Twenty years ago, foreign football enthusiasts had a limited access to what was taking place in leagues they followed. Supporters of Italian teams had a bigger share through the services provided by the Italian State television RAI, eagerly awaiting the programme 90 Minuto to watch highlights of the Sunday afternoon matches. At the time, there were no games played on Saturday or Sunday evening.
Fans of the English league had to wait even longer, as the programme Big League Soccer was screened on Television Malta two or three days after the games were played. There were weeks however when the programme did not arrive in time to be broadcast, much to the disappointment of the thousands of English football followers.
Midweek matches from the European club competitions were sometimes shown live and, again, supporters of Italian football teams here had an advantage.
Things have changed over the past years. The advent of cable television has provided whole weekends of football. League games are spread over Saturdays and Sundays – in the case of English football going on to Mondays as well – and football lovers are entertained to hours on end of live games.
Until last year, Melita Cable TV had exclusive rights to screen matches from the Italian and English football leagues. But this has now changed too, as Multiplus has taken over the rights to broadcast Italian Serie A matches, leaving Melita with just five Italian teams, which meant that many Italian league followers shifted to Multiplus over the summer. Melita responded with obtaining the rights to air games from the Spanish and German top leagues, although these are not as popular as the other two competitions. All this meant that there is practically at least one live game being screened – on either Multiplus, Melita or both – at any time during the afternoons and evenings on Saturday and Sunday.
With the Champions League and UEFA Cup soon to start, we will have few days without football on TV between now and May… and then, in June, the World Cup will start…
One wonders what effect all this football on TV is having on the normal running of Maltese families, although it must also be said that many have learnt to become selective and watch only those games which really interest them.
The battle over television rights has its advantages and disadvantages. In this case, Multiplus offered competitive rates which led Melita Cable to give special offers too – and this meant that the consumer is today paying less for the whole television service, not just for football.
One disadvantage is that Melita Digital still runs the official stations of three Italian clubs while at the same time has no rights to air their games. This situation in fact led to complaints as these three stations were blocked for 24 hours between the Sunday and the Monday on the first weekend of the Italian league as there were fears that the screening of replays of given games would have breached regulations. This issue is expected to be sorted out before the next league games are played this weekend.
As more and more foreign sport – and not only football – is broadcast on television, the biggest loser seems to be Maltese sport.
While, in spite of television coverage the number of spectators in all kinds of sport taking place abroad continues to increase or, at worst, remains even, the attendances at local sport events, in particular football, still leaves much to be desired although the slight increase registered during the past local football season is a ray of hope.
Interest in the local football competitions remains, but today more supporters follow their local team’s behaviour from home while watching their favourite foreign club play on television.