Just done it hopfully ill get an answer it must have been us v someone

Sky Sports' first Live Match was a Premiership Trophy Round 1 match between Castleford and Leeds at Wheldon Road on Sunday 21st April 1991, a day after the channel launched.

I say launched, Sky Sports was actually created following a merger between two rival satellite broadcasters - "British Satellite Broadcasting" and "Sky Television". So whilst the name Sky Sports is 20 years old, the channel itself is actually 21 because Sky Sports directly replaced the proceeding "The Sports Channel" (not Screensport) which was part of BSB.

BSB Sport Channel launched in March 1990 and immediately picked up Rugby League, even though the sport had live coverage of league games (this side of the pennines at least) on Granada ITV. Like on Sky, Eddie Hemmings and Mike Stephenson did the commentary for the channel.

BSB's first Live Game was Wakefield v Wigan from Belle Vue on 1st April 1990 which Wigan won 23-14. BSB had very little audience, and fans were p*ssed off by the original Sunday 6:30pm kick off times. Sky effectively took over BSB's Sport Channels contract. A week before Sky's first game, a Wigan v Castleford league game was shown by the Sport Channel.

Sky Sports was free for the first full year it aired during the 1991-1992 season. Granada were still showing games but by 1992-93 Sky had picked up the Premier League and started to charge £5.99 a month (£2.99 introductory offer) for the Channel. Sky also took exclusive rights to Rugby League and began showing Live games on Friday's with a full delayed, or highlights of a, game shown on Sunday Nights.

21 years later Rugby League remains Sky's longest serving contract with WWE Wrestling. And in all those years BSB/Sky have only failed to televise the Wigan v St Helens derby once. Way back in April 1991 the Good Friday derby was postponed due to Saints playing a Cup Semi Final and when it was re-arranged for a Thursday Night a week later they didn't show it.

Edit - Maybe not.

ps put Wigan 1990 Boxing Day into Google.

Great stuff Bilko.





Yet we aren't in my opinion getting the recognition we deserve for our loyalty. Particularly when you see the adverts that are currently being aired celebrating SkySport's 21 years, we hardly feature in them at all.

I'd suggest a big part of that is because internationally we have had zero success. Premier League, Champions League, Ashes Cricket, Lions Tour Rugby Union, Ryder Cup Golf - those kind of global events are really what people remember and we've had success in them during the 20 years - Rugby League doesn't have anything close to that.

Whether you like it or not, Rugby League is not as big for Sky as it was when they launched. The next TV contract (due in 2012) could be very interesting.

We still get massively higher viewing figures than Union, though (for club games) - typically around 250k v 70k for union.

Without a doubt. Possibly why they offloaded a good chunk of games to ESPN this year. Wonder if Rugby League would be bold enough to try a similar deal?

My friend got SKY in March 1989 when it came out

I'm sure I remember Screensport televising French rugby league - anyone else remember this? Their logo wasn't dissimilar to the SL one either!

just to expand this into Sky Sports memories: There's lots of talk about wiggy's bias over a season but does anyone remember the coverage of Widnes V. Wigan from naughton park on a Friday night when Tuigamala was making his debut? The fact there was actually a match on became a complete irrelevance to Eddie and Stevo who were whipping themselves into an absolute frenzy. By the time Inga came off the bench I think the pair of them were ready to explode. I can't remember how old I was but even as an excited young Wigan fan I remember saying to my parents: "these guys are just too much".

Bilko, that is a fair assessment of the situation, given the current economical situation, the words Peanuts and Cap in Hand are appropriate for Super League.
More Aussies going home and less of them jumping on the gravy train will be a good thing IMHO, the likes of Eastmond, Graham being retained on unsustainable contracts in the future look dire I'm afraid.

Quote ="MattyB"In the advert for 20 years of SKY, is the very first sportsman shown a bearded Keiron Cunningham? If it ain't it's his twin!'" Here's the video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFad1PYRlYQ Looks like Cunningham to me.

Quote ="MattyB"In the advert for 20 years of SKY, is the very first sportsman shown a bearded Keiron Cunningham? If it ain't it's his twin!'" Here's the video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFad1PYRlYQ Looks like Cunningham to me.

Yes they were covered for a while - can't remember if it was screensport or very early on in sky sports (which I am probably remembering).

Either way I recall there were about half a dozen teams featuring regulary and often the games were little more than punch ups especially as there seemed to be one or two "players" I use the term loosely as they were hardly prime athletes- who seemed to be intent on doing nothing but take out the opposition. Good for a lugh if nothing else.

Carcassone, tres catalans, USG are names that ring a bell.

If Sky lost RL then I would cancel my subscription, "sport" in the UK is tedious. For me there is far too much coverage of Football, which IMO, is the most tedious sport to watch. In fact, the more tedious a sport is, the greater amount of coverage the sport appears to get in the media.

I have a Wire V Australia DVD (october 1990) of BSB's coverage, Eddie and Stevo were actually ok they didnt talk too much nonsense believe it or not, and there are moments where they dont talk at all....none of todays Hyped up commentary...!

and best of all was rugby union born and bred John "smug" Inverdale being the presenter and looking and sounding thouroughly piddled off with being invloved with the working class game..

Same here. I only just stop myself cancelling in the off-season because I used to support Manchester Utd in my youth, and still catch some of the bigger games (City, Liverpool, some bigger European games). Football is indeed gash though, perhaps even worse than RU.

Other than that, Sky Sports has little to interest me.

I was there so didnt see the coverage.

I'm a general sports fan TBH (although I cannot stand cricket, tennis or golf). I like to watch different sports from time to time so if Sky did not renew thier RL contract I wouldn't want my Sky Sports to be cancelled. If it were, I wouldn't be able watch PDC World Championship Darts/Premier League Darts/Premier League Snooker/Boxing/RU (internationals) etc and I'd have to make do with BBC/ITV/Five. Now that is depressing!

and the Mosconi Cup.........and NFL

I'm sure Eddie used to cover football games as well as RL when it first started.

They showed him last week being a touchline reporter at a cup game featuring Aston Villa in 1991. He also interviewed Andy Gray, who then was Aston Villa Assistant Coach.

Some great footage on the 1992 edition of the programme last night, including the Lions tour, plus some Boots N All "highlights" which they seem to trot out every couple of years or so....

I still think the highlight of Eddie's career came when he threw a paddy on the air because he hadn't been invited to Andy Farrell's testimonial golf tournament.

As my old dad used to say, there are 'amateurs' and there are 'bloody amateurs'.

Quote ="Salopian Warrior"Here's the video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFad1PYRlYQ Looks like Cunningham to me.'" I just find it absolutely deplorable how we get a split second of "coverage" in a 90 second trailer about Sky Sports. As others have said the viewing figures of RL v RU are more than comparable. It seems like it was a case of "oh lets keep the northeners happy". There have been so many great moments Sky could have shown in that ad, yet we're treated to god-knows how much football, cricket and golf.

Quote ="Salopian Warrior"Here's the video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFad1PYRlYQ Looks like Cunningham to me.'" I just find it absolutely deplorable how we get a split second of "coverage" in a 90 second trailer about Sky Sports. As others have said the viewing figures of RL v RU are more than comparable. It seems like it was a case of "oh lets keep the northeners happy". There have been so many great moments Sky could have shown in that ad, yet we're treated to god-knows how much football, cricket and golf.