BT Sport renews rights for National League football..

[sanjay kumar]

Showing that for the pay-TV provider football is not just about the Champions League and Premier League but also grassroots, BT Sport has renewed its exclusive rights to broadcast the Vanarama National League for a further three years, until the end of the 2023/24 season.
BTSport NationalLeague 23Dec2020
BT Sport has been broadcasting live and exclusive coverage of English football’s fifth tier since 2013 and the new deal will see more games from the pinnacle of non-league and grassroots football broadcast than ever before with games broadcast live each week, in a regular Saturday slot.

Coverage will be led by presenter Matt Smith and will follow the regular season championship race plus the end-of-season playoffs through which one team gains a second promotion place into the English Football League. Alongside Smith will be commentators Adam Summerton and former Brighton & Hove Albion and Celtic defender Adam Virgo plus pundits including former Norwich City and Barrow striker Grant Holt, former Torquay United manager Chris Hargreaves and former Southport manager, Bolton Wanderers forward and England international Kevin Davies. Joining them will be reporters Natalie Quirk and Becky Ives.

Alongside the weekly live match coverage, the BT Sport team bring fans every goal from every National League match in the weekly Vanarama National League Highlights show. The show will be created through a link between BT and students associated with selected National League clubs who receive broadcast training from BT to go on and help create the show.

Commenting on the deal, Simon Green, head of BT Sport, said: “Over the past few years we’ve developed an innovative relationship with the league, including world-first 5G-enabled remote broadcasts and training local students who help create BT Sport’s National League highlights shows. The National League remain a valued partner to BT, particularly during the pandemic, in staging last season’s playoff matches and the 2020-21 season.”

Brian Barwick, chairman of the National League, added: “"We are delighted to continue our partnership with BT Sport. Their coverage of the Vanarama National League has been simply outstanding. Informed and comprehensive, our League has been broadcast in a highly polished and professional fashion. A lot of hard work over the last past seven years has produced some exceptional television. The new three-year contract will take us into over a decade of coverage by BT Sport. This speaks volumes for the confidence we have in how our matches have been brought to an established and growing audience...