Seven Sport


Seven Sport is the brand and production department under which all sporting events on the Seven Network are broadcast. It broadcasts some of Australia's most prominent sporting events, such as Cricket, AFL, AFLW, the Olympics and the Paralympics.
In late September 2019, it was announced that Head of Sport Saul Shtein would be leaving the company after the AFL Grand Final, reportedly as a result of wide-spread company cost cutting and restructuring. He was replaced by long-time Seven Melbourne managing director Lewis Martin.

History

The Seven Network is a major player in Australian sports broadcasting.

Australian rules football

Prior to 2001, Seven was the only broadcaster of Australian Football League matches. As the single broadcaster, only one match could be broadcast in any timeslot, so it was not possible for every match to be broadcast. In 2001, Nine and Ten entered a joint rights deal with pay TV provider Foxtel to ensure that all eight matches of each round were televised, starting in 2002 and concluding in 2006. That brought Seven's 45-year run as VFL/AFL football broadcaster to an end.
On 5 January 2006, Seven regained the rights to the AFL in the following broadcast deal, covering the period between 2007 and 2011 inclusive, in a joint contract with Ten and Foxtel. The cost of the deal was A$780 million, an A$280 million increase on the Nine/Ten/Foxtel 2002-2006 joint broadcast venture. Under the deal, Seven and Ten alternated the Brownlow Medal ceremonies and the AFL Grand Final; Seven televised the Friday night and Sunday afternoon Premiership season matches, while Ten televised the two Saturday matches and Foxtel televising the rest.
In 2011, it was announced that Seven and Foxtel would share the football broadcast rights from 2012–2016, bringing Ten's 10-year run to an end. Under the new deal, Seven would televise four games per week, and Foxtel would simulcast coverage of Seven's games and broadcast the other five weekly games live and exclusive. Seven televised the entire finals series, with Foxtel simulcasting all finals except for the Grand Final, which was televised live and exclusively by Seven. The deal required Seven to televise all but the Saturday afternoon match live into Victoria and Tasmania; all four games were shown live into the northern states on 7mate and games were shown live or on delay into Western Australia and South Australia depending on Seven's television schedule.
It was announced in 2015 that Seven would again be the sole free-to-air broadcaster of AFL matches, for the period between 2017 and 2022. Under the deal, Seven no longer televises the Saturday afternoon match into Victoria, however, matches in this timeslot involving interstate teams continue to be televised into their respective markets. Controversially, however, up to three matches involving each of all four of the Western Australia and South Australia clubs are televised on a significant delay, with the telecast starting after the final siren has gone in real time.
Under the revised deal agreement, Channel Seven will show up to five matches per week live on their networks, with Fox Sports broadcasting each and every game on either a Fox Footy or Fox Sports 503.

Olympics

The network's coverage of the 2000 Sydney Olympics attracted a TV audience of over 6.5 million Australians for the opening and closing ceremonies. The broadcast also ran on the short-lived C7 Sport subscription channel.
During its time as the broadcaster of the Olympic Games, it has won the Olympic Golden Rings for the Best Television coverage for the best television programme during the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens.
During the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Seven and NBC Universal were the major recipients of the Golden Rings; with Seven taking the Golden Rings for the best Olympic Programme, the Silver Rings for the best Olympic feature, and the Bronze Rings for the Best Sports Coverage.
During Seven's coverage of the XXIX Olympiad, numerous complaints by the general Australian public were made to the Seven Network for several reasons, including the lack of a broadcast of events to which Australia is not competing in, too many advertisements and at inappropriate times during events and poor commentating of events. There has also been media speculation about the editing of Olympic events by Seven; how live sound from events is faded and the commentary sound is the prominent sound feature.
Seven had exclusive Australian free-to-air, pay television, online and mobile telephony broadcast rights to the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. The live telecast of the XXIX Olympiad was shared by both the Seven Network and SBS Television. Seven broadcast the opening and closing ceremonies and mainstream sports including swimming, athletics, rowing, cycling and gymnastics. In stark contrast, SBS TV provided complementary coverage focused on long-form events such as soccer, road cycling, volleyball, and table tennis.
Seven's coverage of the 2008 Summer Olympics was widely criticised by viewers, with many angry at the networks contractual obligation to show AFL football over the Olympics. Viewers also complained that many team sports were delayed, with the absence of Roy and HG and with seemingly large amounts of advertising breaks during live events upsetting some viewers. Despite this, the International Olympic Committee awarded Seven the 'Golden Rings' award for "Best Olympic Programme". The award is given for the best overall Olympic coverage.
From 2016, Seven once again became the home of the Summer Olympic Games, Winter Olympic Games and the Summer Paralympic Games. The Network secured the Australian broadcast rights to the Olympic Games in a deal that ensures its place as the Olympic broadcaster until 2020. The multimillion-dollar deal includes TV rights to the summer Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 and Tokyo in 2020, the winter Olympic Games in PyeongChang in 2018 and the summer Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 and Tokyo in 2020.

Commonwealth Games

Seven screened the 2018 Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast in April 2018.

Motor racing

From 1963 to 1997, Seven was the home of motor sport in Australia as they broadcast the Australian Touring Car Championship and the Bathurst 1000. Seven were the first broadcasters to use race cam in the 1979 Bathurst 1000, which allowed them to talk to the drivers mid-race.
The Seven commentary team included Evan Green, Will Hagon and Geoff Stone. From 1977–1995 Mike Raymond and Garry Wilkinson from 1978–1996. Neil Crompton reporting from the pits from around 1985, Mark Oastler, Doug Mulray, Allan Moffat and as a pit reporter Andy Raymond. At the Bathurst 1000, Sandy Roberts or Bruce McAvaney would be the host during the early to mid 1990s.
In 1997, Seven lost the rights to the ATCC to Network Ten, but still broadcast the Australian Super Touring Championship until the series' demise in 2001. In 2003, Seven Sport broadcast the Nations Cup and V8 Utes, before Network Ten broadcast the V8 Utes in 2005 after the collapse of organising body Procar Australia.
From 2007 to 2014, Seven regained the rights to V8 Supercars. The commentary team included Neil Crompton, Mark Skaife and Mark Larkham. From 2015, Seven Sport broadcasts the Bathurst 12 Hour endurance race.

Cricket

On 13 April 2018, Cricket Australia announced that Seven alongside subscription TV distributior Foxtel had won the broadcast rights to televise Australian Summer of Cricket each summer. Seven will broadcast all Test matches, all Women's Internationals, 43 Big Bash League Matches and 23 Women's Big Bash League Matches from 2018/19 season. This ended the Nine Network’s 45 year reign of broadcasting international cricket and Network Ten’s 5 year reign of televising the Big Bash.

Rugby League

In 2016, the Seven Network won the broadcasting rights deal to be the main broadcaster of the 2017 Rugby League World Cup in Australia, beating the other regular rugby league broadcasting channels of Fox League and the Nine Network to secure the deal.

Theme

Seven Sport has used "Fanfare for the Common Man" by Emerson, Lake & Palmer as its theme since 1989. During the 1980s and early 1990s, Seven used the music piece for Sporting events such as: AFL, Australian Open and Australian Touring Car Championship. Up until 2011, an abridged version of the opening fanfare was used. The music piece returned for introductions of the networks sporting coverage since 2018 AFL Grand Final with a version of the Fanfare for the Common Man being used for all sporting coverage including AFL, Cricket and Horse Racing.

Events

Seven Sport holds broadcast rights to the following events:

Current

Past

Programs

Seven Sport has presented the following recurring programmes:
Current
Past

Staff and commentators

The following network personalities are seen across multiple Seven Sport events:
•Bruce McAvaney
•Hamish McLachlan
•Mel McLaughlin
•Johanna Griggs
•Jim Wilson
•Jason Richardson
•Abbey Way

2016 Rio Olympics

Most Seven programs, except Sunrise and The Chase Australia, went on hiatus during Seven's broadcast of the Olympic Games.
As Seven is forced to show viewers in Western Australia, South Australia, New South Wales and Queensland games featuring their respective teams live, sometimes it will show a different game at the same time into these markets then into the rest of Australia. On these occasions, it will pick up Fox Footy's coverage of the match.

Current

Test Matches

Final

Wimbledon
Davis Cup
Past

Melbourne Cup

V8 Supercars

Current

Current

Rugby World Series

Manchester United vs Perth Glory/Leeds United