Sky Scottish was a short-lived

satellite television Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location.ITU Radio Regulations, Section IV. Radio Stations and Systems ...

channel operating on the analogue service broadcasts between 6.00pm and 8.00pm.

History

The service was a joint venture between

British Sky Broadcasting Sky UK Limited (formerly British Sky Broadcasting Limited (BSkyB)), trading as Sky, is a British broadcaster and telecommunications company that provides television, broadband internet, fixed line and mobile telephone services to consumers a ...

and ITV franchise

Scottish Television Scottish Television (now legally known as STV Central Limited) is the ITV (TV network), ITV network franchisee for Central Belt, Central Scotland. The channel — the largest of the three ITV franchises in Scotland — has been in operation si ...

owners SMG plc, was aimed at Scots living outside Scotland who would not otherwise be able to receive Scottish-related programming, such as that also transmitted by Grampian or the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

. The station's main programmes included an extra edition of Scottish Television's regional news programme '' Scotland Today'' and episodes of ''

Take the High Road ''Take the High Road'' (renamed ''High Road'' from 1994 to 2003) was a Scottish soap opera produced by Scottish Television, which started in February 1980 as an ITV (TV network), ITV daytime programme, and was broadcast until 2003. It was set in ...

'' from 1994.

Celtic F.C. The Celtic Football Club, commonly known as Celtic (), is a professional Association football, football club in Glasgow, Scotland. The team competes in the Scottish Premiership, the top division of Scottish football league system, Scottish ...

's 1997 pre-season friendlies were shown on the channel. '' Scotsport'' was also shown on the channel as well as spin-off show ''Extra Time'', and there was also ''The Football Show'' presented by Jim Delahunt and Peter McGuire. Despite BSkyB and SMG entering into a seven-year contract to run the service, it was closed down after 18 months. Its closure was explained as the channel having failed to meet its financial targets. Reports suggested that only ''The Ibrox Club Hour'' and ''The Celtic Park Hour'', programmes relating to Rangers and

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language *Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Foot ...

football clubs, had attracted more than 10,000 viewers. Speaking about its demise, the managing director of SMG at the time was Donald Emslie, described the service as having "been a valuable learning experience" for his company. SMG's finance director, Gary Hughes, stated that the service had shown "it is very difficult to access a Scottish audience outside Scotland", but also that Scottish audiences wanted more home-grown programmes.

References

External links

Official website (archived)

stv.tv
History of television in the United Kingdom Defunct television channels in the United Kingdom Defunct television channels in Scotland Sky television channels Television channels and stations established in 1996 Television channels and stations disestablished in 1998 1990s in the United Kingdom 1990s in Scotland 1990s in British television 1990s in Scottish television STV Group {{Scotland-tv-stub