The Sport Thread

Yep, he's just said as much:

He was always going to be a part of London 2012 and I guess with John Inverdale now being the main athletics presenter we'll at least have some male presence for the Commonwealth Games in Delhi. I wonder if Sue Barker will play any role though now she's scaled back - although she did the Opening Ceremony of the Winter Olympics apart from that she only took on a commentary role, and with Claire, Hazel, Jake and John, I'd argue they don't really need her.

There will presumably be an evening highlights programme during the Commonwealths - perhaps Sue Barker will play a role in that, leaving Inverdale, Irvine, Balding and Humphrey to cover the live coverage.

Has there been any word yet whether the coverage will be anchored from London or Delhi? If its from Delhi, they could be tight on presenters for the first few days. The Games start on a Sunday, which is the final day of the Ryder Cup (Hazel Irvine), and also the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe (Clare Balding).

It'll also be interesting to see how the live coverage is scheduled. Events are starting at around 4am UK time, with the morning athletics and swimming heats taking place between 4.30am and 8.00am approximately. So will BBC One run with continuous coverage, or will they switch to BBC Two during Breakfast, sacrificing the childrens programmes.

The last time any Games were held in this time zone (the 1998 Commonwealths in Kuala Lumpur), BBC One ran a 'Breakfast at the Games' from 7am - 9am with the usual Breakfast News set-up from London and Steve Rider doing updates and overnight highlights.

Also the evening athletics finals start at 1.00pm. Will the Commonwealths be deemed important enough to move the lunchtime news to midday?

All these questions . . .

Just one other trivial point about the Japanese Grand Prix:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/motorsport/formulaone/7925699/Formula-1-to-be-presented-by-female-for-first-time.html

Most articles, such as the Telegraph one above, suggest that Lee McKenzie will be the first woman to present a Formula One race. Strictly speaking, this is untrue - she is probably the first to present a race on location, however Sue Barker presented numerous live stand-alone 'Grand Prix' programmes in the mid-1990s from the BBC Sport studio, usually when she was hosting Sunday Grandstand at the same time on BBC Two.

Just to prove it . . . http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwSlbkdz1GA&feature=related

Sorry to be pedantic, but I wished it to be noted . . .

A potential complicating factor will be the Conservative Party Conference from 4th-7th October, which will probably dictate the BBC2 early afternoon schedule, and therefore dictate the times BBC1 must be used for Commonwealth Games

for the games if its going to be on-location in delhi as mentioned in previous posts there going to be short of presenters .

Sue will probably commentate on the opening of the games and present some events but not as big as were used to . if Gabby Logan gets involved she may host a reaction / late action on bbc 2 (like jake did in the olympics) if not Clare may do this Hazel I can see doing highlights but for the first few days unless shes covered for other events wont be there. Jake , John and Clare are likley to host the live action as they would not take jake off the F1 if the role was not quite big and he has become a leading presenter on BBC Sport.

Party Conferences are generally just shown on BBC Parliament now, they haven't had blanket coverage on the main channels for a long time now.

. . . although the Daily Politics does usually run Conference Specials, and last year they were scheduled for 12.00pm-1.00pm, with additional mid-afternoon programmes for the big speeches. So if that pattern were to continue, it would complicate things.

Thinking about it, it would probably make sense to keep the news at 1pm and switch the Games coverage to BBC Two from 1.00pm-1.45pm, and switching back to One at 1.45pm through until 5.15pm, with the afternoon CBBC moving to BBC Two.

It was the speeches I was thinking about. The general conference special can just go wherever, but I doubt the BBC can influence the times of speeches

The Conferences aren't as important as last year, save for the Labour coronation and the respective leaders speeches (and the rumoured Cameron at the Lib Dems and vice-versa appearances), they will as has been mentioned be on Parliament and the NC almost exclusively.

Are we expecting the roll out of the new BBC SPORT graphics this weekend?

I noticed the gold World Cup colouring was used on the European Athletics last week (whereas usually athletics gets a blue top line in astons), but I don't think they've been rolled out anywhere else (?).

There's the return of Final Score and a live game on Saturday as well as The Football League Show. I shall be interested to see whether they stick with the gold, or revert to red.

Also, ITV Sport have live football next week as well - will they stick with the WC graphics or revert back to that horrible blocky look used for previous England friendlies?

Dan walker has a preview of the new look Football Focus on his twitter. Gold and black again. http://twitpic.com/2bu826