Xs and Os: Sky Sports takes NFL to the next level with new bespoke studio By Michael Burns
Thursday, September 9, 2021 - 13:58
Print This Story
This year Sky Sports NFL studio presentation, from Sky Studios in Osterley, is enhanced with a bespoke design
Sky Sports NFL has just returned for a second run, with the NFL launching its biggest-ever regular season. This time around, Sky Sports has gone all-out for British fans with a new, expanded studio to provide even more visual excitement alongside in-depth analysis of this well-padded sport.
The satellite pay-TV channel is covering the expanded 102nd season (18 weeks) right up to Super Bowl LVI at the SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles on 13 February. All 32 teams are playing 17 games in their attempt to make the playoffs in the most popular sports league in the US.
Although Sky has been a partner of the NFL for 26 consecutive years, last summer saw the launch of the first ever dedicated NFL channel outside of the US as part of the renewal of the partnership; from September until February, Sky Sports Action becomes Sky Sports NFL and just carries NFL content.
We carry at least five hours of original programming every day, says Alex Mason, senior producer at Sky Sports. Sky is part of the ComCast family, so we take some magazine shows from NBC; we take ProFootballTalk every weekday, while from NFL Network, we take their Good Morning Football shows, six days a week. We also take NFL GameDay Morning magazine programming around the live game.
The NFL usually schedules games in five time slots during the week. While two games tend to take place on a Sunday afternoon, there are also generally evening games scheduled on a Sunday, Thursday and Monday, broadcast by different US networks across the games.
We take the American coverage of all the live games, but we have our own studio presentation around the Sunday games, from 5pm until we hand over to NBC's Sunday Night Football in America at 1.30am, says Mason. Obviously games that kick off at 6pm and at 9.25pm [in UK time] sit very well on a Sunday night, as that's primetime for us.
Neil Reynolds is the host of the live coverage, providing analysis alongside a guest analyst, while Hannah Wilkes and Josh Denzel present the Overtime show on Thursdays.
Xs and Os
This year the studio presentation, from Sky Studios in Osterley, is enhanced with a bespoke design. We have more floor space than before to do demos and have a more dynamic and active presentation, with what looks like an NFL pitch on the floor, as well as a brilliant video wall to engage with our remote contributors, says Mason. It's a relatively standard studio set up, but I think what's really important is the return of the jib camera. We can show off all the different floor space that we have and we can set the guys in different areas. The flexibility of the video wall, the ability to have remote contributors in there is something we're really going to try and experiment with this year.
We've still got the touchscreen area, so we can still break down the Xs and Os [playing formations], to explain the plays and stuff like that, but our focus is on the remote contributor being as important as the in-studio guests. This is a core offering for us, he continues. When I started in this role on [Sky Sports] NFL about five years ago I became acutely aware of the challenges from a resource point of view of getting [US star guests and pundits] of a high enough calibre to come to the UK to be part of the broadcast. In the NFL world, our budget isn't the same as the US broadcasters.
The flexibility of the video wall, the ability to have remote contributors in there is something we're really going to try and experiment with this year
The solution came via the pandemic, when Sky Sports turned to remote production to cope with the challenges of lockdown.
The technical guys in Sky Production Services [SPS] utilised vMix, and that's how we were able to make shows remotely, says Mason. I had the experience of producing live shows from my kitchen at home, and it all successfully went to air so that was kind of a new way of working. I asked the guys at Sky if we could incorporate that as a way of engaging remote guests.
Historically we used Skype or Zoom, but with that we have extra steps in the workflow and so we involve other departments, he adds. I felt we could do it in a more self-contained manner, incorporating vMix into our live broadcast.
Inside Sky Sports' new studio for NFL coverage
The video wall was first used last week on Thursday's NFL 32 Live season preview show.
We had a really nice moment last Thursday where we had Neil on camera left and then three contributors in the video wall behind him, he adds. It lent itself to a really nice flowing conversation.
The NFL 32 Live show saw Reynolds on his own in the studio, linking in and out of about 65 prerecorded VTs and having 10 to 12 contributors join remotely. Neil was able to host the four-hour live show, speaking on over 100 topics, and he did it seamlessly and flawlessly, says Mason. So [viewers got] an in-depth, three to four minute conversation about all 32 teams, and then storylines within the teams.
The US contributors working with Reynolds, who is arguably a co-producer with me , adds Mason, are all big names in the NFL world. Nora Princiotti, our new contributor, is former beat writer for the Patriots, says Mason. Peter King contributes to our show on a Sunday and we take pieces of his Football Morning in America column every Monday to publicise it. Our old friend and stalwart of the show Jeff Reinebold comes over after Thanksgiving onwards.
We've also got Will Blackman coming over. He's a former Super Bowl winner with the New York Giants, now an up and coming broadcaster after a
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
Xs and Os: Sky Sports takes NFL to the next level with new bespoke studio By Michael Burns 
