Setanta Sports
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Setanta Sports
Launched	1990
Owned by	Setanta Sport Holdings Ltd
Audience share	0.1% 2007 estimate (, )
Country	Ireland
Broadcast area	International
Website	www.setanta.com
Availability
Terrestrial
Digital terrestrial (Ireland)	Channel 17
Digital terrestrial (UK)	Channel 34
Satellite
Sky Digital (UK & Ireland)	Channel 429
Dish Network (USA)	Channel 406
DirecTV (USA)	Channel 615
Star Choice (Canada)	Channel 239
Bell ExpressVu (Canada)	Channel 420
Foxtel Digital (Australia)	Channel 525
Austar Digital (Australia)	Channel 510
UBI World TV (Australia)	Channel 3
Crown Satellite TV (USA)	Channel 421
Cable
UPC Ireland (Ireland)	Channel 105/401
Virgin Media (UK)	Channel 518 (Setanta Sports News)
	Channel 538 (Setanta Sports 1)
	Channel 539 (Setanta Sports 2)
Shaw Cable (Canada)	Channel 525
Verizon FiOS (USA)	Channel 154
	Channel 1009 (starting 6/30)
Foxtel Digital (Australia)	Channel 525
Austar Digital (Australia)	Channel 510
IPTV over ADSL
Tiscali TV (UK)	Channel 555 (Setanta Sports 1)
	Channel 556 (Setanta Sports 2)
	Channel 557 (Setanta Golf)

Setanta Sports (pronounced [sɛˈtantə]) is an Irish sports broadcaster, operating 12 channels in 24 countries.^{citation needed} Setanta Sports was formed in 1990 to facilitate the broadcasting of Irish sporting events to Irish expatriates, more recently the network has expanded and it now broadcasts various live sporting events aimed at international English-speaking audiences.

Setanta Ireland's CEO is Niall Cogley, former Director of Sport at RTÉ. The company's headquarters is 4th Floor, Georges Quay House, 43 Townsend Street, Dublin 2, Ireland. Joint Group CEOs Michael O'Rourke and Leonard Ryan, COO Mark O'Meara and CFO Nigel Brennan are all based in that area. The channel takes its names from the legendary Irish warrior Setanta, who reputedly played the oldest known field sport, hurling, and who was later given the name 'Cúchulainn' as described in the ancient Irish texts of the 'Annals of Ulster'.

Availability

Setanta Sports offers commercial venues in several countries around the world programming of sports such as Association football, Gaelic football, hurling, golf, cricket, Australian rules football, Basketball, rugby union and rugby league, darts and boxing. Setanta Sports have paid an undisclosed sum to secure the UK rights to the Indian Premier League.

Ireland

In Ireland, Setanta Sports' Channels are available on a number of different platforms. Its flagship Channel Setanta Ireland is available for free on UPC Ireland's basic cable package and as a subscription service on Sky Digital. With Sky Digital subscribers receive the full array of Setanta Sports channels - Setanta Sports Ireland, Setanta Sports 1 & 2, Setanta Golf, Setanta Sports News, Liverpool FC TV, Celtic TV, Rangers TV, NASN, Racing UK and Racing World and more recently launched Arsenal TV.

Setanta also offers a commercial service for Business premises comprising of Setanta Ireland, Setanta Golf, Setanta Sports 1, Setanta Sports 2, Celtic TV, Rangers TV, Arsenal TV, Liverpool FC TV, Setanta Sports News, and Racing World.

United Kingdom

Setanta's acquisition of rights to some matches of England's highest profile domestic sporting competition, the Premier League, with effect from the 2007-08 season, indicated its ambition to challenge Sky Sports, which has been the dominant pay-TV sports broadcaster in the UK since pay-TV was introduced in the UK in the 1980s.

Setanta Sports is available on several platform in the UK. Setanta Sports 1) is available via Digital Terrestrial Television and BT Vision, ten channels are available via Virgin Media^[1]. Racing World and Setanta Ireland are currently not carried by Virgin Media and NASN is not available as part of the XL pack. three channels (Setanta Sports 1, Setanta Sports 2 and Setanta Golf) are available via Setanta by Broadband. Those same three channels are available on Tiscali TV and Setanta Ireland channel is only available via Sky Digital and NTL cable in Ireland. Some programming is restricted for rights reasons.

Setanta are hoping to have a High-definition channel launched by August 2008, in time for the new Premier League season.^[2]

North America

Main article: Setanta Sports North America

Setanta Sports North America, currently available in the United States,^[3] and Canada is split into four parts, and services are provided on the DISH Network, Star Choice, DIRECTV, Bell ExpressVu and GlobeCast WorldTV.

Setanta Sports North America carries most of the world's top rugby competitions, including the 2007 Rugby World Cup, Six Nations, Tri Nations, Super 14, British & Irish Lions matches, Currie Cup, Heineken Cup, Guinness Premiership, Magners League and EDF Energy Cup, all in union, plus live broadcasts of the Australian NRL and European Super League in league. The network also carries the Australian Football League, the principal competition in Australian rules football.

Canada

On August 10, 2007, a Canadian version of Setanta Sports was launched. Currently the service is available to Shaw, Rogers, EastLink, Bell ExpressVu, Star Choice, and SaskTel. Setanta offered a free viewing of the station from August 10, 2007.

Australia

Main article: Setanta Sports Australia

On November 1, 2007, the Australian version of Setanta Sports was launched into homes Australia wide. The channel was initially made available in commercial venues such as pubs and clubs in November 2005.

Currently the Setanta Sports Australia channel is available on all the major pay-TV home platforms in Australia; Foxtel, Austar, UBI World TV, and also to direct satellite customers. Setanta Sports Australia is available to homes via broadband and available commercially to clubs, pubs and businesses via direct satellite (Optus D2) or Austar.

Setanta Sports Australia offers a wide range of international sport including association football, rugby union, boxing, GAA, darts and cricket. Current Setanta Sports Australia sporting right holdings include the FA Cup, England National Football Team, World Cup 2010 Qualifiers, Scottish Premier League, Six Nations Championship and England national rugby union team.

Known costs

• English Premier League rights - £392m over three years.^[4]
• Scottish Premier League rights - £13.625m per year ^[5]
• PGA Tour - £103m ^[6]
• FA Cup - £150m ^[7] over four years^[8]

Security concerns

Concerns have been raised over the security and viability of Setanta's digital terrestrial channel provided by Top Up TV because the encryption system was switched from the MediaGuard encryption system (which was cracked in continental Europe in 2004) to the Nagravision encryption system according to the conditional access manufacturer Kudelski. Like Mediaguard, the different versions of Nagravision are insecure and have also been compromised according to media industry studies, external appraisals [1] and numerous discussion websites. The key-based encryption systems, like Nagravison, are fundamentally insecure because the keys and control words necessary to decrypt the television signal are themselves broadcast by the service provider. It is therefore very much easier for hackers to intercept the keys and reverse engineer the smartcards needed to hack the system. It also blacked out coverage during most of the 2006 Carling Cup.

In the United Kingdom, advanced conditional access modules for digital televisions and personal video recorders, such as the Dragon, T-Rex and Reality CAMs, that can easily decrypt Nagravision encryptions systems are freely on sale directly from suppliers and on the UK version of eBay. In addition, cloned smartcards for set top boxes that can decrypt Nagravision are now readily available and are already being traded on certain illicit websites within the UK. This has led to growing speculation that digital terrestrial pay-TV piracy is increasing within the United Kingdom during the 2007/2008 football season due to the much greater use of these public hack cloned cards and advanced conditional access modules.

Sky's own Sky Italia service suffered heavy losses due to piracy and more than 3 million Italian homes accessed pay-TV services through hacked decoder cards for conditional access set top boxes and conditional access modules for digital televisions and personal video recorders. Sky Italia had to switch from an insecure key-based system to the secure Videoguard cryptographic algorithm encryption system. This issue has been covered by the Guardian and Financial Times newspapers and the Datamonitor commercial analysis group.^{[9] [10] [11] [12]}

Advertising

Former BBC and ITV Sport presenter Des Lynam, together with actress Thaila Zucchi starred in the advertising launch of Setanta's coverage of the Premier League from August 2007. The slogan used in this advert is "Setanta Sports - £9.99 a month, no annual contract."^[13]

Recent contracts

On April 7, 2008, Setanta Sports announced they had signed an exclusive 3-year broadcast deal with Frank Warren's Sports Network to make Setanta Sports the new home of televised boxing with fights involving Joe Calzaghe, Enzo Maccarinelli, Kevin Mitchell, Gavin Rees, Alex Arthur and Matt Skelton exclusive to Setanta Sports subscribers.^[14]

On April 19, 2008, Setanta Sports announced they had agreed a 2-and-a-half-year deal with Frank Warren to exclusively show Amir Khan fights from July 2008.

On May 5, 2006, ^[15] Setanta broke Sky Sports' three-year monopoly on showing the Barclays Premier League in the UK, successfully bidding £392 million for the rights to show 46 matches per season on its subscription channels.

On May 21, 2008, Setanta Sports announced that they will be following up their Indian Premier League coverage with the Asia Cup featuring the international sides from the Sub-Continent going head-to-head from June 26, 2008 through to the final on July 6, 2008.^[16]

On May 22, 2008, Setanta Sports announced that they will be showing live coverage of the Vodacom Challenge Cup in South Africa, featuring Manchester United. They will be showing action from The Red Devils' games against Orlando Pirates and the Kaizer Chiefs. The tournament takes place between the 19th and 26th of July.

On June 30, 2008, ^[17] Setanta agreed a new £125 million contract to show the Scottish Premier League until the end of the 2013/2014 season.

Presenters, Pundits, Commentators & Reporters

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Football

Presenters

• Rob MacLean
• Jim Delahunt
• Angus Scott
• Adrian Durham
• Rebecca Lowe[2]
• James Richardson

Pundits

• Scott Booth
• Craig Burley
• Terry Butcher
• Steve McManaman
• Les Ferdinand
• Tim Sherwood
• Emmanuel Petit
• Neil Warnock

Commentators

• Ian Crocker
• Jon Champion
• Jock Brown
• Jim Proudfoot
• Archie Macpherson
• Brian Etherson
• David McKinney
• Ken McRobb
• Steve Bower

Co-Commentators

• Scott Booth
• Craig Burley
• Mark Hateley
• Paul Parker

Reporters

• Stuart Lovell
• Rebecca Lowe
• Alex Hayes
• Des Lynam
• Kelly Dalglish

Rugby Union

Presenters

• Rhodri Williams

Boxing

Presenters

• Paul Dempsey

Pundits

• Steve Bunce
• Barry McGuigan

Commentators

• John Rawling
• Duke McKenzie
• Steve Bunce

GAA

• Michael Lyster (RTÉ)

References

External links

• Setanta Sports cancellation fiasco
• New channel goes big on Premier League
• Setanta Sports