Durban Sandshark

Brazil and Ecuador also join Australia in qualifying that day from South America with the former now headed by Carlo Ancelotti. Brazil, now again participating in every World Cup held, beat Paraguay 1-0 in Sao Paulo, and Ecuador drew scoreless with Peru in Lima. Uruguay and Paraguay still look solid in going to North America Man, Peru, very likely going to be eliminated here, has been on a downward spiral since they returned to the show in 2018 after 34 years away starting with the intercontinental playoffs in Qatar and those penalty kick misses to Australia. Chile is faring worse and is now already eliminated. Shame. (BTW Rob, I saw that Ange decided to part ways with Tottenham days ago)

AUSTRALIA'S IN!!!! 😃 All the Socceroos needed to do was to make sure they did not allow the Saudis score winning in a 5-goal margin to leapfrog the Aussies, playing in front of a vocal crowd at Jeddah's King Abdullah Sports City. But the Socceroos' strong goal differential entering this game certainly made that was not gonna happen as they became the 8th nation overall and the 6th Asian AFC nation to qualify for their 6th consecutive World Cup appearance. Beating them 2-1 under coach Tony Popovic https://www.footballaustralia.com.au/news/perth-jeddah-socceroos-qualify-fifa-world-cuptm-2026 AFC third round is finished. Now the fourth round kicks off October 8-14 with the aforementioned Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Iraq, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, and Oman. Top group finishers claim the final direct Asian spots. Shame about Palestine not advancing...

BREAKING NEWS: South Korea, and special congratulations to Jordan and Uzbekistan in making their history-making World Cup debuts today in their international windows, all qualified out of Asia! Australia's Socceroos is just another game away in qualifying in beating Japan for the first time in 16 years in Perth as one of the top two teams directly qualifying out of their group with already-qualified Japan. Despite Saudi Arabia eliminating Bahrain 2-0, it'll be very difficult to successfully chase the Australians in the standings when they face each other in Jeddah June 10. Goal differential being one tough factor. Will have to settle for the fourth round with Iraq, Indonesia, Qatar, UAE, and Oman/Palestine.

South Africa's Supersport celebrated the "golden triumph" that it achieved on DSTV with an average of 12.4 million South Africans unique decoded viewers and 6.4 million views streamed and 530,000 catchup watches. Days 16-17 brought out the biggest audiences each with 12.4 million viewers. This DStv Media Sales Paris 2024 Olympic video details each day with the top viewing event each day: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/golden-triumph-paris-supersport-dstv-media-sales-wjk5f The Canadian Screen Awards commenced over the weekend in Toronto, and it resulted with CBC Sports' Paris 2024 coverage walking away with only two wins for Best Original Music, Factual, Lifestyle, Reality, or Entertainment and Mark Lee in track and field for Best Play-By-Play Announcer out of its 12 nominations. Did expect it would win a few more noms than this, but I guess the other nominees in the other categories were equally strong. Also, I think having CBC Olympic Morning's Anastasia Bucsis and CBC Olympic Primetime's Andi Petrillo in the same category cancelled each other out this time to prevent either one to win. Same wasn't done with Lee and Alex Despatie being in the same category. But Petrillo has already won multiple Canadian Screen Awards already. Also also, there isn't as much in the way of tech categories like we see with the Sports Emmys: https://www.academy.ca/nominees/ Moving things focused down under, Australia's TV Week Logie Awards 2025 will announce its nominees in less than two weeks on Monday, June 16. Can expect Nine's Paris 2024 massive coverage could garner some of them like Best Sports Events. The show itself will take place at The Star Sydney on August 3 broadcast live and exclusively on Seven and 7Plus with Sam Pang again hosting: https://www.nowtolove.com.au/celebrity/celebrity-news/tv-week-logies-2025/ Chilevision, unlike many Olympic broadcasters worldwide involved with Paris 2024, didn't start its coverage with soccer and handball prior to the Opening Ceremony as Channel 11 in Santiago. The sports-obsessed Chilean TV channel started its live and exclusive 500-hour multiplatform Paris 2024 coverage also on its online signal, the Pluto TV Sports channel, and the Mi CHV app with the live opening ceremony at 1pm Chile time, lasting well after 5pm immediately after the morning show Contigo en la mañana and following the current affairs program Contigo en directo (With You Live ) will reair until 7:00 p.m., when the Sports Department will resume broadcasting with a summary of the first day with a OC re-airing later that night. On Saturday July 27th, meanwhile, things really began taking over at 4:00am for a marathon and uninterrupted session until 9:00pm, starting with the Paris 2024 debut of Chilean judoka Mary Dee Vargas and then at 4:30am in swimming with the presentation of Chilean Eduardo Cisternas. From then on, two special primetime programs were confirmed to cover the different disciplines contested in the French capital: With You in Paris (Monday to Friday from 2:00-6:00 p.m. and weekends from 8:00 am to 8:30pm) and Stellar Paris (Monday to Friday from 6:00-8:00 PM with the best moments of each day. Additionally, CHV personnel deployed for a live broadcast featuring Javiera Naranjo, Claudio Palma, Aldo Schiappacasse, Daniel Matamala, Romina Canonni, Claudio Bustios, Roberto Cox, Rodrigo Vera, and Karen Bittner, and Gastón Fouré. Karateka Valentina Toro were also present. Live coverage from France were hosted by Naranjo and Bustíos. Starting the following week, Chilevisión's afternoon schedule was completely redesigned to focus entirely on the Paris Olympics, with broadcasts starting around noon, affecting Contigo's morning broadcast schedule. After the evening newscast (3:30 p.m. on Monday and Tuesday; and 2:00 p.m. on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday), the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics returned to the screens with Schiappacasse and Bittner hosting. However, at 5:30 p.m., with a break to broadcast Big Brother: It's Happening, a program hosted by Emilia Daiber that compiles the best moments that the reality show has had in the last 24 hours. At 6:15 p.m., Matamala and Canonni lead the primetime segment With You In Paris from the Summer Olympics, which continued until 9:00 p.m., when Chilevisión Noticias Central begins. Finally, for early risers, there was also a section called Paris Today with the daily highlights (2:00 a.m.) while Waking Up with Paris 2024 will be shown between 4:45 a.m. and 5:45 am: https://elfiltrador.com/chilevision-programacion-juegos-olimpicos/ https://elfiltrador.com/chilevision-juegos-olimpicos/ https://redgol.cl/juegos-olimpicos/los-juegos-olimpicos-por-tv-abierta-asi-sera-la-transmision-de-paris-2024-en-chilevision Chilevision's Paris 2024 opening ceremony presentation commentary and analysis was presented by specialists journalists Aldo Schipaccasse and Rodrigo Vera and athletes Romina Cannoni and Karen Bittner. It scored big among Chilean TV viewers and dwarfed all the other Chilean TV networks TVN, Canal 13, Mega, La Red, TV+, and Telecanal. It had reached throughout its coverage, achieving an average household rating of 6.7, reaching more than 10 million Chilean TV viewers. During this Summer Olympics period in which Chilevision comfortably winning and outperforming against the competition, Mega ranked second with 5.0 points; Canal 13 ranked third with 3.8 points; and Televisión Nacional (TVN) ranked fourth with 3.1 points. Claro Sports scored big on the pay-TV side: https://elfiltrador.com/chilevision-rating-juegos-olimpicos/ https://elfiltrador.com/chilevision-rating-juegos-olimpicos-2/ https://elfiltrador.com/paralimpicos-batalla-chilevision-claro/ Speaking of Mega, it struck a deal with Claro Sports to have the latter's Paris 2024 4-channel coverage available through the Mega GO streaming app while also streamed for fee on YouTube: https://elfiltrador.com/nuevo-rival-chilevision-juegos-olimpicos/ One of the numerous RTVE Paris 2024 promos from Spain celebrating the multiple Olympic sports in action and the athletes who indeed do celebrate with much of the footage coming from Tokyo. There will be more soon from RTVE since I unfortunately didn't touch on RTVE in recent times: Did check out again Mauritius' MBC's Channel 11, the sports channel, to see if it actually air some Olympic coverage. Turns out, judging from the schedule, it didn't at all. Mauritius' MBC isn't even listed in Wikipedia's 2024 Olympic broadcasters list. All it did show was the magazine programs Olympic Games Paris 2024: Countdown To Paris and Olympic Games Paris 2024: Guide To The Games, neither went even beyond 30 minutes. MBC Sports Channel 11 would've carried it all in English like it did in the past with various sports and focusing on Mauritius' 13 athletes in Paris. Outside of being a Supersport subscriber, downloading olympics.com, or maybe Eurosport France (not likely), Mauritians were out of luck. Azam TV's ZBC2 in Tanzania broadcasted the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics in Tanzania: https://www.instagram.com/azamtvsports/p/C90LJ0GurE-/#

To this point, Nine very much confirms that the same broadcasting/online/print structure it employed for Paris will very much be utilized for Milan-Cortina 2026 in both We could also expect that the ABC Radio stations in cities that aren't part of the Nine Radio Network like Adelaide, Canberra, Darwin, and Hobart get involved again under a sublicensing deal: https://www.sportcal.com/news/nine-consolidates-milano-cortina-26-coverage-with-paralympic-rights-pickup/ Another article centering on the OBS student applications from Sports Video Group: https://www.svgeurope.org/blog/headlines/obs-opens-student-applications-for-its-broadcast-training-programme-ahead-of-milano-cortina-2026/ More OBS applications and initiatives are also in store to fill out to encourage and train more female camera operators to get involved in Milan-Cortina called Framing The Future. Applications are available now! https://www.ibc.org/people-purpose/news/olympic-broadcasting-services-launches-training-initiative-for-female-camera-operators/21933 https://www.tvbeurope.com/live-production/olympic-broadcasting-services-opens-training-programme-for-female-camera-operators

Not a major surprise and was seriously speculated for a while, but Mexico's FMF confirms to ESPN that it will co-host 2031 FIFA Women's World Cup with the United States and US Soccer. Although it must be noted that US Soccer itself in this article has not yet confirmed this joint co-hosting, and we obviously know the USA is more than capable in hosting solo. But the co-hosting is gonna happen--maybe get Canada Soccer in the mix too after 16 years for that nation! We would expect that Mexico City will be involved as one of the few Mexican cities involved, starting with Mexico City's Azteca Stadium having expectingly the first Mexico home game there for the women. Gotta have Mexico City! At least 3-4 games for Mexico overall with the expanded 48-nation field. Preferably, it would be nice if this current crop of Mexican El Tri players qualify and get some valuable WWC experience with Brazil as Mexico has not participated in the last two WWCs, so they wouldn't get intimidated with all the both internal and external demands and pressure come 2031 and be like a deer (or rabbit) caught in the headlights.

The OBS officially launches and now welcomes its Milan-Cortina 2026 student broadcast training applications since April 28--835 submissions from local students alone so far: https://www.thenewsmarket.com/news/obs-opens-applications-for-broadcast-training-programme-to-students-ahead-of-milano-cortina-2026/s/f8022794-ddbb-4d60-8443-c245882403ba https://www.insidethegames.biz/articles/1153574/obs-milano-cortina-broadcasters-olympic

It is expected that the IOC will continue excluding Russia from this Winter Olympics edition coming up in Milan-Cortina. Gonna happen. The IIHF has already extended its suspension on Russia and Belarus as far as the winter team sports like ice hockey are concerned. The IIHF doesn't think it's safe to bring them back with the invasion still ongoing--sending the Olympic hockey schedule to the IOC without Russia involved at the recent IIHF Annual Congress in Stockholm. Citing and confirming by sources the Latvian sports website Sportacentrs. So France, as previously named earlier here, will participate in both Milan-Cortina 2026 Olympic men's and women's ice hockey: https://www.iihf.com/en/news/65675/russia_and_belarus_not_reincorporated_into_2025_20 https://thehockeynews.com/international/latest-news/iihf-president-luc-tardif-clarifies-position-on-russia-at-olympics https://thehockeynews.com/international/latest-news/russia-excluded-from-2026-olympic-ice-hockey-tournaments https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/other/iihf-president-ioc-to-keep-russia-out-of-2026-games/ar-AA1FwxGN Yeah it sucks that we will not see some of Russia's great hockey players like Alex Ovechkin, Evgeni Malkin, Sergei Borbrovsky, taking part in what could be their final Olympics to nab a gold medal, considering their ages being firmly in the 30s. Ovi craves that gold medal like his basketball-playing mom Tatiana has herself back in 1980. Does look like this Russian golden generation of stars will never come back afterwards and can't expect those immediately after them like Vladimir Tarasenko, Artemi Panarin, Nikita Kucherov, and goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy in the next four years and would feel wrong by this, placed into this position beyond their control (although some would support Putin). Would've been a sight to see in taking on the other major hockey powers best-on-best like what could've been with the 4 Nations Cup. But the IOC and IIHF must stand firm. Their nation's military actions should and must be condemned: https://thehockeynews.com/news/latest-news/will-we-never-see-ovechkin-malkin-and-other-veteran-russian-stars-in-the-olympics-again https://russianmachineneverbreaks.com/2025/05/24/russia-reportedly-barred-hockey-tournaments-2026-winter-olympics-alex-ovechkins-last-active-player/ Now the ROC issues a legal challenge after the IOC confirms barring them, as reported by sports TV channel Match TV. Not gonna be successful--Good luck with that!: https://russianmachineneverbreaks.com/2025/05/27/russian-olympic-committee-plans-legal-challenge-ioc-confirms-teams-barred-2026-winter-olympics/ https://matchtv.ru/olimpijskije_igry/matchtvnews_NI2208928_Otstranenije_khokkejnoj_sbornoj_juridicheski_ne_svazano_s_reshenijem_MOK_ot_2023_goda_OKR_prorabatyvajet_varianty_osparivanija_v_mezhdunarodnyh_sudah Only four Russian figure skaters in men's and women's figure skating are approved by the ISU in qualifying for the neutral individual athletes team for next February: https://www.espn.com/olympics/story/_/id/45341792/ioc-says-russian-teams-remain-banned-26-winter-olympics In the basketball realm, FIBA announced it'll extended discussing the status of Russia and Belarus until this August. Don't any changes there either: https://about.fiba.basketball/en/news/fiba-central-board-approves-rescheduling-of-future-fiba-womens-basketball-world-cups-as-of-2030

Definitely right. They were just actual cameras they carried, although plenty athletes also did carry videocams back then. Besides, the Internet was still very young and no broadband yet for several more years...

OK, the 2025 Sports Emmys took place on Tuesday, May 20. And NBC/Peacock won big winning 10 Sports Emmys for its Games of the XXXIII Olympiad including Outstanding Live Special Championship Event, two for Steven Spielberg for producing and writing the “Land of Stories” opening, Outstanding Short Feature for Caeleb & The Critic: Games of the XXXIII Olympiad, Outstanding Interactive Experience, Outstanding Technical Team Event, Outstanding Technical Team Studio, Outstanding Audio/Sound – Live Event, Outstanding Graphic Design – Event/Show, Outstanding Editing – Short Form, and Outstanding On-Air Personality in Spanish for Telemundo's Miguel Gurwitz, who was involved in the NBCU's Paris 2024 coverage as the 11th. A major reason why NBCU won a record 13 Sports Emmys. No shock NBCU won in the tech realm: https://www.olympics.com/ioc/news/nbcuniversal-s-coverage-of-paris-2024-tops-sports-emmys https://www.nbcsports.com/pressbox/press-releases/nbcuniversals-paris-olympics-coverage-tops-sports-emmys-with-10-wins-as-nbcu-ties-company-record-with-13-awards https://www.sportsvideo.org/2025/05/21/46th-annual-emmy-awards-paris-2024-games-dominates-with-10-awards-nbc-and-espn-top-all-networks-with-13-emmys-apiece/ https://theemmys.tv/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/46th-Annual-Sports-Emmy-Awards_winners_2025-5-20-1.pdf https://deadline.com/2025/05/2025-sports-emmys-winners-list-1236406860/ If you were a Swedish Olympic fan on August 2 last year, Kanal 5, Eurosport, and HBO Max had you covered: it was excitingly chock-a-block with Swedish Paris 2024 Summer Olympians in what was Sweden Super Friday starting at 2pm Sweden time with the Swedish men's handball team facing Croatia with Henrik von Eckermann, Rolf-Göran Bengtsson and Peder Fredricson simultaneously defending their Swedish Olympic gold medal from Tokyo, and when the final of the team jumping is decided in the Château de Versailles. Half an hour later, at 2:30 p.m., Truls Möregårdh will play the men's table tennis semifinal against Brazilian Hugo Calderano--but that was relegated to HBO Max and Eurosport but played live and interrupted in its entirety: https://www.expressen.se/sport/os-2024/beskedet-i-kanal-5-truls-moregardh-ratas-igen/ Nearly 5 million Austrians have watched at least some portion of ORF's Paris 2024 Summer Olympics coverage. The widest viewership possible there. Track and field proved, not shockingly, to be the biggest hit with the men's 100-meter final on August 4, which was watched by an average of 737,000 sports fans (31% market share), as the public broadcaster announced on the following Monday. The men's 400-meter final on August 7 took second place with an average of 735,000 viewers, followed by the men's discus final featuring Austria's Lukas Weisshaidinger – also on August 7 – with 722,000 TV viewers On the online/streaming realm overall, the live streams and videos-on-demand of ORF's entire Olympic TV coverage up to and including August 11 achieved 3.5 million net views (consecutive usage events) and 13.4 million gross views (video starts) across Austria, which is significantly higher than at the last Summer Games (Tokyo 2021). With 117 million minutes of total usage, a new record was achieved compared to all Summer and Winter Olympic Games since the introduction of AGTT measurement. The most-watched ORF live streams from Paris 2024 were the final of the men's 400-meter race on August 7 with an average reach of 27,600, followed by the men's discus final with 27,100 DRW and the semifinal of the women's 400-meter race with 26,200 DRW (both also on August 7): https://kurier.at/kultur/medien/olympische-spiele-orf-quoten-top-hit-100-meter-finale/402935437 TV2 Denmark recruited 200-260 people for it portion of the Danish Paris 2024 TV/online/streaming coverage with "approximately 50 in Paris". TV 2 revised its strategy wholesale and showed a wider range of Summer Olympic sports live with, for example, TV2 Play having up to 15 streams to help cover it. Meanwhile, DR, also committed to heavy Paris 2024 coverage, sent 20 journalists with many other personnel back home. Anders Kern Boje, deputy director of DR News with responsibility for DR Sport, says that along with the Paris 2024 Summer Olympic sports action, "In our Olympic coverage, we walk on two legs. We focus on the Danes, the big stories, and the shared excitement when Danish athletes do well. And at the same time, we use the Olympics to tell stories about both Paris and France, but also the major political contexts that an Olympics must always be seen in context of". Several Danish newspapers also sent its personnel to Paris this past summer to intensely cover this Summer Olympic edition: https://journalisten.dk/dr-og-tv2-saetter-bunkevis-af-journalister-til-af-at-daekke-ol/ But for the Danish TV broadcast, Flatpanels asked both on presenting Paris 2024 in the best resolution possible. DR "received the signal in 1080i50 and then upscales it to 1080p50, so that Danish viewers get the best possible quality," but TV2 only "produced the Olympics in 1080i50 and had no plans for 4K / UHD," Both deemed producing it, at that time, in 4K/UHD would be "too expensive. It has to be purchased as an extra feed at IBC in Paris, but will not be distributed in UHD but in normal 1080i50, which would mean that we would have to transport UHD home from the Olympics ourselves, which is very expensive": https://www.flatpanels.dk/nyhed.php?subaction=showfull&id=1719560945

Would like to see Kieran Perkins and Susie O'Neill light the torch TOGETHER in Brisbane. Not only they're both Brisbane products and swimming legends, but it could also serve, in a way, a nod to when Australia made Olympic history in being the first nation to have both male and female co-flagbearers with Moscow 1980 from Max Metzger and Denise Boyd marching in the OC. But perhaps for the same reasons suggested about Cathy Freeman here, they too come from the same era as Freeman and can possibly connect with Sydney 2000 to Brisbane. But maybe too distant for that now and could work against them. Australia certainly has lots of Olympians to happily chose from for this. How about Sally Pearson, Saya Sakakibara (who is from the Brisbane-Gold Coast region), Cate and Bronte Campbell (ditto), Ariane Titmus?

NFL REDZONE'S "INCOMPARABLE" SCOTT HANSON RETURNS TO HOST PEACOCK'S MILAN-CORTINA 2026 WINTER OLYMPICS GOLD ZONE WHIPAROUND COVERAGE SHOW (while still negotiating his very likely staying on at NFL RedZone) There's more details here (with photo of him at the NFL Honors) and here An excellent conversation Sports Video Group has in its video on how OBS, NRK, Warner Bros. Discovery/Eurosport, and CTO all getting ready for the upcoming Milan-Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics at the SVG Europe’s Winter Sports Forum on March 13 in Oslo, Norway and was moderated by George Bevir, SVG Europe’s Editorial Director: https://www.sportsvideo.org/2025/05/01/getting-set-for-the-milano-cortina-2026-winter-olympics/ Our first host Italian news contribution here: Allianz, an official 2026 Olympic partner, sponsors 6 Italian Allianz Ambassadors--Sara Conti & Niccolò Macii (figure skating), Nikolaj Memola (figure skating), Giuseppe Romele (paralympic Nordic skiing), Martina Valcepina (short track, multiple Olympic medalist), and Martina Vozza (paralympic alpine skiing) for next winter's Olympics and Paralympics paired along with 6 Italian Winter Olympic and Paralympic icons--Paul De Church, Barbara Fusar Poli, Christian Ghedina, Maurizio Margaglio, Francesca Porcellato, and Christian Zorzi "in a symbolic relay of values and experiences between past and future." The above 6 will be involved in a multiplatform docuseries project broadcast on RAI 2, Rai Sport and RaiPlay, created in collaboration with Dentsu Sports, YAM112003, and Rai Pubblicità. Title is Dreaming of Milan Cortina 2026: On the shoulders of Giants. This docuseries will be segmented series under 5 episodes of 30 minutes with 1 special episode “Best Of” of 60 minutes, and 1 episode dedicated to the very young members of Team G in paralympic skiing. Paolo De Chiesa will be the narrator. The format also includes the production of 20 1-minute clips, to tell the athletes' preparation in brief. No word yet on when it'll premiere. But I expect sometime by winter 2025-26: https://www.milanosportiva.com/allianz-milano-cortina-2026-sulle-spalle-dei-giganti/ Also, RAI aired a live one-year countdown special on RAI 3 February 6 at 4:25pm under the TGR banner called Milan-Cortina: The Great Adventure with https://www.rai.it/ufficiostampa/assets/template/us-articolo.html?ssiPath=/articoli/2025/02/Milano--Cortina-La-grande-avventura-8fa0f2fc-71ca-42ba-a101-12222f22020f-ssi.html He has helped cover 20 Olympics in total for Italian public broadcaster RAI: 9 summer in track and field/athletics and 11 winter in cross country skiing over the decades. Now Milan-Cortina 2026 will serve as Franco Bragagna's final one before retiring. Likely once again in cross-country skiing, where the Italians are usually a powerhouse in, often competing against the Norwegians. But before that, Bragagna visited with high school students back in March to discuss the magic of the Olympics and also spoke in a separate discussion with Italian coaches and broadcasters: https://www.informatorevigevanese.it/sport/2025/02/14/news/verso-le-olimpiadi-di-milano-cortina-2026-il-13-marzo-incontro-organizzato-dal-pool-vigevano-sport-con-il-telecronista-rai-franco-bragagna-562806/ Skiing legend Lindsey Vonn participates for her own on-set b-roll NBC 2026 Winter Olympics promo video shoot in Universal City, California. Filming for 12 hours: https://unofficialnetworks.com/2025/05/22/lindsey-vonn-on-nbc-set-for-2026-olympics-promo-shoot/ She's part of the dozens of Team USA Olympic and Paralympic hopefuls who are doing these shoots made to resemble Italian Alps and conduct interviews. All celebrating Italy: https://www.wsav.com/news/nbc-gears-up-for-the-2026-winter-olympics/ Man, that's going to be "a massive Q1 2026" for Nine next year with those events going on and being televised by Aussie standards. Certainly helps that Australia (and New Zealand) now has a very solid Winter Olympics pedigree so that nowdays assures them coming out the Winter Olympics with at least medals, including gold ones, for both nations. Although still relatively marginal in terms of mass national Australian/Kiwi interest, but rapidly growing, compared to the aforementioned sports events. I can definitely see the Nine Network dominating the Australian TV ratings then. Certainly it's similar to what we Americans got here with NBC during its Q1, particularly our February TV "sweeps", with the Winter Olympics as the centerpoint. Actually it doesn't even compare. But actually of course we do it MUCH bigger and it'll be historic in its strong 2-week+ live sports programming slate that'll rake in billions in ad sales. NBC, including its massive multiplatform Milan-Cortina 2026 coverage, also got Super Bowl LX, held at Santa Clara's Levi's Stadium, the home of the San Francisco 49ERS, on February 8 (two days after the Opening Ceremony) and the return of the NBA On NBC after 23 years starting at the very season when the Winter Olympics are going on. With the NBA, NBC has the rights to the NBA All-Star Weekend, held inside the Los Angeles Clippers' new Intuit Dome home at this time, it inherited from TNT/Turner Sports, except for the All-Star Celebrity Game that ESPN still holds. Not to mention NBC will unquestionably lean in heavily on its 100th birth year: https://frontofficesports.com/super-bowl-nba-olympics-drive-nbc-toward-billion-dollar-february/ https://variety.com/2025/tv/news/nbcuniversal-winter-olympics-nba-super-bowl-100-anniversary-tv-upfront-1236265828/ https://qz.com/nbc-2026-advertisers-upfronts-super-bowl-olympics-1851770740 Plans are way well underfoot to bundle and optimize the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics and Super Bowl LX, along with NBA All-Star Weekend in capitalizing with advertising sales packages for these marquee sports events through its leverage, warning of missing out. Not for the first time NBC did this with the first two regarding commercials. NBC will charge $7 million for Super Bowl LX ad space alone: https://awfulannouncing.com/nbc/bundle-super-bowl-olympics-ad-inventory.html https://awfulannouncing.com/nbc/super-bowl-lead-in-nba.html https://frontofficesports.com/can-nbc-capitalize-on-super-bowl-olympics-nba-trio-in-2026/ Nelson Monfort and Philippe Candeloro may not actually be done with France Televisions' figure skating coverage after all following Dancing With The Stars. There's a serious possibility the duo will be back together for Milan-Cortina next year as they talk with RMC's Les Grandes Gueules (The Big Mouths) hosts. Monfort was impressed that Candeloro followed him out the door even when he didn't ask Candeloro to: https://rmc.bfmtv.com/actualites/people-culture/nelson-monfort-apres-danse-avec-les-stars-objectif-jo-d-hiver-2026-avec-philippe-candeloro_AV-202502060571.html

Definitely not holding my breath for--or even expecting--both for the Cheeto Man In Chief Anyway, it's full steam ahead for NBCUniversal's Telemundo as far as its 2026 FIFA World Cup US-Spanish television plans: It'll broadcast all 104 matches from all three countries live starting from Mexico City at Azteca Stadium with Mexico to East Rutherford, New Jersey's Met Life Stadium for the WC final in the New York/New Jersey area across Telemundo, Telemundo Deportes Ahora, and NBC Universo and streamed on Peacock and the Telemundo app. Not only that, the already robust, authentic, and dedicated Road To The World Cup content leading up to the massive event already on there and being the designated and exclusive US Spanish TV home of Team USA soccer games... Just remembered Telemundo is going to launch its own 24/7 sports channel come August called Telemundo Deportes Ahora, devoted to offering 50+ live hours a week of Spanish language sports devoted to also, not unexpectedly, "spotlight on “fútbol” as the countdown to FIFA World Cup 26™ begins. Telemundo Deportes Ahora brings viewers closer than ever to the world of sports—anytime, anywhere.": https://www.nbcuniversal.com/article/telemundos-2025-26-upfront-slate-powered-5000-hours-live-tv-fifa-world-cup-26tm-premium-series-and

Surely that'll be the case. But it also definitely leaves behind legacies as far as society and the world at large for years are concerned. Yes, it is definitely expanding to 48 teams with US Soccer's support starting with 2031: https://www.espn.com/soccer/story/_/id/44515026/uk-set-host-2035-women-world-cup-rival-bids-drop-out Anyway, the FIFA Council announced in April the 48-team 2031 FIFA Women's World Cup allocation spots in the newly expanded field in response to the deepening level and growth of worldwide play dating from the 2010s and 2020s. Like with the men's version, there will be intercontinental playoff winner spots. But the major difference in terms of spots, unlike in the men's World Cup game, is that European national women's teams get the biggest increase as opposed to other continents with the possible exception of Africa. I get why here because Europe is where the women's soccer talent is the deepest, talented, most developed and competitive and organized, and professionalized overall continent-wide right now. Man, that's practically the entire UEFA EURO field and then some, unless that too gets expended, something that we could see expanded itself by then. As we can expect from an expanded field, we will without a doubt see and expect some WWC debutants. --CONCACAF (North America, Caribbean, and Central America): 5 slots (including automatic hosts the United States, possibly still could include a potential CONCACAF automatic co-host like Mexico or maybe Canada, up 1 from 2019-2031) --CAF (Africa): 7 slots (up 3 from 4 in 2019-2027) --AFC (Asia): 8 slots (up 2 from 6 in 2019-2027) --OFC (Oceania): 1 slot (expect New Zealand in this as always) --UEFA (Europe): 20 slots (up 9 from 11 in 2019-2031) --CONMEBOL (South America): 4 slots (up 1 from 2019-2031) --Interconfederation Playoff Teams: 3 slots (same since 2023) And those inter-continental playoff tournament, which I consider as part of the WWC like a NCAA Tournament March Madness play-in, will also see an increase in its spots too. Every confederation will still have at least 2 spots except the Oceania's OFC, which will still have only 1, but CONCACAF will attain an additional spot like it would in next year's 2026 World Cup as the host confederation up to 3 and Europe's UEFA will have another entry, reaching at 2. So including the intercontinental playoff teams allocations, the 2031 FIFA Women's World Cup field will have 57 teams total participating in North America... --CONCACAF: 8 spots (including hosts USA) --CAF: 9 spots --AFC: 10 spots --UEFA: 22 spots --OFC: 2 spots --CONMEBOL: 6 spots Sure it's very early on this. But based on what we endured so far at this, I can see the WWC debutants--to add to the 44 nations that already tasted WWC action in its history as of 2023--come 2031 being Finland, Belgium, Austria, Poland, Wales, Senegal, Taiwan, Indonesia, Zimbabwe, India, Uzbekistan, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Fiji, Iceland, Wales, Czech Republic, Croatia, Serbia, Greece, Hungary, Slovakia, Turkey, Mali, Slovenia, Botswana, Algeria, Tunisia, Trinidad & Tobago, Dominican Republic, DR Congo, Guatemala

And we got recent Milan-Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics broadcast media coverage news coming from Sweden that was hot off the heels of the successful Paris 2024 Summer Olympics for that nation with Armand "Mondo" Duplantis, Sarah Sjostrom, and the beach volleyball duo of Jonatan Hellvig and David Ahman all winning gold. Kanal 5/Eurosport Sverige/HBO Max and SVT were there with the latter just handling the nighttime highlights show corresponding to Warner Bros. Discovery Sweden's entities in the former. TV4 makes its return to Swedish Olympic TV broadcasting for the first time since Athens 2024 when it got involved with soccer and basketball, back when it shared the coverage with public broadcaster SVT as a junior partner. Now this free-to-air partnership returns when SVT, under a pan-European broadcasting licensing deal with Warner Bros. Discovery and the EBU in this Olympic cycle through 2032 after TV4 purchased some terrestrial rights from SVT. Discovery's Eurosport/HBO Max will continue to maintain pay-TV and streaming rights, allowing Swedish viewers to continue picking and choosing. From the looks of this, this will be more of a distribution and sharing of Olympic events between TV4, known for its immense soccer and ice hockey coverage, and SVT. Not unlike what we see out of Scandinavian nations during recent Summer and Winter Olympics with DR and TV2 in Denmark, TV Norge and NRK in Norway, and YLE's TV2 and Kanal 5 in Finland (Iceland's RUV always maintained the Icelandic Olympic rights except when Stod 2 Sports got involved even earlier). On the terrestrial side. Both will showcase major Winter Olympic sports and those that will have broad Swedish TV audience interest--and particular interest like when there's a Swedish Olympian competing. Rumor has it that SVT, which I suspect will handle both ceremonies, is interested in showing Nordic cross country skiing and biathlon and possibly hand ice hockey over to TV4. Details will be forthcoming: https://www.aftonbladet.se/sportbladet/a/o3K5WB/os-i-tv-svt-och-tv4-delar-pa-rattigheten-fran-2026-till-2032 https://omoss.svt.se/arkiv/nyhetsarkiv/2024-08-22-svt-sander-olympiska-spelen-tillsammans-med-tv4.html Actually, TV4, on its press release from September and updated in November, announced that TV4 and TV4 Play will air ice hockey (sharing with SVT), biathlon, freestyle skiing, women's curling, snowboarding, luge, bobsledding, and the debut of ski mountaineering. SVT, along with sharing ice hockey, will show alpine skiing, figure skating, short track, skeleton, men's and mixed curling, ski jumping, speed skating, mogul slope, cross country skiing, and Nordic combined skiing and also on SVT's streaming service. My guess is the men's hockey, with its Swedish NHL stars involved, will appear on TV4 as the non-Sweden women's matches head over to SVT. Could be a mix with all of Sweden's men's and women's games appearing on SVT and the rest on TV4. But we'll know the exact distribution between the two Swedish Olympic broadcasters when the Milan-Cortina 2026 ice hockey schedule gets released in the fall--and both will share both men's and women's ice hockey games: https://press.tv4.se/post/har-ar-sporterna-tv4-sander-fran-vinter-os-i-milano-cortina A sneak preview of what the Milan-Cortina 2026 CBC Sports presentation animated graphics, like the intros, will look like in this teaser promo from the 1-year mark. Colors are more purple, navy, royal blue, violet, yellow, and white as opposed to light blue and white in the last time the CBC was over in Italy two decades ago