats in the past have been on ITV and scarred their reputation in my mind.

Besides, BBC coverage is so much better. No matter what ITV try, they always manage to make it crap.
italian fanatic

those damn brits they dont know how to play the game of football and should just quit now. they are a discrace to the game.
italian fanatic

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italian fanatic

inter milan is going to win the champions league
anon

Italian fanatic, its spelled “England”.
http://www.worldcupblog.org Daryl

Ha, I’ve seen plenty of trolling on World Cup Blog, but that might just be the worst effort ever. Thanks to the above commenter for helping this fool with his spelling.

Also, I’m going to take a zero tolerance approach from here on out. Any comment that’s blatantly looking to cause trouble will just be deleted.
http://fuodutdkdk.bob dunno

united states are shit at football we can beat u any day