Sky Sports' ‘Supersized' Sunday means viewers can watch five games at once

Telegraph

a day ago

'It will end the flick,' says Gary Hughes, Sky Sports director of football, of an innovation this Premier League season that signals the end of that most irritating of habits: channel hopping.
How? By dedicating a single platform to simultaneously broadcasting as many as five matches on a single screen, with a dedicated commentator, director and producer helping guide the viewer to the main action.
It will initially be rolled out at 2pm as part of Sky's 'Supersized' Sunday, when its new broadcast deal will mean increasing the offering on that day from 36 to 63 matches a season. Most intriguing of all is that it could, in time, potentially involve different sports.
Sky will screen at least 215 of the 380 Premier League matches this term, compared to 128 in the previous rights cycle. The broadcaster also has around 50 extra midweek games.
Should the 3pm Saturday blackout end – and Sky Sports managing director Jonathan Licht describes this as a conversation 'that is coming' before the next broadcast deal from 2029 – it could one day also be used on a Saturday afternoon. Think Soccer Saturday while also having the footage of multiple games being screened in your home.
For now, though, the focus will be on Sunday 2pm and Sky's newly acquired midweek slots, with single matches remaining in the usual Friday night, Saturday night, Sunday 4.30pm and Monday-night slots. Sunday early afternoon is different because it is the time that clubs with midweek European fixtures will generally play.
Like Soccer Saturday, Hughes admits there could be 'a bit of chaos' as Sky's director and commentator try to keep up with matches that will also be individually screened for those viewers who prefer a single focus.
'We won't linger on a game for a long period if nothing's happening, we'll bounce around,' said Hughes. 'What we've always tried to do is innovate, but also offer customers choice. So, if you want to watch game one, but you're slightly interested in another game, you've got an option. Some midweeks, we might have five simultaneous games. It'll end the [channel] flick.'
Asked if it could be expanded, Hughes said: 'Certainly. In the summer months you might have a Test match going on, you might have a grand prix going on, good tennis, a brilliant football match going on. We're constantly looking at ways how we can innovate and evolve.'
As well as multiview, Sky Sports is launching a new Friday night preview show this season that will be hosted by Roman Kemp, as well as the return of Goals on Sunday and Sunday Supplement on Sunday morning.
Licht also sounded a warning over piracy, and the prevalence of illegal firesticks, highlighting the links to organised crime and how their normalisation stands as a risk to English football.
'It's everyone's responsibility – we certainly look at big tech to take that on and we look at government to help,' he said. 'It is a serious issue. It's value destructive.'
He also highlighted how a dramatic fall in the value of the broadcast rights in French football had been largely attributed to piracy.
Mimicking NFL-style innovation is a major challenge
For as long as sports broadcasting has existed in the UK we have looked to America for inspiration, so it should not surprise you that Sky Sports' multiview has its roots across the pond. If it can provide something close to the NFL's Redzone it will be a huge success. The only issue is football's stubborn unpredictability.
American football is perfectly suited to the rapidly-changing coverage of Redzone, which whips around up to eight simultaneous games on Sundays, always prioritising the match deemed most likely to deliver excitement. This is easier to decide in a sport in which a team that reaches 20 yards from the goal line – the titular red zone – will either score, make a mess of an opportunity or turn the ball over.
Attempts to ape this previously with football have been fun but inessential. James Richardson helmed BT Sports' Champions League goals show with typical charm and TNT resurrected the format with Matt Smith for the final Champions League group stage games last season. The trouble with football in this format is that goals can come with little warning, so the viewer can feel like they are watching a more irritating Soccer Saturday.
Every great moment is potentially viewable as it happens, inevitably many are missed. TNT's version cut away from an Aston Villa game just before they scored to show Paris St-Germain players standing around waiting for some fog to clear. You long for the badinage of Paul Merson and Charlie Nicholas when you have watched one too many attacking passages break down in Borussia Dortmund versus Olympiacos.
Sky will attempt to amend this by having several matches on screen at the same time, an overdue response to the average width of a UK television now exceeding that of a 1959 Morris Mini-Minor. Redzone does this too, occasionally leading to thrilled chat from host Scott Hanson of a 'quadbox': four live games on screen at once taking a quarter of the screen each. From the mock-ups Sky has published it appears there will be one game taking up a large portion with lesser events sharing smaller slots. Clearly there will be moments when the most compelling action is only viewable at squint-required resolution.
The other issue is who to put in charge. As we have seen from ghost ship Soccer Saturday since Jeff Stelling's departure, the casting of an anchor is crucial for such an unusual sports show, one in which you hear far more from the presenter than a conventional live broadcast. Simon Thomas, Stelling's replacement, is an accomplished host but it is impossible to replace someone so revered from a programme they became synonymous with.
NFL Network, or its new owners ESPN, will face a similar challenge when Redzone 's Hanson reaches his final down. He has been like Stelling on Red Bull since the show began in 2009, able to keep a choppy and chaotic broadcast compelling. It is a seven-hour stint for him every Sunday during the NFL regular season, during which he allegedly does not take a comfort break. Good luck to Sky finding an equally strong-bladdered parent for its new baby.