The Australian Olympic Committee has just announced a new, long-term partnership between FINA and The Seven Network, resulting in both the 2015 (Kazan, Russia) and 2017 (Budapest, Hungary) editions of the FINA World Swimming Championships being broadcast under the new agreement.
The partnership will include free broadcast television and subscription television rights, as well as mobile and online digital platforms, aimed at delivering “the most comprehensive, technologically advanced, multi-platform coverage of the World Championships to all Australians on any communications device.” (corporate.olympics.com.au)
Of the announcement, FINA President, Julio Maglione expressed “The FINA World Championships is a true Aquatic Festival, capable of inspiring the youth worldwide. Australia is no exception, being a country that loves Aquatics and has many stars in FINA disciplines. Therefore, this agreement with Seven is of paramount importance for the exposure and popularity of our sport in this exciting country.” (corporate.olympics.com.au)
The Australian Swim Team took to Twitter today to express its excitement over the announcement:
This plan for comprehensive Worlds coverage is in stark contrast to the 2013 edition of the championships, where the event was nowhere to be found on the Australian airwaves. In the wake of the 2012 London Olympics, where Swimming Australia was in repair-mode from the Stillnox scandal, as well as the departure of EnergyAustralia as a primary sponsor, the lack of coverage symbolized another blow to the overall morale and support of the sport’s fan base down under.
However, Swimming Australia scored a new partnership earlier this year with Hancock Prospecting and also has been publicly building up its focus on overall squad cohesion, embodied in the resurfacing of the team name “Dolphins”. The Aussies are getting the job done in the pool as well, with 30 times ranked in the world’s top five across all events, instilling confidence inside and outside the Swimming Australia organization.
Swimming Australia President John Bertrand put forth quite directly that, “This announcement is very important for the sport of swimming in Australia. The 2015 FINA World Championships is the most important swimming event globally leading into the Rio Olympics. We expect some exciting performances from the Australian Dolphin swim team, led by three defending World Champions; Cate Campbell, James Magnussen and Christian Sprenger, and a new breed of exciting young talent as they take on the world.” (corporate.olympics.com.au)
Here is the list of channels that are broadcasting FINA World Aquatics Championships live online in different regions. Some are free while some requires paid/cable subscriptions.
http://www.purevpn.com/blog/fina-world-championships/
Channel 7 means Giaan Rooney . Giaan knows her swim stuff but is always going on about some cause of other . I Might have to stream the Russian commentary because they have no causes whatsoever . Alive or dead & that is it . Very refreshing attitude .
OK for you , but what if you speak Russian and you hear their causes talked about ?
Where did It say I don’t speak Russian?
Btw put me down for the return of Lvov to Poland .
Lane Four, Unfortunately, I’m in the same boat with you; but Mel and Braden are powerful swimming website executives and I’m sure they can work out an agreement with Universal Sports to allow us to livestream the competition here on SwimSwam! 😉 PLEASE!!!
YES!!!!! PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE
Something like that is not an easy deed.We are talking about a possibility of 100000 viewers here.The costs with bw-server are not nice.
In my country, SporTV channel shows the World Champs in HD. I will always watch on TV, they streaming sucks big time.
Geez. All we will get here in the States is Universal Sports. If your cable company doesn’t carry it, TOUGH LUCK! Oh well, here we go again. It is going to be up to the SwimSwam fans lucky enough to watch the swimming live to give up to the minute reports regarding each and every event…..just like last time. Since I will not be able to watch the championships, I will be crying while waiting for the live reports from those who are watching live. Don’t fail us!
You can stream Universal Sports (and beIN for the odd World Cup meet) via the Sling service to to your tv set. Seven day free trial right now, so you can even time it out to see almost all of Worlds for free.
https://www.sling.com/programming/sports