Say goodbye to Setanta and hello to Eir Sport.
The telecommunications company formerly known as Eircom have gone all out with the corporate rebrand over the past year or so. Whatever about the logo and the name, that song of theirs caught the imagination early on, then it buried its way into the collective head of the nation to the point where you couldn't go a day without 'Hummana naw na naw' taking over your every waking minute.
Thankfully, that passed. And now we're down to brass tacks. Catchy songs are all well and good but what are you actually offering? For the sports fans in Ireland, it seems the answer to that is quite a lot it.
Setanta is no more. It's now the Eir Sport pack which includes Eir Sport 1 and 2 as well as BT Sport 1, BT Sport 2, BT Sport Europe and BT Sport ESPN. The big news of the day is that all that is available free to new and existing Eir Broadband customers via their TV or device of their choice.
The announcement was made in Dublin earlier today with one of the main points of interests being the deal to broadcast the 2019 Rugby World Cup. Setanta founder Mickey O’Rourke, who continues in his role as CEO of Eir Sport spoke of that aspect of the deal today.
We are delighted to have secured all the Republic of Ireland rights to the 2019 Rugby World Cup in Japan. We broadcast all 48 games live in 2007 and 2011 and it’s great to know we will be doing the same again in 2019.
We are very thankful to World Rugby for entrusting us with these rights along with the U20′s Championship, the Women’s World Cup and Sevens rights.
With that deal secured as well as the Premier League rights and everything that comes with the BT Sport pack, that all adds up to a bit of a game changer for Irish sports fans.
They even managed to get Riyad Mahrez to run through a building for them.
Setanta Sports is now eir Sport. Get all your sporting action FREE with an eir Broadband Bundle! #settingsportfreehttps://t.co/W0A5inIXnF
— eir Sport (@eirSport) July 5, 2016
Image via: INPHO/Dan Sheridan