UK public-service broadcaster the BBC confirmed reduced coverage plans for the 2012 Australian Open tennis tournament, which starts on Monday.
The BBC will broadcast the men’s and women’s finals live on second channel BBC2, as well as one men’s semi-final live via its Red Button interactive television service. In previous years the BBC has shown more live Red Button coverage of the tournament, and all matches featuring top British player Andy Murray have been live on BBC2.
Piers Newbery, a senior broadcast journalist at BBC Sport, said on Twitter that coverage had been scaled back due to budget cuts. The BBC is reducing its annual budget by 20 per cent by 2017, due to a government-imposed licence fee freeze.
The Australian Open is one of the four Grand Slams – the most prestigious tennis tournaments – along with the French Open, the US Open and Wimbledon. The BBC signed a new three-year deal to retain Wimbledon rights from 2015 to 2017 in October. It lost the rights for the French Open tournament from 2012 to 2014 to commercial broadcaster ITV in November. Pay-television broadcaster Eurosport has the UK rights for the US Open until the end of this year.