Programming
Much of the channel's output is football. This includes action from the Premier League, FA Cup matches, European Cup, European Cup Winners Cup and League Cup finals and some England games. ESPN Classic also shows games from the FIFA World Cup following a multi-year deal to show 150 classic FIFA World Cup matches from 1930 to 2006. Though most coverage on the channel is from the colour era, it has shown original black and white footage of European Cup finals going back as far as 1959.
A significant proportion of the football action on ESPN Classic is archive ITV football coverage, including matches covered by regional ITV companies. However much of the football seen on the channel is not shown with the original commentary. Instead, many games, especially the Premier League and FA Cup games, tend to feature commentary dubbed on more recently by commentators such as Jon Champion and Paul Dempsey, or commentary by Sky Sports broadcasters such as Martin Tyler and Alan Parry which seems to be from the international feed of the time. Similarly, the footage from games where commentary was later added does not include original on-screen captions, with ESPN adding captions themselves. Some 1960s European Cup finals have also had a new commentary dubbed on by Tony Jones.
The channel also shows some rugby union international matches, including action from the Rugby World Cup, as well as past matches from the rugby union Premiership. Other sports featured include cricket, ESPN-produced vintage boxing matches, The Ultimate Fighter and more recently, action from American sports to complement the live American sports action which is broadcast on ESPN UK and ESPN America.
In addition to the programmes mentioned above, ESPN Classic has made a variety of other programmes. These include Sport Years as well as many football compilation programmes. In addition, to mark the 30th anniversary of ESPN, the channel has been showing the ESPN Films' 30 for 30 series.
ESPN Classic regularly repeats the sporting action that it shows on the channel with the same material often being shown time and time again. Some of the action, especially ESPN-produced programmes and series, has been broadcast on the channel on dozens of different occasions.
Read more about this topic: ESPN Classic (UK)
Famous quotes containing the word programming:
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—Melinda M. Marshall (20th century)