Channel 5 has awarded the multimillion-pound contract to produce its weekly primetime Football League highlights show to Sunset+Vine, the independent producer that also holds the BT Sport contract.
The three-year deal will see Sunset+Vine produce 46 highlight shows a season that will air for 90 minutes on Saturday nights from August.
It is the first time that a Football League highlights programme will be shown in prime time.
“We’re excited by their proposed approach to bringing football back to the channel,” said the Channel 5 chief operating officer, Paul Dunthorne.
The deal will also see Sunset+Vine, which produces Channel 5’s Test cricket highlights show, make three 60-minute shows covering the play-offs from the three Football League divisions.
The deal also includes eight one-hour highlights shows covering action from the Capital One Cup.
Channel 5 has also hired Mark Sharman, the former Channel 4 and ITV director of sport and ex-deputy managing director of Sky Sports, as a consultant to oversee production of the new highlights show.
Sunset+Vine, which is owned by Question Time producer Tinopolis, already holds the £100m-plus contract to produce coverage of BT’s Premier League football and Premiership rugby matches.
Earlier this month, the Football League announced that Channel 5 would be taking over from the BBC, which had aired the highlights after Match of the Day.
ITN Productions won the multimillion-pound contract to film and produce 1,813 games from the Championship, League One and League Two.
