Италия футболы: Channel 4 және британдық теледидар тарихы

Television production company Chrysalis had worked with Paul Gascoigne on a documentary about his return from injury called Gascoigne – The Fightback. Afterwards, Gascoigne said to producer Neil Duncanson that it was a shame that British viewers would be unable to see his Serie A games. Channel 4 outbid Sky to take the UK rights for Serie A. Gascoigne did not play due to injury, but the broadcast had three million viewers. Veteran broadcaster Kenneth Wolstenholme linked off screen, and Peter Brackley and Paul Elliott commentated. Paul Gascoigne was the intended presenter of Gazzetta, a highlights programme. Luther Blissett, Ray Wilkins and Joe Jordan. Notable broadcasts included a 1995 Genoa v Milan match abandoned at half time. A Genoa fan had been murdered before the game, and the spread of the news sparked crowd trouble. Football Italia: Mezzanotte (Midnight) was a late night program with coverage of the Italian Sunday night game. Broadcast weekly from 1993–94 on Tuesday nights, Mezzanotte was shown on Thursday night in 2002 and on Sundays after moving to Bravo in 2006. Channel 4 also covered some Italian international matches live, including Italy's 1998 World Cup qualifying playoffs against Russia, which finished 2–1 on aggregate. A light hearted trailer for the matches, with the voiceover "Will the Russians rub their faces in it?" while showing an Italian fan's face being rubbed in a plate of pasta, led to questions in the Italian parliament and caused 12 complaints (not upheld) to the ITC. Richardson said: "Everywhere Channel Four was being labelled as anti Italian. In the end we re enacted a spoof version where Pierluigi Casiraghi shoved my face in a plate of spaghetti." Just twelve months earlier, Channel 4 had accommodated schedule changes, when a rainstorm held up Juventus's unsuccessful 1999–2000 title bid. Channel 4 showed their final live Serie A match on 17 June 2001, between Roma and Parma. Live coverage was abandoned altogether in 2001–02, which was Serie A's final season on Channel 4.

After Channel 4 dropped Italian football, Serie A returned to British screens halfway through the 2002–03 season when Eurosport bought the rights. Granada had considered bidding for the rights in April 2002, but didn't do so. Eurosport's weekly live match was the "showpiece" Sunday evening 7pm kick off, After poor viewing figures, Bravo discontinued their coverage on 23 December 2006. The 2006 Serie A scandal had tarnished the league's reputation, and had forcibly relegated top club Juventus. Pundits on the programme at this time included Lee Sharpe and Ron Atkinson.

Five gained the rights to broadcast Serie A highlights and live games in the 2007–08 season. The show thus returned to terrestrial television and live games were shown weekly at 1:30pm UK time on Sundays, as the original series on Channel 4. Under the new name of Football Italiano, the show was presented by Mark Chapman and Italian sportscaster and model Laura Esposto. The first game shown was a 1–1 draw between Inter Milan and Udinese on Sunday 26 August 2007, with Tony Jones and John Barnes as the commentators. The opening theme song in this version of the show was "Phantom pt. II" by Justice. The show's end was announced on 27 June 2008, on the Football Italiano website. The message, posted by James Sugure, read: "Unfortunately, it is now unlikely that Five will be continuing their Football Italiano television coverage of Serie A for the 2008–09 season. As a result, this website will now be suspended until further notice. On behalf of all the team here at Football Italiano, I would like to thank you for your support over the last year."

Italian football was absent from British TV for the 2008–09 season, other than live coverage of the Milan derby on BBC Three. From 2009–10 season up to 2012–13 season, coverage of Serie A was shown on ESPN, and since 2013–14 season, it has been shown on BT Sport. They show numerous live games per week during the Serie A season, including those of the Coppa Italia. ESPN do not, however, use the Football Italia title for their programmes. For part of the 2018/19 Serie A season onwards, the league is no longer shown on TV in Britain. Instead, a streaming service called Eleven Sports shows them, later having one of their matches simulcast on the STV Player in Scotland. Eleven Sports' first Serie A game involved Juventus playing away. It was made available live and free on Eleven's Facebook page. However, four months later, Eleven Sports ran into problems, and the rights passed to Premier Sports for the remainder of that season. The rights returned to BT Sport for the 2021/22 season. Since Football Italia launched, a number of other European domestic leagues have been broadcast on British television. Ultimately, the series' popularity fell, as Italian football slipped behind first Spanish and then English in the UEFA Coefficients and the perceived level of quality. However, James Richardson later added: "I heard Steve [DuBerry] who'd produced the music for the show say he'd wanted it to sound like 'go Lazio' because of Paul Gascoigne presenting it and so had added a twist to the soundbite."

The Channel 4 version's producer, John D. Taylor, launched an accompanying website, initially under the Channel 4 web domain, also called Football Italia. After Channel 4 lost the rights to Serie A coverage in 2002, Taylor took full ownership, launching JDT Sports Productions and the website Football Italia. net, which also included the magazine of the same name. The website was later sold to Tiro Media in 2014