Yesterday it was a chilly summer day so I spent a lazy Sunday feeling and acting as perfect couch potato. I realized that Federer and Roddick were playing Wimbledon’s final and the game seemed to be tight, so I decided to watch the last set. I turned on the TV and wait a minute… there is no coverage of Wimbledon in Finnish television this year. I checked all the free channels and nothing, then I took the TV guide and look at the pay TV listings. Zero! The Wimbledon final was not broadcasted in Finland. There was instead a couple of documentaries on public channels, a singing contest, an American Idol special about Michael Jackson, a film starring Kirsten Dunst, and a harness racing competition, which happens to be a very popular sport in Finland.
That is a bit odd because it is a major sport events and last year’s semifinals and finals (men and women) were freely broadcasted by MTV3, one of the commercial channels, while the previous rounds could be seen in one of the pay channels. But this year, the only Wimbledon to be seen was on Saturday night, when MTV3 showed the 2004 British film Wimbledon, starring, again Kirsten Dunst. Was that a joke?
Federer’s victory was tough and lengthy yesterday and the last set’s score was 14-16 lasting more than 90 minutes. I cannot help wondering if Finnish television would have dared to broadcast the whole match. A couple of weeks ago, public broadcaster YLE show FIFA Confederations Cup. Every minute of every match was supposed to be aired live from South Africa. But everything was too much and YLE chopped the match for third place between South Africa and Spain. The game went to extra time, but someone at YLE decided that the match was not important enough and stop the live coverage right before the extra time and continue with the regular programming. After 90 minutes of the dullest football ever seen, it was not possible to see in Finland how the match ended. I still wonder why.
