Trying to deflect my attention from The Big Event between England and Denmark, I change TV channels to Sky to watch the British and Welsh Lions rugby union team play a South African provincial team called Sharks. I am no expert on rugby union and normally my interest in the sport rarely extends beyond Bristol Bears and England, but the Lions is ‘special’, so special the authorities have flogged off the TV rights to Sky and the radio rights to the phone in station Talk Sport. The Lions usually attract a vast following of wealthy middle class and middle aged supporters, but this tour is different. There will be no fans present at all.
Sky are doing their best to hype the event with a long, sprawling build-up programme and pretending that somehow this tour needs to go ahead. It’s the old ‘everyone needs something to cheer themselves up at this difficult time’ bollocks, which, as we have previously noted, means nothing because the vast majority of people will not be able to watch it BECAUSE IT’S ON SKY. It’s on Sky because the authorities can get more money by not having it free to air. It’s not about fans or mere viewers like me at all. It’s all about the money.
No one can go to the games, few people can watch it on TV; that’s just part of the story. Covid is running wild in South Africa and the virus has seeped into both camps. Tonight’s game has been put back an hour due to positive tests, Saturday’s game is off for the same reason. Soon, it will be the test matches with no fans and a relative handful of TV viewers.
Even the generic Sky presenter describes the build-up to this game as ‘chaotic’ and he’s the one trying to sell it to viewers.
I’m beginning to feel that there are more important things than this and perhaps the efforts of the South African authorities could be more usefully directed at easing the growing Covid crisis, especially in the poverty-stricken townships where the rich folk rarely go. But I suppose the broadcast rights matter more than anything else.
