Eir Sport 2 (stylised as eir Sport 2, formerly Setanta Sports 1) was an Irish

pay television Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to Subscription business model, subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichan ...

channel owned by Setanta Sports Channel Ireland.BCI approves ownership changes at Setanta and signs 2 new Content Contracts
Broadcasting Commission of Ireland, 28 July 2009 The channel carried coverage of

association football Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

(including top-flight European leagues and

UEFA Europa League The UEFA Europa League (UEL), usually known simply as the Europa League, is an annual association football, football club competition organised since 1971 by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European footb ...

), boxing, golf, motorsport, and coverage of the SSE Airtricity League. On 16 December 2013 Setanta Sports launched a high-definition of Setanta Sports 1. Setanta Sports 1 HD was first exclusively available through

Virgin Media Ireland Virgin Media Ireland is Liberty Global's telecommunications operation in Ireland. It is the largest digital cable television provider within the country. the company offers broadband internet, digital television digital (VoIP) telephony and ...

, but later launched on Sky on 20 July 2015, along with Premier Sports HD. On 15 August 2019, Eir Sport and

Virgin Media Sport Virgin Media Sport (formerly TV3 Sport) is a sports production unit at Virgin Media Television in Ireland which produces specialist sports content for its television channels Virgin Media One, Virgin Media Two, and Virgin Media Three. The depa ...

contracted a deal to show

Eir Vision Eircom Limited, trading as Eir ( ; stylised eir), is a large fixed, mobile and broadband telecommunications company in Ireland. The company, which is currently incorporated in Jersey, traces its origins to Ireland's former state-owned monopol ...

and Eir Sport 1 on

. As per eir's announcement on 19 May 2021, Eir Sport 2 closed on 20 July 2021. Eir also announced that

Eir Sport 1 Eir Sport 1 (formerly Setanta Ireland) was an Irish pay television sports channel featuring local and international sporting events. The channel is available on some basic cable packages in Ireland, while it is available upon direct subscription t ...

will also close before the end of 2021.

Broadcast rights

Most of these aired on both

Setanta Ireland Eir Sport 1 (formerly Setanta Ireland) was an Irish pay television sports channel featuring local and international sporting events. The channel is available on some basic cable packages in Ireland, while it is available upon direct subscription t ...

and Setanta Sports 1 and were shared between the two channels. In some instances (largely

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

coverage) Setanta only possessed

Republic of Ireland Ireland ( ), also known as the Republic of Ireland (), is a country in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe consisting of 26 of the 32 Counties of Ireland, counties of the island of Ireland, with a population of about 5.4 million. ...

rights, during such programming the channel is unavailable in

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ; ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, part of the United Kingdom in the north-east of the island of Ireland. It has been #Descriptions, variously described as a country, province or region. Northern Ireland shares Repub ...

. Conversely, live coverage of GAA Championship matches was available only in Northern Ireland and not the Republic.

Club football

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by List of top-division football clubs in UEFA countries, top-divisio ...

FA Cup The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual Single-elimination tournament, knockout association football, football competition in domestic Football in England, English football. First played during ...

(

only) *

League of Ireland The League of Ireland is a national association football Sports league, league consisting of professional clubs in the Republic of Ireland and Derry, Derry City in Northern Ireland. It is governed by the Football Association of Ireland. It was ...

Setanta Sports Cup The Setanta Sports Cup was a club football (soccer), football competition featuring teams from both football associations on the island of Ireland. Inaugurated in 2005, it was a cross-border competition between clubs in the League of Ireland from ...

International football

Copa América The CONMEBOL Copa América (; known until 1975 as the South American Football Championship), often simply called the Copa America, is the top men's quadrennial association football, football tournament contested among list of men's national ass ...

*Friendly matches, typically on a once-off basis

Gaelic Athletic Association

* GAA Football National League * GAA Hurling National League *

All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship The GAA Hurling All-Ireland Senior Championship, known simply as the All-Ireland Championship, is an annual Inter county, inter-county hurling competition organised by the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA). It is the highest-tier competition for ...

(Live coverage in Northern Ireland, Deferred (not same day) in the Republic of Ireland) *

All-Ireland Senior Football Championship The All-Ireland Senior Football Championship (SFC) () is the premier inter-county competition in Gaelic football. County (Gaelic games), County teams compete against each other and the winner is declared All-Ireland Champions. Organised by the ...

(Live coverage in Northern Ireland, Deferred (not same day) in the Republic of Ireland)

Rugby Union

* IRB

Rugby World Cup The Men's Rugby World Cup is a rugby union tournament contested every four years between the top international teams, the winners of which are recognised as the World championship, world champions of the sport. The tournament is administer ...

Pro14 The United Rugby Championship (URC) is an annual rugby union competition involving professional teams from Ireland, Italy, Scotland, South Africa, and Wales. For sponsorship reasons the league is known as the Vodacom United Rugby Championship in ...

(Deferred/highlights only from September 2010 onwards) * Exclusive rights to the highlights of the

RBS 6 Nations The Six Nations Championship (known as the Six Nations, branded as Guinness M6N) is an annual international rugby union competition by the teams of England, France, Ireland, Italy, Scotland and Wales. It is the oldest sports tournament contes ...

* Certain international rugby union Test games on a one-off basis *

IRB Sevens The SVNS, known as the HSBC SVNS for sponsorship reasons, is an annual series of international rugby sevens tournaments run by World Rugby featuring national sevens teams. Organised for the first time in the 1999–2000 season as the IRB World ...

Rugby League

Rugby League World Cup The Rugby League World Cup is an international rugby league competition contested by senior men's national teams who each represent member nations of the International Rugby League who run and administer the tournament. The tournament has be ...

National Rugby League The National Rugby League (also known as the NRL Telstra Premiership for sponsorship reasons) is a professional rugby league competition in Oceania which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria (state), Victoria, the Austral ...

Other programming

Setanta's major in-house programme was ''The Sports Show'' (formerly ''The Hub'') which aired daily. It also simulcasted the radio show Off The Ball from

Newstalk Newstalk (formerly NewsTalk 106) is a national independent radio station in Ireland. It is operated by News 106 Limited, a subsidiary of Bauer Media Audio Ireland, and broadcasts under a sound broadcasting contract with the Broadcasting Aut ...

Setanta Sports Cup

Setanta was the sponsor of the

, an annual soccer tournament which featured teams from the

and

Irish Football League Irish commonly refers to: * Someone or something of, from, or related to: ** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe ***Éire, Irish language name for the island and the sovereign state *** Erse (disambiguati ...

Availability

As of July 2016 in the

, the Eir Sport Package was available for free to any Eir broadband customer. This included the

BT Sport TNT Sports (formerly BT Sport) is a group of pay television sports channels in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Now owned by Warner Bros. Discovery Sports Europe, Warner Bros. Discovery and BT Group, they first launched as B ...

package. Additionally the Eir Sport Package was available on Eir TV,

Sky Ireland Sky Ireland Limited is a subsidiary of Comcast-owned Sky UK and supplies television, internet and telephony services in Ireland. Its corporate headquarters are in Dublin which were opened by Taoiseach Enda Kenny on 18 January 2013. Sky Irelan ...

and

Vodafone TV Vodafone Group Public Limited Company () is a British Multinational company, multinational telecommunications company. Its registered office and global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It predominantly operates Service (economic ...

. Eir Sport offered commercial venues in Ireland programming of sports such as

(soccer),

Gaelic football Gaelic football (; short name '')'', commonly known as simply Gaelic, GAA, or football, is an Irish team sport. A form of football, it is played between two teams of 15 players on a rectangular grass pitch. The objective of the sport is to score ...

hurling Hurling (, ') is an outdoor Team sport, team game of ancient Gaelic culture, Gaelic Irish origin, played by men and women. One of Ireland's native Gaelic games, it shares a number of features with Gaelic football, such as the field and goa ...

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various Golf club, clubs to hit a Golf ball, ball into a series of holes on a golf course, course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standa ...

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

rugby union Rugby union football, commonly known simply as rugby union in English-speaking countries and rugby 15/XV in non-English-speaking world, Anglophone Europe, or often just rugby, is a Contact sport#Terminology, close-contact team sport that orig ...

and

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as rugby league in English-speaking countries and rugby 13/XIII in non-Anglophone Europe, is a contact sport, full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular Rugby league playin ...

and

boxing Boxing is a combat sport and martial art. Taking place in a boxing ring, it involves two people – usually wearing protective equipment, such as boxing glove, protective gloves, hand wraps, and mouthguards – throwing Punch (combat), punch ...

. On 12 September 2019, Eir Sport 2 was removed from Sky in Ireland and was replaced by

. On 13 August 2020, Virgin Media Sport's feeds on

Eir In Norse mythology, Eir (Old Norse: , "protection, help, mercy"Orchard (1997:36).) is a goddess or valkyrie associated with medical skill. Eir is attested in the ''Poetic Edda'', compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources; the ...

and

that were provided by Eir were replaced by Eir Sport 2 on those platforms, as Eir refused to pay the contracted distribution license fee.

References

External links

* {{Use dmy dates, date=August 2016 Sports television channels in Ireland Gaelic games on television Television channels and stations established in 2004 Television channels and stations disestablished in 2021 2004 establishments in Ireland 2021 disestablishments in Ireland Television stations in Ireland Association football on Irish television