What’s the story?
Recently it was rumoured that TNA Executive Producer Jeff Jarrett was looking to secure a meeting with the brains behind the revamped World of Sport in the United Kingdom with a view of working together, and it turns out the smoke could well be coming from some legitimate fire.
Jarrett is currently in the UK alongside Impact Wrestling President Ed Nordholm, with the duo looking to secure a new broadcasting deal for the company in the country. ITV seems to be their primary target for the same.
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Wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer has confirmed that a meeting between the two is on the calendar.
Impact was previously broadcast in the UK on Challenge TV, but the latter decided against renewing that deal at the end of 2016.
ITV is one of the largest broadcasters in the UK and the financial benefactors behind the revamped World of Sport. They have been rumoured to be looking to add a wrestling program to their full-time programming in the near future. Could TNA soon end up on ITV?
In case you didn’t know
ITV was the historical home of World of Sport, the iconic British wrestling show that used to draw audiences of over 20 million some three decades ago.
The show was revived on New Year’s Eve for a one-time special with a view to morph into a weekly show, and whilst the news has been slow in that regard in the six weeks since, ITV was reported to be happy with the ratings for the New Year’s Eve show.
Also read: TNA News: TNA blames losing UK TV deal on "spoilers"
Jeff Jarrett is one of the co-founders of TNA but was forced out of the company by the Carter Family at the end of 2013.
When the Carters relinquished control of the company at the end of 2016, Jarrett soon found himself back in favour with the company. On January 5th, 2017, it was announced that Double J had returned to TNA.
The heart of the matter
The UK has long been an important market for TNA and securing a television deal in the country must be high on their list of priorities right now. ITV is also third only behind Sky and BBC in the nation in terms of viewership, and their desire for having pro wrestling programming must make it the ideal place for TNA to land.
What’s next?
Until anything has been announced, this will all be pure speculation, but if Jarrett is unable to secure a deal with ITV, then the company’s options in the UK will be somewhat limited.
If a deal is made then one can expect WWE to continue to up its operations in the UK as they would be looking to offset the competition.
Sportskeeda’s take
Whilst we would prefer to see ITV run with a revamped World of Sport program, if it were to agree to a deal with TNA, it could lead to Jarrett & Co becoming a must-see wrestling television program for the first time in years. For the wrestling fans, this really is win-win.
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