The wheels have come off as the BBC gives up another major sport

13 April 2012

Sky Sports and Formula One - to my mind that's a match made in heaven. Now, my mind is more easily swayed by swooshy graphics, people shouting and the dual roar of a semi-orgasmic commentator and petrol engines. But still. You see what I mean.

A deal announced this morning splits Formula One rights for 2012-18 between Sky and the BBC. It's a deal weighted heavily in favour of Sky: it will show all the races, all the practising, all the build-up, all the build-down and all the breaking news that's fit to roll across the screen on an electronic ticker.

The BBC, meanwhile, will screen 10 races a year: a much-truncated version of its current deal. It has saved a great deal of money, no doubt: part of the corporation's commitment to strip 20 per cent out of its budget under the new licence fee agreement. In the process, of course, it has removed a good 50 per cent of the Formula One race calendar from free-to-air broadcast.

What shall we make of the deal? Well, it will no doubt be met with hostility following on from the Beeb dispensing with the FA Cup, England's home football internationals and, of course, Test cricket. There is a pitchfork-waving mob out against the Murdoch empire and the default position to take for many people (rightly) disgusted with the actions of the News of the World is to rail against anything done by a company connected with the Murdoch clan (they own 39 per cent of BskyB). To simplify: Glenn Mulcaire did a load of nasty bulls**t. Therefore Sky must be prevented from broadcasting F1.

Of course, that is an argument with about as much logical weight as a handful of dust. A better complaint is that in muscling in on F1, Sky has been allowed to poach yet another raft of big sporting occasions from public broadcast.

Since its return to the BBC in 2009, F1 has been one of the few sports shows the channel does really well. From the vigorous, youthful anchoring of Jake Humphrey to the energetic and knowledgeable commentary of Martin Brundle, its broadcasts have had real spunk and intelligence.

To cut this in half, and presumably to slash at the funding along the way, is a great pity. But such is the way of the world. The Beeb is in a parlous financial state. In order to hold onto its protected licence-fee-funded status, it has to self-eviscerate. And sport, being ever-more expensive to buy and screen, is a natural first place to make big cuts.

It isn't just F1. Sky has already moved in on Wimbledon. It was there in force this year, although the BBC had full rights to broadcast the tournament. Why? Because a rights-share for coverage of the tennis is almost certain within the next few years even though the Beeb insist they want to hang on to it: Sky will very likely buy the rights to broadcast exclusively from a single court and build its position from there.

Is this necessarily a bad thing? If you can afford Sky, then it is not. We all love to mock their overblown, hyperbolic approach to broadcasting sport but, when we step back, Sky has changed the way sport is covered on TV in this country - in part for the worse but in much greater part for the better.

Formula One is made for them. It has hankered after motor racing a long time. (Witness the ill-fated project that was A1GP.) Motor racing is the nerd's sport par excellence. You could make a whole week of Sky Sports News rolling coverage out of a downward diffuser alteration. There is so much data for it to play with. The sport is accommodating and open to giving broadcasters access to its people and to the track.

I look forward to F1 on Sky. And if it hasn't already signed up Georgie Thompson to anchor the show, it's mad. We all know Sky is many things - camp, hyperbolic, super-wealthy, ruthless - but it's not barking.

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