Colm Parkinson’s hugely popular GAA Podcast The Smaller Fish is unlikely to air on your TV screens this year despite its popular pilot.
Back in November last year, Virgin Media teamed up with the former Laois footballer to produce a TV programme version of his podcast.
Despite it clashing with RTE’s Late Late Toy Show, the programme was warmly received on social media afterwards.
Before hand, Parkinson had said that discussions were ongoing to see if a 16-show run during the inter-county GAA championship could take place.
However, in correspondence to his subscribers yesterday, Parkinson said that “unfortunately, it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen now”.
He said: “A lot of you have been messaging me about the show on Virgin which was supposed to start 2 weeks ago!
“Unfortunately it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen now.
“I heard nothing from Virgin for about 10 weeks, despite chasing them up, and had to email the boss in there to get a response.
“My contact then emailed to tell me they tried for sponsors but there was no interest.
“It seems strange because I sent them a contact for an interested sponsor (Benetti Menswear) in on February 1st but they never contacted them.
“It’s disappointing another year will go by without a GAA show on TV.
“At least from the pilot we have shown we are able to produce and present a TV show – Maybe Declan McBennett (RTE’s head of sport) will be interested 🤣”
Parkinson received replies from his listeners – suggesting he should take his show to YouTube.
He said: “Just updating this because a lot of you suggested Youtube. I’ll have a look into that next year. It would involve a lot more work and I’m already fairly busy with all the shows.
“What a TV company offers me is a high level of production, production staff & a studio – all that would need to be sourced on my own. Also selling the show if Benetti didn’t come on board would take up my time.
“At least I’d be in control of it and not depending on anyone else I suppose. Too late for this year but maybe next.
“Thanks for the suggestions.”
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