Spread of TV Time Slots - NFL and EPL

[John L]

In the US in the Fall, Friday nights are for high school football, Saturdays are for college and Sunday afternoons are for National Football League - The NFL had two traditional time slots: 1pm and 4pm (ET) - Most of these were regional broadcasts and everybody played their games within these times - Or at least thats the way it used to be - About 40 years ago, the NFL expanded to Monday Night Football (and Howard Cossell) to televise a single game at 9 pm (ET) - (I know - this really dates me) - It stayed that way until about 10-15 years ago when ESPN started to add a single Sunday evening game at 8 pm - Then as they realized the college season ended by December, the NFL started to add Saturday afternoon games about 10 years ago as well - So now the NFL has managed the TV saturation of their product to mulitple time slots on Sunday and a single game Monday nights and now to Saturday afternoons and Thursday evenings late in the season - And of course all of this has meant lots more money - And its TV money that drives the NFL teams - Some teams are fortunate enough to have great merchandizing for extra money, but most owners make their money from TV - I sorta think too that the NFL has just about saturated their product on TV - Midweek games rarely do well in the TV ratings and advertising money won't stand for poor ratings and low viewership

My question is, how has the spread of TV time slots occurred in England and the EPL? - Seems like it must have started by tradition on just Saturday afternoons with the occasional Wednesday evening, or am I wrong? - And I realize that while the richest owners in the EPL don't recoup costs from TV money, most owners probably do rely on TV money - They aren't all oil-rich Russians and Iranians - And do you feel the EPL has just about saturated their TV market with Saturday afternoons, Sunday afternoons and now Monday evenings? - Would more TV time slots mean lower viewership?

[RichardL]

Live matches didn't start here until about 1984 (not counting the FA Cup Final, which has been live since TV really got going I think). In that first year there were about a dozen live games a season, all on a Sunday afternoon, with all other games starting on Saturday at 3pm.

Remarkable as it may seem, 20 years ago they didn't even have cameras at every top division match. If the match wasn't slated for highlights, and wasn't the other match picked for the 30 second round up at the end of the national news, then the match was completely unrecorded.

Slowly the number of live games increased per year, with the odd Friday night game as an experiment (rather than because there was also a game on a Sunday). I think it may have even been that BBC games were on Fridays, and ITV on Sundays, but it's hard to recall exactly. Even up until the late 80s/early 90s, you only had one live game per week, and often less. TV viewing figures weren't that good, and TV money was tiny.

It was only when SKY and the premiership came along more and more live games got added. Regular Monday and Friday night games got added. Two games on a Sunday became normal, even if the first game was usually from outside the premiership. The late and early Saturday games are a more recent addition.

No games are allowed to be shown at 3pm on a saturday though, to avoid a clash with the normal fixture programme.

[DaPrince84]

from what ive read... Match of the Day was a much more important program before the premiership, than it is today... they had highlights from nearly every match, and it was the the only way to see clubs play...

[Grah]

Live matches didn't start here until about 1984 (not counting the FA Cup Final, which has been live since TV really got going I think). In that first year there were about a dozen live games a season, all on a Sunday afternoon, with all other games starting on Saturday at 3pm.

Remarkable as it may seem, 20 years ago they didn't even have cameras at every top division match. If the match wasn't slated for highlights, and wasn't the other match picked for the 30 second round up at the end of the national news, then the match was completely unrecorded.

Slowly the number of live games increased per year, with the odd Friday night game as an experiment (rather than because there was also a game on a Sunday). I think it may have even been that BBC games were on Fridays, and ITV on Sundays, but it's hard to recall exactly. Even up until the late 80s/early 90s, you only had one live game per week, and often less. TV viewing figures weren't that good, and TV money was tiny.

It was only when SKY and the premiership came along more and more live games got added. Regular Monday and Friday night games got added. Two games on a Sunday became normal, even if the first game was usually from outside the premiership. The late and early Saturday games are a more recent addition.

No games are allowed to be shown at 3pm on a saturday though, to avoid a clash with the normal fixture programme.


But having said all that SKy had the package to watch 1 team you had to pay for all teams like it of leave it. the gate money got so expensive the pawn sandwhich eaters got to go to games and workers stayed home.

[revelationx]

In the US in the Fall, Friday nights are for high school football, Saturdays are for college and Sunday afternoons are for National Football League - The NFL had two traditional time slots: 1pm and 4pm (ET) - Most of these were regional broadcasts and everybody played their games within these times - Or at least thats the way it used to be - About 40 years ago, the NFL expanded to Monday Night Football (and Howard Cossell) to televise a single game at 9 pm (ET) - (I know - this really dates me) - It stayed that way until about 10-15 years ago when ESPN started to add a single Sunday evening game at 8 pm - Then as they realized the college season ended by December, the NFL started to add Saturday afternoon games about 10 years ago as well - So now the NFL has managed the TV saturation of their product to mulitple time slots on Sunday and a single game Monday nights and now to Saturday afternoons and Thursday evenings late in the season - And of course all of this has meant lots more money - And its TV money that drives the NFL teams - Some teams are fortunate enough to have great merchandizing for extra money, but most owners make their money from TV - I sorta think too that the NFL has just about saturated their product on TV - Midweek games rarely do well in the TV ratings and advertising money won't stand for poor ratings and low viewership

My question is, how has the spread of TV time slots occurred in England and the EPL? - Seems like it must have started by tradition on just Saturday afternoons with the occasional Wednesday evening, or am I wrong? - And I realize that while the richest owners in the EPL don't recoup costs from TV money, most owners probably do rely on TV money - They aren't all oil-rich Russians and Iranians - And do you feel the EPL has just about saturated their TV market with Saturday afternoons, Sunday afternoons and now Monday evenings? - Would more TV time slots mean lower viewership?

It is interesting that there is probably not much more live Premiership football that Sky could show. Typically they show a live game at 12.45pm on Saturdays. Then there is usually a batch of games at 3pm Saturdays. (This is the traditional time slot for football matches in England. As such these Premiership games at this time are not broadcast live in the UK as part of an agreement so as not to potentially harm gate receipts.) Then Sky usually show a live match at 5pm ish. Then usually there are two games or so broadcast live on Sunday afternoons and one on Monday evening and one on Wednesday evening. If you factor in the Champions League on Tuesdays/Wednesdays and the Uefa Cup on Thursdays then only Friday has no English top flight football.

People tend to go out (rather than to football matches) on a Friday night so I cannot see Premiership matches being played then (although some Championship matches occur on Fridays). The Premiership would not want to compete with the Champions league by having matches on Tuesdays and of course the biggest English clubs are in the Champions League (at least in the Group stages) and so any Premiership matches scheduled for Tuesdays/Wednesdays in Champs League weeks could not feature these big teams. I think it is possible to watch a live football match on TV every day of the week in England so we are pretty much at saturation point as we also can watch La Liga, Serie A, SPL, Dutch and South American Football!

[leg_breaker]

It's oversaturated as far as I'm concerned. I don't see the point in the Saturday lunchtime match, even when my team's playing I have to force myself to watch it. The Saturday teatime game is also another poor time as many people are...having their tea, or coming back from a match, or going out. 4pm on Sunday is the only really decent slot.

Maybe they could experiment with a Spain-style 8pm Sunday match.

[Dr_Intoxicated]

from what ive read... Match of the Day was a much more important program before the premiership, than it is today... they had highlights from nearly every match, and it was the the only way to see clubs play...

From what I recal (and here I have to admit the old memory is not what it used to be) before the prmiership (= Before SKY) The BBC only showed highlights from about 3 games and that was it.

[RichardL]

From what I recal (and here I have to admit the old memory is not what it used to be) before the prmiership (= Before SKY) The BBC only showed highlights from about 3 games and that was it.
they'd have two or three games, as would ITV. Normally at least one match shown for highlights over the weekend would be from a game outside the top division. The other games weren't shown at all usually, although there'd normally be the goals from one match shown at the end of the news. In the last few years before SKY took over, all the premiership goals were shown.

Because all games were played on Saturday, MotD or the ITV highlights show "the Big Match" was always able to show the best games, unlike now where the best games might be on Sunday.

In my opinion, the way games were presented was a lot better then too. Due to squeezing more games in, the highlights of each match are shorter and feel much more edited than in the past. You get no sense of the pre-match build up as they usually now just jump straight into the action, and the "hanging on at the end" tension has also been scrapped for the low-attention-span generation by ending the highlights after the replay of the last significant shot has been shown.

They used to feel like watching a whole match which had magically and seamlessly had all the dull bits chopped out

The lack of extensive coverage was often at the wish of the football league, who were concerned that too much football on TV (even a goals round-up) would lead to fans not going to matches. That might seem an odd idea now, but crowds had been falling ever since MotD started in the 1960s, and many thought "too much football on TV" was a contributory factor.