TV3 secures championship rights

November 30, 2007
RTE will no longer have exclusive TV rights to the GAA championships following an agreement between the GAA and TV3 for the independent station to screen at least 10 live and exclusive games over the next three years. In what is another major blow to the national broadcaster's sports programming portfolio, TV3's commercial director Pat Kiely has confirmed that of the 10 matches, two will be provincial finals and five will be provincial semi-finals - in either code. The remaining three will be All-Ireland football qualifiers. TV3 will screen two provincial finals in 2008. RTE hit back by claiming it has "secured four of the eight packages allocated by the GAA so far." However, Montrose chiefs admitted: "We are disappointed with the GAA's decision on the allocation of live TV rights package III - only 30 out of the 150 games have been allocated (so far). None of the games from the top two packages have been decided upon (yet). Until negotiations are completed on all packages, we will not be making any further comment."

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